Tourism analytics are a real asset for tourism-based businesses. Data can help you understand seasonal trends, know what your competition is doing, and support your customers' purchase and planning process. Everyone has suggestions on what to track, what tools are best, and how to link it to your business insights. The good news is, there isn't a one size fits all recipe. There is so much data that you can track almost anything today. We want to share the only four things you need to know when building an analytics program for tourism marketing rather than getting caught up in the tools and processes.

Figure out what you're trying to understand:

First and foremost, decide what you want to learn. Depending on your business model, you might not need to collect every piece of data about your customers. For example, the Ritz Carlton is known for impeccable service, personalized experiences, and white-glove attentiveness. They decided to harness data to their customer management system to track trends in food and beverage, tastes and preferences, and expectations. They use this data to personalize the service delivery experience when guests are on site. You might decide you'd like to understand how your customers navigate between mobile and desktop sites, how long the sales cycle lasts and what assets they need during that time, or how to price competitively in your market. Knowing what metrics are most important will work best for you starts with defining the problem you hope to solve. Start there, and the rest of your data strategy will develop more naturally.

Realize that you can't do it all:

Focus on the big swings. This is especially important if you are just building your data program. With so much insight available, it's easy to try to do too many things at once. Work with your data team or a trusted marketing agency like ours to prioritize your data needs based on level of effort and impact. A good rule of thumb is to start with low hanging fruit (this might include things such as site heuristics, quick UX and content updates online, or mobile integrations). This gives you time to formulate a problem and hopefully find its answer based in data. When choosing what metrics to track, always double check that that KPI relates back to a question you have about your business or client base. And don't forget to pare down your strategy. To start, choose one to three things to track and work on each quarter. If you find this is easy, ramp it up; but start small to ensure you get results from your investment.

Learn and act fast:

Many digital marketers joke that ROI is out --- and speed to market is in. While we still think ROI is an important metric to keep an eye on, we agree that action is key. Tourism and hospitality are ever changing industries where customers tastes shift as new trends emerge and new technology changes how we travel and interact with the world. Don't collect data for the sake of collecting data and know what you want to do with it. Before tracking any given metric, create a hypothesis of what you think might be happening and how you would address it if data proves you right. That last part is critical. If you don't have a plan for how you want to use this information, you're simply collecting observations rather than insights; And that won't help your business.

Invest in the future:

Because you might not be able to do everything at once, it's important to prioritize your data collection and your data tools. Look ahead to consider the systems you will need in a year, or five years. Even if you opt out of these tools now, it's important to keep them in mind so you don't suddenly find yourself behind your competition. Partnering with a data-based agency like BIGEYE is a great way to help prioritize your data investments, tools, and collection roadmap so you are using the data you have and planning for the future effectively (and affordably). No matter what stage you're at in your data strategy, we're here to help. Click here to learn more about the types of services we offer - from data mining and trend forecasting, to online testing and retargeting.