The Cost of a Forgotten Website

This week’s insight goes right back to basics.

After 20 years in tourism, I’ve found that it's applying the fundamentals properly, consistently and with discipline that underpin successful businesses.

And few marketing fundamentals matter more than your website.

For 20 years, I’ve watched Intrepid Travel lead the way in getting the website fundamentals right. https://www.intrepidtravel.com/au 

Their website engages visitors at a deep, emotional level. It connects people with the places they travel, makes complex destination and product choices easy to navigate, and provides clear itineraries and booking pathways.

For a business with such a broad global offer, the website remains remarkably consistent — authentic to its brand, values and purpose across every page.

In this Tourism Insight, I’ll share what I’ve learned from watching the best get this right, and how tourism businesses can take greater control of their website to strengthen engagement, improve conversion and drive more direct bookings.

Your website is often the first real interaction a customer has with your business. And in many cases, it is the difference between a booking and a lost opportunity.

It is almost always the call to action for your marketing investment. It's where people go after seeing your Google search and ads, social media posts, and media articles.

It is also where many customers visit after seeing you on ATO's like Expedia, Airbnb, Tripadvisor or GetYourGuide — to explore your offer further, compare value, or see if they can book direct.

That matters because direct bookings through your own website are commission-free.

So your website needs to convert as hard as possible.

Over the years, I’ve reviewed many tourism websites — and the same issues keep coming up.

Poor tourism websites are dated, difficult to navigate, filled with poor content, reliant on clunky booking engines, perform poorly on mobile, fail to communicate value, and do not reflect the true quality of the experience.

A good website is clear, compelling, current and easy to use.

It should quickly answer:

What and where is this?

Who is it for?

Why should I choose it?

How do I book?

Your website is also one of the few digital assets you fully own and control.

Unlike OTAs or social media platforms, you are not limited to a small listing format or a few images. You can use your website to deeply engage people through strong copy, professional photography, video, blogs, itineraries, local tips, frequently asked questions, customer stories and behind-the-scenes content.

It is also a place to build your database, encourage newsletter sign-ups, connect people to your social media channels and continue the relationship beyond one visit.

But because a website is not a printed brochure sitting on the desk, many businesses forget about it.

It gets left behind. Or worse, it's handed over entirely to an agency, most likely a young team who may understand digital tools but not tourism, your customer behaviour, product positioning or conversion triggers.

That is risky.

Your website is too important to be treated as a side task.

In projects I’ve worked on involving digital strategy and optimisation, improving the website fundamentals has consistently increased performance.

Not through gimmicks.

But through clarity, quality and conversion.

Your website should reflect your brand and your experience.

If you are positioning as premium, it needs to feel premium.

If you are positioning as family-friendly, accessible, adventurous, intimate or highly local, it needs to feel that way.

The architecture, usability and content need to be best practice.

Your images, video and copy must be excellent.

And your website should feel human, because tourism is in the people business.

There are also excellent tools available to test and measure website performance, including:

Google Analytics, Google Search Console, PageSpeed Insights, Hotjar, SEMrush or Ahrefs.

These tools can help you understand how people find you, where they drop off, what needs improving, and how your website performs in search.

And with modern Content Management Systems (CMS) and DIY platforms like Wix and Squarespace, tourism businesses now have total control to manage and update their own websites without waiting months for simple changes.

That control matters.

And if your website is forgotten, outdated or unclear, your marketing investment is working much harder than it should.

3 actions you can take now

1. Send your website to 10 trusted people and ask for an honest review of the experience

2. Use tools like Google Analytics, Search Console and PageSpeed Insights to identify what is costing you traffic and conversions

3. Find 5 websites that you feel are best practices and apply the learning to your own website.

Next week

Understanding and improving your website are among the most powerful steps you can take.

But it’s only part of the equation.

Because your website does not exist in isolation, your customers are comparing you — consciously or unconsciously — against other experiences, other destinations and other ways to spend their time and money.

Next week, I’ll look at why knowing your competition properly is essential to understanding your own value, sharpening your positioning and standing out in the market.