Sweden Tourism - a blog for tour operators

Sweden Tourism blog has moved… and grown up

Curt Landin — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 20:42:36 +0000

Thanks to the inspiring response from international readers I´ve decided to expand this blog´s perspective to include tour operations and tourism related issues worldwide. For that purpose, I´ve renamed and moved the blog.

From now on I will be writing Pro Tourism Blog – for tour operators and tourism professionals worldwide. You reach it at naturalconsulting.se/Blog

As ususal, comments and discussions are most welcome.

Please update your bookmarks and RSS feeds accordingly.

All the best,

/Curt Landin

From a Jack to a King

Curt Landin — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 09:45:10 +0000

In these days of royal ceremonies, where the Swedish Crown Princess Victoria will marry Daniel Westling, an ordinary man of the people (actually his cousin is sitting next door to me right now, it´s a small country…), I finally stumbled upon “the ultimate tour”, while doing some export coaching for African tour operators.

I can be a King. At least for a few days:

Day 3: Transfer to your Kingdom early in the morning, after breakfast. Upon arrival you will check into your palace and have lunch. Later in the afternoon you will have a short meeting with the local chief and be introduced to the village elders. Overnight in your Palace.

Day 4: A tour of your kingdom and visits to local schools, health centers, etc to be introduced to some of the leaders of the village. Latter in the afternoon you will be briefed on the installation process and what is expected of you. During this period you will learn all about being a King in an African village and the installation process. Overnight in your palace.

Day 5: This morning you will be prepared by your subjects, all costumes and jewels befitting your ceremony will be brought out and made ready for your installation.You will be dressed up in the afternoon and the ceremony will begin and end with spectacular cultural dance performance. You will go to bed in your palace to wake up the following day as the king of the village for one day. You will carry out all the responsibilities of the king while enjoying the privileges that comes with being a King in a village in Africa. You will end the day with a handover ceremony. Overnight in The palace.

Day 6: Day of reflection. Enjoy the day in the village, later in the afternoon we will visit all the nice people who have helped make your stay fantastic and say goodbyes. Overnight in the Palace.

Now, wouldn´t it be nice?

Gothenburg right on track

Curt Landin — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 13:52:59 +0000

I´ve travelled quite a lot. Worldwide. Being a sales trainer, management consultant has made me somewhat sensitive when it comes to service and customer relations, especially where my (business) heart lies: tourism. C´mon, we´ve all been through it: Taxi´s that doesn´t show up, hotel receptionists acting like a headache, train delays and restaurant waitresses ignoring you. I hate to say it, but after a while you get used to it.

Not so in Gothenburg. I´m on my way back home from Sweden´s biggest travel trade fair, TUR 2010. Made my decision just 2 days before the opening and expected nothing but troubles. Usually, the town is fully booked, crowded with the swedish travel industry´s VIP´s and others. So also this time.

Saying I was late with my reservations is an understatement. Nevertheless, I managed to find a room, 10 minutes from the fair, thanks to PR-specialist Andrea Jovell Svensson, Tillvaxtakademin (Growth Academy). The rest is a tourism fairytale.

Nya Varvet Studios were formerly a prison for women, and an army compound. Today, the many buildings are renovated to a cosy hotel village. I´m not paid to say this, but must let you know that the rooms are excellent. Sea-view, 3-floors flats with a small kitchen, micro oven, flat-TV, refrigerator and absolutely outstanding beds (must have cost a fortune), their SEK 595/singlebed (US$ 90) a night is a bargain. 10 min´s drive from downtown Gothenburg with sea-view! Well, that´s not the best part. Their service is excellent, friendly and welcoming (I´m still not paid to say this). A simple, but nice b´fast, office equipment available 06.30 a.m. and – everybody smiled.

Needed a taxi. The tram took me roughly 1½ hour downtown, while driving were just 10 min´s for 160 SEK (~22$). Now, we all know taxi´s, anything can happen. Not this time. Or next.

I just say: VIP taxi. Call them if in Gothenburg, +46 31 670130. Excellent service. On time. friendly operators, serviceminded – and they remembered my name. I even got brands of the cars who were going to pick me up. The drivers called me a few minutes before arrival, just to say they´ll be there in 2 min´s.

So what´s the secret with Gothenburg? I checked with some other tourism professionals attending the fair. We agreed it´s not just a coincidence. Gothenburg has a strategy for tourism since a couple of years, with the aim of being a world class event organizer and we´ve just experienced that it´s not only words. It´s more of an attitude that´s spread among suppliers of tourism services. An attitude. Good one. They´ve even started working on a nature tourism strategy, being the 2nd biggest city of Sweden. From my point of view: Gothenburg is on track. And on time.

Tourism Website Review

Curt Landin — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 08:09:11 +0000

Got a tourism website? Does it sell? Nah, didn´t think so… There are millions of tourism websites, but not many of them are specifically designed to promote sales of tourism products. Not surprisingly, most of them are built by IT professionals with little or no experience of tourism sales processes.

Want to see the midnight sun? Try to make a reservation at Sweden´s national railways www.sj.se . Outstanding

Tourism Website Review

wild bear watching, anyone? Try www.nordicnature.com. A conference or training camp? Check out www.friscordia.com. These are just samples… they´re all excellent, award-winning companies. However, the websites are quite impossible to understand for non-swedish speakers. Like many others around the world.

Buying a tourism experience is not like buying an Iphone. You can´t try before you buy. If it´s “broken”, you can´t return it. A tourism experience is consumed in the very same moment it´s being produced, which makes the marketing and sales process quite different from most other industry´s.

It´s not about translations. It´s about communication. It´s not about getting high ranked at google. It´s about how you get leads and how you converts them into actual sales.

Now there´s a solution. Natural has developed a Tourism Website Review. While common website reviews are done mostly by IT companies focusing on search engine optimization, structures and IT technicalities, this Tourism Website Review is done by experienced tourism professionals and has its focus on layout, content and functions that promotes sales of tourism products.

The Tourism Website Review is divided in 4 sections:

A general review of basic functions required for tourism websites.
A specific review of advanced tools and functions for tourism marketing and sales.
A SEO report for search engine optimization
Other requirements of importance for successful tourism e-marketing & sales

Completed by a summary of the most important findings and marketing to sales conversions. A main purpose with it is to provide you with advices and recommendations on…

how to visualize your products, services, company and destination on the website
how to identify, collect and convert leads to sales
how to measure the results of your e-marketing and sales

From a number of perspectives, your website will be evaluated, estimated and compared to competitive websites with the aim of providing useful comments and recommendations for website improvement that leads to more sales. It is useful by yourself as a roadmap to sales or as a practical instruction to your webmaster for direct implementation on your website.

The best stats you´ve ever seen

Curt Landin — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 09:23:54 +0000

Sometimes some facts & figures can change your view of the world… Tourism development is often seen as a sustainable way out of poverty. This week Natural is educating 143 tour operators from 28 developing countries on the Scandinavian tourism market under the flag of CBI´s Export Coaching Program in Rotterdam.

Enjoy Hans Rosling´s inspirational speech at TEDx Tokyo, showing that the world is reasonably on track when it comes to fight poverty.

Online tourism boosting

Curt Landin — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 10:28:35 +0000

A recently published study, Netstudy Travel Industry 2009, by Swedes Peter Hellman and Alf Hedlund, shows that e-marketing is becoming more important within tourism.

The travel industry´s online market has grown tremendeously, from SEK 10 Bn 2005 to SEK 25 Bn 2007 (US$ 1,43 Bn to US$ 3,58 Bn). The travel sector has increased the most and stands for 30% of all online shopping in Europe. The pure net travel actors had a turnover of SEK 7 Bn 2007, estimated to SEK 9 Bn next year (US$ 1 Bn to US$ 1,29 Bn).

The consumer behaviour is now rapidly changing. 90% begins their journeys on the net, but information on a website or online reservations is no longer enough. We´re in for the third wave of e-marketing: social media. Visibility, contribution and interaction, almost in real time, in an engaging way, are keywords to get online tourists to identify themselves with your brand and contribute to the dialogue that leads to bookings.

The online trend is boosting all over Europe. The online travel market had a turnover of € 49,4 Bn 2007. Great Britain and Germany together stands for almost half the value, wich indicates that swedish incoming tourism companies who wants to be part of the market at least should consider translating their websites, but that´s just the beginning.

While the use of internet increases – 1 Bn users already back in 2006 – the search engines´ role are becoming more important, why knowledge and strategy in e-marketing are crucial for future success.

Wind power vs tourism employees in Sweden

Curt Landin — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 07:42:53 +0000

wind power vs. tourism employees in Sweden 2008

Sources: Swedish Energy Agency & Swedish Agency for Economic and Regional Growth

Sweden according to visitsweden.com

Curt Landin — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 05:17:04 +0000

Fill in the blanks…

7 Growth industries characteristics, part 3: Requirements

Curt Landin — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 11:21:31 +0000

Sweden is becoming more and more unknown among foreigners, accordning to a recently published report by The Swedish Institute. “The reason for this is that the choice of countries being investigated changed compared to previous years” says Olle Wästberg, SI Director-General. “The other reason is that the competition has become tougher as a result of globalization.”

Well, there´s a shortcut to change peoples opinion about Sweden: Invite them to see for themselves. Sweden have thousands of tourism related entities, with approximately 160,000 employees all together who would be excellent hosts to guests from abroad. If only the potential guests knew, for example, where to make a mid-sweden guest house reservation, understand what´s on a swedish restaurant menu or book a swedish train ticket from home. None of it is easy today.

Which lead me to part three in our series of “7 growth industries characteristics” – the requirements for operating on the international arena of tourism & travel.

The tourism industry has an advantage compared to other businesses: There is already an existing worldwide network of distributors eager to find new destinations for their customers. You just have to meet the requirements to be part of the game. So what are they?

1. A sales manual.

A description of the destination, not only your own business or the closest neighbourhood. Tourism is a question of cooperation. We move consumption between places. So you must be able to give sales support to your distributors on the places and experiences you offer. A friend of mine, Neil Rogers, has put together a list of what should be included:

Written materials that bring itineraries to life and make them sound appealing in comparison with product from other companies and destinations. It is necessary to deliver information in well written English and other languages if the size of a particular market warrants it.
Detailed hotel descriptions and amenity information such as bed configuration, physical activites bathroom and toilet facilities, meal times, type of menus etc.
Information on cultural interaction as most trips are a combination of cultural and physical activities.
Quality assurance (testimonials from clients and travel companies) and any quality schemes you are part of.
Level of excursion, activity or tour difficulty, average distances walked, type of terrain with trail maps and destination relevant maps to give context to the itinerary.
Whether your company and those you work with are licensed to operate and if your company carries adequate insurance for injury, accident and liability.
Do your vehicles (land and water) have adequate safety equipment such as seat belts, fire extinguishers, emergency medical kits and are your driver or guides trained in case of medical emergencies.

When you approach international tour operators they will most probably ask for this information. If you´ve got your ducks in a row, you´re in. If not, you´ll have to do the homework.

2. Tour Packages

Make the experiences you offer saleable. A tour starts at the travellers home. Not yours. This opens for unlimited marketing opportunities, before, under and after the actual journeys. Say, an average american tourist, first time in Sweden, will spend a week or two in “Scandinavia”. If you´re lucky this means Sweden. Then they´d like to see the archipelago, buy some crystal in Småland, see the midnight sun and go shopping before taking off to Alesund in Norway. Leaves 2 nights to your business. Where do you fit in?

Cooperation is the key word. When you put together an attractive tour package, look for distributors that already have your potential guests in their customer database. Make it easier to contract you by offering a study tour or pioneer trips.

3. A Price list

See my posting on part 2, Pricing. This includes the supplements of additional services to make the whole travel solution workable. Negotiating reasonable rates with your partners/suppliers to make the tour saleable to your target group is crucial for your success. Easy said. And quite easy done.

Curt Landin

PS. Don´t forget there are high-end clients as well as budget travellers. Just to mention, Urban Nomads mongolian tour starts at USD 2 millions per person…

Sweden cheaper than ever

Curt Landin — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 09:38:13 +0000

Being a tourist in Sweden is cheaper than in ages. A hundred swedish kronor is equivalent to USD 12,16, EUR 9,03 or GBP 8,45 today. It´s a 40% drop in value of the swedish currency since april 2008. This means business for incoming tour operators and overseas agents. However, Riksbanken (the Central Bank) says it´s a temporary situation and expects the krona will be back at normal rates within a year or two. The reason is that, despite the international recession, Sweden has a quite strong position compared to other countries with an overplus in the current account balance.

I wouldn´t say it´s now or never. But it´s definitely a chance to see Sweden at bargain prices this summer.
/ Curt Landin