Got my coffee ready and I’m digging in to the new course by Tourism Tim for the third day straight. It’s been a marathon to go through all the material he’s presented! Normally the course is presented in bite-sized pieces over several weeks, but I got access to the entire buffet!

These are busy days for me, and it’s hard to drop everything and spend three days focused on something that I hadn’t planned for… but sometimes I discover a new internet marketing strategy that makes me change the way I build my websites, from the ground up, so the changes are incorporated in the very design and engineering of the website.

This is one of those times.

And I want to blog about exactly what my experiences are, while they are happening, with the knowing that my story will only resonate with the small segment of the world who are also trying to improve the sales success of their current website.

Great Sequence Of Teaching

Tim knows his stuff and has the track record of success in helping tourism and travel professionals make their site into a marketing piece that are time-tested and proven to generates sales and bookings.

The sequence of material in the course is brilliant!

For me, the course started out with an aspect of web design that I wasn’t expecting. It felt something like a baseball-bat-whollop out of no where – and it clarified something I had seen before, but didn’t even recognize.

And then, Tim followed up with a clearly organized, masterfully edited, 56 page ebook that, for me, was like a super slow motion replay of the baseball-bat-whollop… from several angles.  (I’ll tell you more about the specifics of exactly what I mean by that, I’m going to create a Case Study of a before-and-after, doing a website make-over with some of the current websites I manage… then Tim will personally review my work… on video!)

After hitting you with everything up front, then Tim presents a series of detailed case study videos that reveal how these strategies help his clients improve aspects of their website design that, as a result, get more bookings.  I love the client testimonial videos that are included at the start of each section of the course.

Sometimes, it’s hard for me to watch his entire video, I’m so excited that I want to dash off and implement these improvements on a dozen websites all at the same time!!

Today’s Module is Search Engine Optimization

I’m completely stoked about this section of the course and I want to cut this blog post short and get to it, but I set a timer and I must keep writing until it beeps… (thank you Ed Dale).

I think Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a fantastic carreer for anyone who would do well in perpetual university.  SEO used to be focused on the keywords and keyword density of your web page, and then it started to include links in the importance, then the quality of link and anchor text became critical elements and now we have real time search and a focus on the most recent material and the additional weighting that social actions now have on the staying-power of newly gained top rankings…

SEO is now a sophisticated orchestra that includes the social engagement of your customers.

Self Promotion Pitch

Not Blogging?  Not Social-Ready? Not Mobile-Ready?

Not reorganizing your content and marketing message to match Tourism Tim’s Strategies?

Then it’s time for your business to consider an annual marketing plan with specific, step-by-step strategies that change throughout each month of the year – specifically created FOR the small to medium seasonal tourism business.

One of the most fantastic things about Tourism Tim’s Course and the solutions that I provide for my clients is that both strategies and both plans fit together perfectly – and I can’t wait to share more about that as well!

Ok, my timer went off.  Now I’m going to watch the next series of videos in the amazing new Tourism Marketing Success Course by Tourism Tim Warren!

This morning over coffee, I read the Hubspot Report The Essential Guide To Internet Marketing.

I highly recommend that your read this report with a pad of paper near by so you can write down the ideas and questions that are sure to flow!

Read it here: The Essential Guide To Internet Marketing

This is a fantastic resource that should serve as a baseline for everyone who owns a tourism business. After reading through with gusto – this one passage stood out to me: I read it several times…

What Should I Write About?

What If I’m Not A Writer?

How Do I Market My Blog?

Private Reviews Of SpyFu Recon Files Reports

Hello and thanks for tuning in to my first video podcast about using SpyFu Recon Files to produce Search Engine Optimization Reports and plan strategies with my clients.

I am Doug Lampi from Quetico Internet Marketing, a web design company and SEO Firm in Canada. I started using the Internet, then called bulletin boards, back on the Commodore Pet in 1982, and now I’m on Youtube, Facebook, Twitter and others!

The Youtube Cosmic Panda update just happened so have no idea how to set this up – so bear with me as I change my YouTube channel around.

Video Series On Using SpyFu Recon Files

I have started a video series to share my experiences working with a new tool that I just signed up – Spyfu Recon Files for search engine optimization.

SpyFu Recon looks very powerful and has knocked my socks off!

I want to make Private SEO Video Reports for my clients, so I upgraded to the business version of Screenr.com. Now I can create private videos to personally review the SEO Reports with each of my clients.

I will share the data with everyone in my client group so everybody benefits from all of the data to collect.

A Deeper Look Into Keywords and Competitors

I’m taking a deeper look with Spy Fu Classic to find out details of the organic keywords positions that everybody holds, organized into spreadsheets. I’m collecting all on organic keywords for each of my clients and creating videos for them to review successes and opportunities.

In addition, I’m going to create blog report videos for other people who are running business website.

Maybe you are in the same position as me – you’re working on building your community and followers on Social Media.

We will get more successful together!

Thanks again for watching I will continue these videos as I’m learning more about SpyFu Classic and SpyFu Recon Files.

Do SpyFu Recon Files Reports Help?

Search Engine Optimization Reports created with SpyFu Recon – Private video reports for each client so you can understand what the reports – and comparative data so you can see how your numbers compare to others in your industry. Highlight the financial value of organic traffic and keywords with SpyFu Recon Files.

All Canada Show - An Online Marketing Leader

Web Design For Fishing Lodges

Fishing Lodge Web Design

We are a Canadian Company focused on providing Internet Marketing for Tourism and Travel Businesses in Canada, specifically – web design for Fishing Lodges. We cater to the annual cycle of small, seasonal lodges who service between 500 and 1000 guest per year.

Web Design and Business Development

We regard each piece of online real estate we build for you, as an asset established for your business. But, like a car without a driver, web properties are not much use without web marketing strategies.

Successful Website or Successful Business?

In my town, tourism businesses were the first to establish websites. In the early days of Web Design for Fishing Lodges, a tourism business site was considered successful if they ranked well in the search engines. These days, the tourism business themselves are successful if they are well represented in the Social Media arena.

Social Media Traffic vs Search Traffic

It’s important to understand the significant difference between traffic from the search engines and traffic from Social Media sources. Once you do, it will transform the focus of your marketing.

Search traffic comes to your website with interest, perhaps, but generally without any prior relationship to your business. Of course I’m not talking about people who search for your business name – those people know you, or have been exposed to you by word of mouth, print etc. By search traffic, I draw attention to the audience of new people who find you through the search engines – and I want to compare them to the audience of new people who may find you through Social Media Channels.

People who find you through organic search, or worse, through paid Google Ads, are starting a relationship with you from a cold start.

On the other hand, if people find you through Social Media, it is because one of their friends or family mentioned you online. When traffic lands on your site from a social media source, odds are much better that this person was referred to you through online word-of-mouth.

Referral From A Trusted Source

Word-of-Mouth marketing has always been recognized as The King for building sales. For this reason, all of our web design projects for Tourism Businesses like Fishing Lodges, Resorts, Camps and Outfitters – now include a strong component of Social Media Marketing.

Web Design for Fishing Lodges

Websites are getting easier to run – and we shorten your learning curve.

If you are a Camp Owner or Manager with a traditional static website that your webmaster must update, it’s time to invest in an upgrade.

If you are a Camp Owner with plans to sell your business in the next few years to a decade, it’s time to invest in establishing online real estate that will increase the resale value of your business.

Web Design for Fishing Lodges and Hunting Camps

A new blog is like a sailboat in the open waters – if you want to get anywhere, you have to unfurl the sails.

As a sail catches the wind, your web strategies aim to catch visitors, or traffic.

And, just as the angle, or presentation of the sail to the wind gives speed to the boat, it is the presentation of your Brand that will direct your visitors to take action – and give momentum to your internet marketing results.

It’s all about Traffic and Conversions – but how do you get there?

If you set sail from Newfoundland, you already know that you must pass Nova Scotia and New York, and a lot of other places, before you can get to Jacksonville, Florida.

But the path from here to there in the ‘Internet Marketing World’ may be unclear – and the path may appear very different, depending on which expert you speak with.

However, all the marketing strategies you may hear, seem to have three common themes;

The First Common Theme – Search Engines

Search Engine Optimization is built-in with WordPress; and completed as you post to your blog.

If you set up with the correct WordPress Plugins, you can forget about SEO – just write for your readers, not the search engines. Your WordPress setup takes care of the technical SEO details.

In other words, SEO is pretty much automatic. Pick just one or two phrases from your list of ideal keyword phrases and then write your content for your readers.

Simply tag your posts – and you’ve completed your work for the search engines.

The Second Common Theme – Social Media

A boomerang only comes back if you throw it.

The Social Bookmarking and Social Networking Sites CAN have a tremendous impact on your business.

Get familiar with Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Digg – they each take a little practice – start with a small list of friends – be selective. Make mistakes on a small scale.

Remember: There is no need to provide any more information about yourself than what is already available on the Contact Us page of your website. You can adjust your privacy levels to suit your comfort. Start today.

The MAIN Common Marketing Theme

Building Subscribers.  It’s about providing great content on a specific topic – and getting the word out that you provide it. 

If you are technical, or a business owner, you may be interested in reviewing my simple strategy of Syndicating your RSS Feed to create the Echo Effect of Social Bookmarking.

This is Part Three of Many: Blogging as an Effective Marketing Tool

The Internet Is Changing and most of us have web pages.

The web pages started out as a static brochure. They didn’t change very often. So what happened is somebody would go on your website, then they go on your website a month later – it’s the same thing, a month later it’s the same thing, a month later… a year later… it’s the same thing, it’s the same pictures – nothing was changing. It’s like you had the guy your brochure and he just keeps pulling it out of the cupboard and keeps looking at it.

What’s happened with the internet over time is now what is referred to as Web 2.0 which is more interactive. People go on the internet to find new stuff. so they go on to read newspapers – it changes every day, they go on to find stock quotes – it changes in minute by minute. Blogging has become one component of that, where you can change it every day – it takes very little effort, but it gives somebody a reason to come back to your website.

It’s like imagining being able to talk to your guests, every single day, for zero cost. And you’re copying their schedule and it doesn’t interrupt your schedule. You know, why not? That’s what blogging is all about.

If you have questions, just pop up a hand… there’s no bad questions, I may give you a bad answer… but there’s no bad questions. I’ll do my best… If I know the answer, you’ll get it right away, if I don’t know the answer, I’ll take a second, I’ll think of something – I don’t know if it’s true or not but I’ll try anyway.

Definition – What is a Blog?

Essentially it’s a contraction of weB LOG, so you take the ‘B’ and the ‘LOG’ and it’s BLOG. It’s a journal, like a diary that you put out. It’s interactive and it’s available on the internet.

Ok, someone who does the work of ‘blogging’ – is a ‘blogger’. And when you’re a ‘blogger’, your ‘blogging’. That’s the actual doing… so if you hear those terms it all has to do with the fact that the blog is the little diary and blogging is putting it up; blogger is what you are as you do it.

One thing about blogs is that they’re just about always arraigned in chronological order with the newest being first. So you end up with a whole bunch go down the row and as they get older they fall off into an archive, however there’s still readily available. And we do have our blog over here, after you can take a look at it, Karen’s got it up on our computer.

Next: Why Would You Want To Blog?

…more on Ignace Outposts

Brad Greaves of Ignace Outposts gave a fantastic talk at the NOTO 2008 Conference;

Blogging As An Effective Marketing Tool.

I was given permission to record and broadcast the presentation.

…and Brad’s presentation was packed full of useful tips on Blogging for Camp Owners. The hour-long presentation was filled with fresh, personal examples of how Blogging has helped him stay connected with his Fly in Fishing Outpost Cabin Guests; Brad explains how your tourism internet marketing can benefit from blogging.

And Brad explains it without cluttering your tourism marketing objectives with technical details.

A Timely, Important Message

Brad’s message is so timely and important, that I’ve taken seven hours to transcribe everything he said – so I can share it with you!!

Not only did I learn a great deal about what a Camp Owner wants their blog to do for them, but I also learned a great deal about how to speak about the benefits of internet marketing and blogging, rather than speaking about the technology… a chronic challenge of mine.

Put Good Advice Into Action

I’m following Brad’s Blogging advice.
I learned a lot from him, and I know you will too.

Watch for my new series of several short blog posts to share Brad’s Presentation with my readers and Tourism clients over the next couple weeks. My newsletter subscribers will also gain exclusive access to the full transcript in one pdf document!

Three cheers Brad!

A timeless non-technical review of blogging for tourism marketing – Presented at the NOTO Conference in 2008

Today I had a great question from a Client:

Does it matter if I set my privacy settings so only freinds view my profile?

Here’s my reply:

Keep your privacy settings to Everyone, and just keep business detail available on your profile.

I go on to explain:

Think of Facebook as just another piece of Internet Real Estate – just like your website, only in a different city.

As you set up each social media profile, include as much of the content from your website as you can – in a well-presented format – with the intent to always lead your visitors to take action and become a Friend, Fan, or Blog Subscriber so you can contact them (and their friend’s) again.

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Check out this example

http://twitter.com/secretIMriches

The background image has a call-to-action that builds the friend list!
Genius!

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After you Follow this profile, (Trust Step One)

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you receive a direct message with the invitation to get your gift. You click,
(Trust Step Two)

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Split Test Conversions
…and you hit a simple, uncluttered landing page with an eye-catching layout (split-tested between several variations to find the most effective) that directs you to leave your email and name to receive the free gift…
(Trust Step Three)

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Tip for subscribers:

When you leave your email address, give yourself a special name. I named myself IM-Doug. This way I’ll instantly know when I start getting his auto-responder series of email that starts walking me through a relationship with his product or service…
(Trust Step Four)

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No Ongoing Support

I’m also certain that the pre-writen series of email are pre-timed to be sent at regular intervals after I sign up, requiring no ongoing work from the business owner.

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Bring Them Back – Engage Them

Within these email, the business owner shares the benefits of their product or the solution they offer, and asks open ended questions and request for your reply on Twitter, or on his Blog.
(Trust Step Five)

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In review:

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Once a Fan, Follower, Subscriber etc, surpass Trust Step Five – they are certainly worth staff time and ongoing follow-up to learn about them as an individual.

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One Example

This is just one quick example of how to use social media to start building relationships with people who are interested in what you offer.

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Measureable Marketing Results:
• This simple Five Steps to Customer Trust can produce some fantastic results because each step is clearly identified and the actions produce measureable marketing results.

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Improving Processes

Each time I find great, professional examples of people doing Internet Marketing right, I improve my own processes. Thank you @SecretIMRiches.

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Follow @douglaslampi
for Tourism Internet Marketing Twitter updates.

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You’ve likely heard it already.

You already know that 2/3 of travelers
ONLY use the Internet to plan their vacations.

From mapping the driving route or booking the airline tickets, booking transportation, accommodations and event tickets, to browsing pictures and menus to find local restaurants before they start their vacation – today’s travelers are captivated by a relationship that BEGINS and grows online.

Today, it’s easier to market online.

It’s true.

And tourism marketing stands to gain the most.

New Social Media sites like Facebook have made it easy and compeling for millions of people to register and connect with dozens, sometimes hundreds of family and friends.

Match this up with the fact that, on a personal level, most Tourism Operators have also used Social Media sites to connect with their family and friends online – and it’s like peanut butter and chocolate!

Now, more than ever, travel and tourism business owners can target and build a relationship with their ideal client, while both people are at home, without the cost of traveling to Sport Shows

Remember – your ideal client now logs into Facebook or eMail daily…
but, they attend Sport Shows annually…

Douglas Lampi takes the guess-work out of Tourism Marketing,
by teaching the small business owner Social Media
strategies that build lasting, measureable results.

Save time, go directly to the most effective strategies. Learn to protect your personal privacy while boosting your business connectedness. Doug can show you how to spend just one hour each evening online through this winter to build online relationships with new prospects – and especially with people who have booked a vacation with you, now, or in the past.

With Social Media Marketing prepared in advance for next season, then you can REALLY maximize the power of word-of-mouth adversiting from your current guests with real-time, online exposure before your client’s entire friend networks.

If you can see how fast and big this can be, then you know your business has to be a part of it.

Visit www.douglampi.com, join the Newsletter, and see how Doug makes it simple for your business to Go Social!