This one is from a while back. Someone asked me:

My question to you is, what do you think should be the online strategy for a tour company in Kenya and how should they approach it and what tools should they apply?

Here’s my response:

What would be a good online strategy for a tour company in Kenya? This is an interesting challenge. So let’s see, what I would do is launch an elegant website that is intuitive to use and stylish (web2.0-ish also). I’m assuming this site will have some sort of ‘place’ (a shopping cart, online booking form etc) where a sale needs to be made – focus on this. Make the buying/ordering process easy to use for even a passing browser. And the sales copy around it has to be absolutely well done. If need be, hire professional copywriters for this one page (menwithpens or Kenyan Freelancer come to mind). You do this to make sure that your site doesn’t suck at selling.

Now, in my mind, the target visitors of this site are not in Kenya. True? So you need to find how to reach them. I would include a blog with the website. You can talk honestly and with a personal voice (no corporate-speak) about Kenya, and why it’s such a great country. I’m sure there are tons of things that your blog can talk about.

How to get visitors? I like the organic way – make a remarkable site and blog and then apply SEO VERY well (the works: link building, directory submissions etc). Also, since your visitors are not from Kenya, it should be easy to find out where they hang out – other travel blogs, forums, etc. Go there and join those conversations and, by all means, get noticed. But be subtle.

To complement this sort of ‘organic’ strategy, also carry out a PPC advertising campaign (with Adsense or YPN). This will get some visitors and some sales (if you did your sales copy well). I don’t like extended PPC campaigns so probably you should phase this out as the organic traffic rises – unless your returns on the advertising are very good.

As you get visitors to the site, have some way to opt in visitors into an email marketing campaign. Use mailchimp (by my experience they rock!) to provide your auto responder software/services. Don’t spend too much money on this – people sometimes go crazy – just a basic Mailchimp account will do (they even have a free offering). Be creative in how you get people to join your email list (NEVER buy email addresses). Perhaps you could offer free Swahili lessons via email, or an amazing free video of unseen Kenyan delights. But I’m sure there’s no shortage of creativity on your end.

I think if you do this, you’ll have a good strong start. I doubt many other Kenyan sites have done this well.

To recap:

• Build an elegant site. Let is be super easy to use.
• Do your sales copy excellently.
• SEO everything.
• Market the site by authentically joining the conversation on other travel blogs, forums and other sites.
• Carry out a PPC campaign and consider stopping it (or slowing down) when there is enough organic traffic.
• Create an email marketing campaign.

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I had not mentioned a social network strategy (Facebook, twitter, etc). I’ll work on that and post it here soon. Stay tuned. Got questions? I have answers!