Between Booking and Trip Day — The Pre-Trip Experience That Wins Reviews

Did you know that most guest satisfaction is shaped before the trip even begins?

In this episode of the Tour Operator Growth Podcast, we break down the often-overlooked part of the customer journey that happens between booking day and trip day. This is the window where guests either become more excited and confident about their purchase… or start second-guessing whether they made the right decision.

Greg and Nikki unpack how confirmation emails, post-purchase communication, real-time updates, and pre-trip messaging can dramatically improve guest confidence, reduce cancellations, increase upsells, and lead to more five-star reviews. They also share real stories from Western River Expeditions, Kilimanjaro, Svalbard, and more to show what great pre-trip communication actually looks like in practice.

This episode kicks off Stage 4 of the Growth Engine: Experiencing. Because the guest experience starts long before anyone shows up at the meeting point.

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Chapters:
00:00 Why the Guest Experience Starts Before Trip Day
02:18 The Swamp Tour That Felt Like a Scam
06:06 How Great Pre-Trip Communication Builds Trust
11:32 The Confirmation Email Every Tour Operator Needs
14:41 Using Post-Purchase Emails to Increase Revenue
17:47 Smart Upsells That Actually Add Value to the Trip
19:46 Why Personalized Communication Reduces Cancellations
21:52 Real-Time Notifications That Improve the Guest Experience
26:07 Pre-Trip Messages That Eliminate Support Calls
29:36 How to Apply This to Day Tours and Short Booking Windows

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to another episode of the Tour Operator Growth Podcast. Did you know that 70% of guest satisfaction is influenced before the trip even begins? Think about that for a second. Most tour operators believe that the experience starts when the guests show up at the meeting point. But research and data is pretty clear that actually starts the moment somebody clicks book now. All right, just a quick reminder where we're at in the ResMark Growth Engine. There are five stages: dreaming, planning, booking, experiencing, and sharing. Today we are officially stepping in into the experiencing stage of the Resmark Growth Engine. And this is a part that a lot of tour operators overlook because it actually starts a lot earlier than people think. And if you think about your own behavior as a traveler, you've probably felt this before. You book something, whether it's a day tour, an Airbnb, a multi-day adventure, and then there's this window between booking and arrival. And in that window, one or two things happens. Either you get really excited and really confident that this tour is going to be amazing and you made the right decision going with this tour company. Or you start second guessing. Did I make the right call? Where am I even supposed to go? What if this isn't what I thought it would be? This is an entire emotional roller coaster and it happens before the trip even starts. The operators who win are the ones who realize that this window isn't dead time. It's where guest satisfaction is actually being built. So, Greg, I'm curious, can you think of maybe a trip or an experience that you booked in the past where the time between booking and actually showing up either made you really excited or honestly made you second guess if you made the right choice?

SPEAKER_01 1:46

So this might seem weird because I'm in the tourism industry, but I don't personally do a lot of like paid experiences. Um I tend to wander on my own. I like the ability to change my itinerary if the weather's bad or whatever, right? So I don't do nearly as many. But my wife, she travels with her sister, and they tend to do some some tours here and there. And a few couple years ago, I guess it was, they went to see Taylor Swift in New Orleans, and they're huge Swifties, so they flew out there, but they flew to Florida into like Pensacola, I think, and then drove into New Orleans. But in Pensacola, they wanted to do a swamp tour. They always thought that would be so fun, especially watching, you know, shows like Duck Dynasty and kind of seeing the swamp and the fun the things they do. I thought one of those big fanboats would be the coolest thing. So they they booked a tour, and I remember my wife saying like immediately that she was nervous that it was a scam. And I can't remember if it was because she did it off some thirty third party site, some OTA site that maybe isn't like a Viator, um, trying to get a deal, or if it was the company website. But the reason she felt like it was a scam is she didn't hear from them. She booked it. Radio silence. There was nothing preparing her for the trick. Um and so she started getting nervous. Like, is this real? Are we gonna show up and like they're not even gonna be there? Or like what what do we expect to happen? It turned out that it was real. They had a great time. They held a little alligator as well, or crocodile. Um had a great time, but that nervousness made her almost not book or sh made her can almost cancel the trip. Um, I remember her going through emails and trying to see like how do I cancel, and that wasn't clear either. So she ended up not. I think I talked her through it too and looked at the site and was like, oh, this looks real, like you'll be okay. Um, but the same thing actually happened with their hotel. It was either this trip or a trip they did to um you know, like Gatlinburg to go see the Titanic um replica. But the same thing kind of happened. This one was from a third-party hotel site trying to like, oh, there's a good deal, right? Like Google will even say lowest price, like 50 bucks, but then really you go through a real website, it's not that. And so there's been multiple times where she's been nervous, like, did this actually happen? Is this real? And it's part of the booking flow that causes that frustration. It's the post booking experience of what emails or notifications they're getting, but then also the like are there good directions to get there? And so that's what we're gonna be talking about today is how you as a tour operator can really hone in on that so that a guest books and they don't have buyer's remorse, but they have buyer's excitement instead. So, Nikki, what about you? Do you had an experience like this?

SPEAKER_00 5:10

Not like somewhat, but I do have a question. So did Bianca leave a review after, or I'm assuming since they didn't send any form of pre-messages and left her kind of unknowing, did they send any post messages? Um we'll talk about that today. I'm just curious with the specific example. Did they send anything?

SPEAKER_01 5:30

I doubt she left her review, but I don't know if there was any post messages or anything. We never talked about it, that that part of it.

SPEAKER_00 5:40

Yeah, I I I would doubt it. But I had the opposite um scenario where many of you guys know, if you're listening to this podcast, I booked a trip uh to go on a Western River expedition. And my dad is a very curious person. He's not an adventurer himself, and there's a lot of questions he has. I gifted this to him um last Christmas, and he wanted a lot of things answered. Now, unfortunately for him, maybe fortunately, it was already booked. So, like that part was already like done and dusted. But I was able to ease his mind. There was no way out for him because I'm taking him on this trip, whether he likes it or not. But we were able to ease his mind with all of the valuable emails that we were getting. And what's really cool about the emails, I have some of them up right here. I think some of them I did trash them. So I don't have them all after I read them, of course. But um, for example, they're coming from a specific person within the Rust uh Western River um team. So I'm getting a specific, I'm getting an email from Bonnie who is telling me and asking me questions. I'm getting information such as critical packing details. Do you have medical dietary restrictions that we need to know about? And then more like value-based emails like here are the food options, or here's what we're going to be eating on the river, which my dad really found valuable because he's really nervous that they won't have peanut butter and jelly sandwiches because that's what he eats all day, every day. And believe it or not, Austin River has the option of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

SPEAKER_01 7:22

So that's like a rafting staple. The rafting staple.

SPEAKER_00 7:27

My dad is meant to be my dad is meant for this, whether he knows it or not. So he was so happy. Um, but especially the packing list was really critical for us because this is a bigger trip. I'm flying internationally, I'm meeting my dad. My dad is not a traveler. So, what I did actually at Christmas time is I printed out the packing list because sometimes it's just really nice to have it in your hands. You can have a pencil and you can kind of cross things off as you go. So just having that information available to us literally on our kitchen table where we could talk about it together. And then on the opposite side, I booked several trips, several day tour, day tours in Svalbard. Svalbard is a little island north of Norway. It's actually owned by Norway, um, but it's underneath the North Pole. And really the only thing you can do on that island is our tours. Um, so when I booked tours, I was booking like three a day every day, because the more tours you do in Svalbard, the more you increase the chance of seeing polar bears, seals, those sort of things. So we booked as many as we could. And these are expensive tours, even though they're they're day tours and they're expensive day tours. But I booked them and I had trust. I didn't, I wasn't like your wife, Greg. I didn't think it was a scam by all means. But when I booked it, I didn't get an email confirmation that it went through. And I had so many questions. The website for these tour providers, they're not flushed out in any sort of way. Their booking system is not flushed out. And so it was a little underwhelming, to be honest. I'm going to this beautiful, beautiful island. Um, and I have questions that are unanswered. And when I actually reached out and emailed the tour providers, I didn't get like thorough answers back. It was kind of like a uh, you know, you you have to book tours anyway. So, you know, we don't care if you go with us or our competitor. It was a little weird. But that's how they operate, you know, in Svobard. Um, if you're a small bard operator listening to this, please reach out to me. I would love to talk to you about how you can improve your your everything marketing. But that principle kind of can, I could take that and and talk about that with other tour operators in other situations and other, you know, locations. So um, yeah, that's kind of my my situation. But there's so many more. I've done so many tours and I've had good experiences, good experiences, and bad experiences. And what I can't say is those good experiences start from actually from the very beginning in that dreaming phase. But since we're just talking about experiencing today, it absolutely amplifies when you click book now and you get that confirmation email, you get this, you get that, you get your questions answered. Everything looks a-okay, and it helps lead to that five-star review and rating fan. So, Greg, I would love for you to touch on some points that tour operators can take from today and make sure that they have these things in place. What's the first thing you can think of?

SPEAKER_01 10:49

Yeah, the first thing you've mentioned a couple of times is the confirmation email, right? I click a book now button, I enter my payment, I expect some sort of receipt, right? That's with any purchase, I expect a receipt. In in our realm, that's an order confirmation. What what should be on the order confirmation? Any information that they might need to prove that they purchased, right? So if I have to show up with something and say, here's my order number, that should probably be on there. My name, the date and time of the tour, um, the location, anything that's going to help them refer back to an email. Because you're hopefully gonna send a bunch of emails from the time they book to the time they actually do the tour, especially if you're a multi-day trip that's being booked out, you know, six months in advance. You at least when I've done those type of trips, I typically know that like I can go to the confirmation and I'm gonna get the information from it that I need on the day of arrival. Now we'll we'll talk a little bit about why that shouldn't have to be the case. But um if all that information is on the order confirmation, then at least there's that one email, that one message that someone can refer back to and know that they're gonna have everything that's vital on the day of arrival at their fingertips. So that's what I would say is make sure you're sending it, make sure you're sending it promptly, and then make sure it has that key information so that that initial comfort is already felt by the person booking.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

Greg, do you have any recommendations for ways that people can easily send those order confirmation? Now I know we can do that through ResMart. So if you want to touch on that for a second.

SPEAKER_01 12:44

Yeah, I mean, this day and age, if you have a booking platform, it's gonna probably send it. I don't think there's any booking platform out there that doesn't automatically send an order confirmation. But for those of you that don't, which there are definitely people, then you'd need to use some sort of system that you can, you know, say, Hey, there was an order, send this email, right? And so it's it might be more manual. You might have to keep track of orders and then go to MailChimp and send it out or send it out by yourself each time. But the the key here is get a booking system, it's gonna be better for the end user, it's gonna be better for your business, and it's gonna automate that process as well as well. Um, and then also make sure it's branded. You don't want to just send out like an email that could be anyone's email. Make sure it has your brand so that it's easy to find and it's coming from an email with your domain. I think that's important too. Because when I go back to search for it, I'm gonna type in company name. And if it's not associated company name, it's not gonna show up. It's gonna be really hard to find. So those are some of the things I would do.

SPEAKER_00 13:55

That's a really good point. I'm glad you made that. So, number two, I want to focus on post-purchase messages. So this is the window between booking and trip day. And many operators leave it completely empty, believe it or not. So when you're thinking about post-purchase messages, of course, we could utilize them to provide value and trust, but we could also use this as an opportunity to provide additional revenue. So this isn't just communication, it's a revenue channel. Post-purchase messages generate additional purchases pre-trip. So here are some examples that I've seen specifically with Western River expeditions, my trip up Kilimanjaro, some day tours. So brand new gear in apparel, t-shirt, hat, water bottle, that sort of thing, photo video packages. Um, I had this as an option going up Kilimanjaro. So we could have had a porter. I don't, but we could have had a video videographer, video, videographer, a videographer to take the videos and photos. I didn't pay for that, but that was an option. I love that as an option. Um, add on additional excursions, think sunset cruise, like the night before, brewery, winery, stop after, hot spring visit, scenic helicopter flight. Safari companies do this really well because this is where they usually upsell the hot air balloon ride over the Serengeti. So everywhere, all every day, we would be reminded: hey, before you go out on your safari, you can go on this hot air balloon ride because I usually start at like 4 a.m. before the safari start. So I had a few reminder emails about that. But then also when we got there, when we were on the safari, we got a bunch of pamphlets throughout the hotels and stuff too. It just made me think of that. Gear upgrades, of course, premium kayaks, better wetsuit, dry bag rental. I see this a lot. Um, meal and lodging upgrades, trip protection and insurance. I see this one quite frequently. And then also, I think this is a huge missed opportunity is gift cards and referrals. Also, funny enough, a good upsell that I got of Kilmindaro was a private toilet. So I don't think that was under gear upgrade. I think it's more amenity upgrade. But yeah, so and they did showers too. I didn't do that upgrade. But yeah, so think of those post-purchase emails as an additional revenue opportunity and don't think of it as, yeah, they just bought something. I don't want to sell them again and lose them or lose their trust. Like that thing that you're offering to them might add additional value for them. For example, my my little private toilet up Kilimanjaro was Chef's Kiss. I promise. I'm very glad to get that email upgrade. All right.

SPEAKER_01 16:54

So there's one one thing, there's one thing I would add to this list. Um, we talked about Western River a lot, and they have the packing list, right? And on the packing list, there's a bunch of things that you need for your trip. Well, what a great way to make a little bit of revenue. Either having this, these things yourself that you can sell them directly, or having affiliate links to other providers that are going to sell that. So an example is like, hey, you need some nice shoes. Here's a link to go buy shoes that we recommend. And now you have an affiliate link, you get a little bit of kickback from that, or maybe you actually sell the shoes yourself. And that's another way to help them prepare for the trip in a way that they're getting things that you actually know are gonna be good. Because what you don't want to do is, hey, buy a poncho, but then they show up with the you know two dollar poncho from Walmart. In reality, you needed like a nicer one because that's not gonna keep you warm at all, right? So you want to make sure their experience is the best. So making sure that you have recommendations to that gear, you might as well make some money off of that as well if you can.

SPEAKER_00 18:05

Also, a lot of consumers don't want to think. Like sometimes money isn't their biggest friction point. It is time to research. So, for example, a wetsuit, if they need to buy a wetsuit because they're going on a uh snorkeling trip or a diving trip with killer wells or something in Trump so like they need to be educated and they have the money to do so. So just give them what you want them to buy. So that's a great point.

unknown 18:31

All right.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

You can even have like a package of hey, here's everything on the packing list, buy them all now, and we'll ship it to you.

SPEAKER_00 18:40

Yeah. Awesome ideas. I love it. I love it. Additional value. Utilize these post-purchase messages to add value. Think insider tips, local restaurant recs, what makes this trip special, automated payment notifications. Now, something I thought of that would be a really great thing to do in this additional value. I haven't seen this, but uh meet your guide intro. So they send a video via email of who your guide is going to be. Now, this is probably going to be more for a multi-day trip where they're going to be spending maybe a week, maybe even two or three weeks with a with a specific one guide, you know, get to know that person. So although I haven't seen that, when I booked Kilimanjaro, my tour guide followed me and my husband on social media. So we did get to know him beforehand, but I don't know if that's part of their process, or he just does that with the people that are going to go on his tour. So I think that'd be awesome if it was part of the process, though. Why not? So the one thing about whether you're adding revenue or value is you want people to feel great about the decision that they made. It is going to dramatically reduce cancellations. I guarantee you, Greg, Bianca would not have thought about canceling that trip if she was reassured that it wasn't a scam, right? So there's a stat, 27% increase in return visits from personalized post-purchase communications. And although some of these are more heavier for multi-day tour operators, they can absolutely be utilized in their own way for day trips, other types of excursions. This isn't just only multi-day tour operators can utilize post-purchase messages, right? All right, Greg. We got two. I think we have two more. What's another way tour operators can improve the experience?

SPEAKER_01 20:44

So I would say real-time notifications. What does this mean? This is like maybe, maybe you didn't require payment right away, or it's a payment plan, right? Because these multi-day trips can cost a lot of money. So you don't want to pay 20 grand up front for your tour, and you're paying it throughout a couple months. So getting a text message or an email that's like a one-tap pay to make it really convenient, really easy to continue the process of you know, paying your the rest of your trip off. That's gonna go a long way. Um time-sensitive text. Like there's weather changes that happen. That's one of the big, you know, unknowns that people have. And so if there's a change in meeting location, weather changes, water level updates, even, uh road conditions, whatever it might be, having a way to send that out as time sensitive to the people on that tour is gonna be super helpful. So usually this is something like SMS because that's gonna be the most visible. But if you don't have that ability, then sending an email that's still time sensitive is gonna be beneficial, right? Like, oh crap, there's you know, road construction, they're gonna shut down this part of Main Street. We recommend a new route. Like sending that to the guests is one, it's going to make your tour still start on time, hopefully, because they're not going to get stuck in in traffic and be late. It's just going to make them happier to be like, oh, I missed all this, you know, construction and got here in a timely manner. Um, emails with richer content, so itinerary changes, packing updates, those type of things is going to be beneficial. Um, other things is like just building that relationship of, hey, we're we're ready for you. Here's, you know, something about the tour today that we're excited, like we're excited to see today. Um, don't forget to grab your you know, packing list or whatever it is. Um, just something that's friendly. Like that make sure they're not sterile, make sure they're not just feeling automated. We all know it's automated. Like when I get a text from from Jerry, I know it's not Jerry.

SPEAKER_00 23:01

Like it's well, it's hold on.

SPEAKER_01 23:03

I need coming from an automated text most of the time.

SPEAKER_00 23:06

Or marketing people and business owners know that, but I don't know if the average consumer knows that because yeah, I I I don't know if the average consumer knows that because my mom-in-law gets messages that she thinks they're directed to her.

SPEAKER_01 23:22

I'm like, I think it depends on the generation, right? Like younger generation, they're gonna know. Older generation, maybe not as often. Um, but it doesn't matter if you're making it friendly and more personal. Like, I don't care if it's automated or not, as long as it is giving me value, right?

SPEAKER_00 23:41

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 23:42

And so making sure that these real-time notifications are valuable and timely as well. Um with text messages, you don't want to send too many. Um, for some reason, people get annoyed if you send too many text messages, but you can send more emails and it's fine. So respect that frequency. Don't do it too often. But if it is something that's time sensitive and you need a lot of updates, then they're going to appreciate it at the end of the day.

SPEAKER_00 24:11

So in your marketing, you could also request how they would rather receive notification. So would they rather receive it via email, via SMS, or both, and then just direct it to what they prefer.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

Yeah. So, Nikki, we've had the order confirmation. We've now done some post-purchase messages, which really are those lead up messages for these trips that you know the the buying cycle is longer. We have those real-time updates to which are good for whether it's a day trip, uh a short-term short uh billing site or booking cycle or a long booking cycle. It's still going to be beneficial. What's the last piece of this kind of messaging sequence that we would want to make sure that's included in our flow?

SPEAKER_00 24:58

Pre-trip messages. So the pre-trip messages are kind of that final stretch typically one to two weeks out and the day before. These messages are more logistical, readiness focused, get them prepared so they show up ready to go. So a couple before you spoke, Greg, I talked about post-purchase. Those are more like, we're so glad you're coming. Let's build that relationship together. Whereas what I'm talking about right now is more of handling the logistics. Here's exactly what you need to know. But what we see is this is where 30 to 50% of your support calls are going to disappear if you do it right. So here are some points. One to two weeks out, make sure you maybe resend or make sure you do send if you haven't already, the packing list, what to wear, meeting location, weather notes, what to expect. These are also good things to help set the expectation in tone. So you don't get any unnecessary negative reviews because of them doing quotes if you're listening, bad weather, right? Because that's not something you can help. So let's make sure that people understand that it might be raining next week on the river, you know, day before. Keep this short, warm, you know, final logistics, last time conditions, genuine excitement. Show that you're excited to see them. And then also your waiver completion reminder. So most likely you're using an automated system, hopefully, waiver sign. So all of that is done before they actually show up, and it's one less thing to worry about. So this is a compounding effect. Prepared guests are three times more likely to give you a five-star review.

SPEAKER_01 26:45

I I think something you said there's really important, like sending weather updates. I know we're talking about that with the timely messages too. But when I was when I went on my Grand Canyon rafting trip that I did a few years back, um, I remember, I can't remember if they call it a wetsuit or it's not like a wetsuit of when you're going scuba diving, but there's the the really nice rain conchos that are like pants and jacket. I can't think of the name. But they suggest bringing one of those. And um, they've had a history of people not being very happy, like, hey, I spent money on this and I didn't need it. Right. And so, me, I'm pretty frugal. And so when I was preparing for this, I was like, one, I can deal with cold water and cold weather. I'm gonna be fine. Two, let me see what the weather's like. So I remember getting some of that information later on of being like, this is, you know, your trip's looking nice or whatever it is. And I check the weather a lot to see what things on the packing list do I actually really need. So that would be a good time to be like, hey, the weather's looking a little cold. We really suggest these three items that you might be considered not bringing because it's gonna benefit your trip, right? And so having that type of personalization is gonna be really helpful. So before we wrap up, I just wanted to really tie this all together with we've talked a lot about multi-day tours, but there's single-day tours as well, or not even single day, but the the booking cycle is really short. And how does this apply to your business if that's your booking cycle is a day, two days, same day? So if it's same day, like obviously they're booking an accounter probably at a kiosk, whatever. They're coming up to you in booking, you're not gonna send all these messages, right? You're gonna send a confirmation email. They probably don't even need it to refer to where they're going because you're going to tell them where to what to do next. But those post-purchase messages, I think, are can still be important. This is a time, and maybe people would call this like a post-experience. Um, it's after the actual experience, but making sure that you send some emails right after they book, whether it's a day or two or the same day, that helps them feel the value to then leave a good review after as well and to share with other people is going to be really important. So you'll just have to kind of figure out your cadence depending on what works for your business. But don't think that, hey, you know, all my bookings come in two days before. I don't need to do any of this. There's still room to prepare the guests and still help them really find value in your business that's going to help drive forward.

SPEAKER_00 29:45

I love that. All right. So whether you're using one, two, or all four of these systems, each one builds confidence, reduces friction, and generates additional revenue for you. The operators getting the best reviews aren't always the ones running the best trips. They're the ones running great trips and making guests feel like they are taking care of weeks, months, days, hours, minutes before the trip starts. But what happens once guests actually shows up? Now that's still part of the experiencing stage. So in next week's episode, we are going to break this down. We'll call it part two of the experiencing stage, where we're going to talk about how do you actually amplify the guest experience when they're actually on the tour itself. Thank you so much for listening to another episode of the Tour Operator Growth Podcast. If you haven't already, like, subscribe, follow, share, give me feedback. I would absolutely love it and take it and implement it. Thank you. We'll talk to you next week.