The Essence of Stellar Travel Content

What is the essence of stellar, emotionally engaging, confidence building and activating content for travel companies?

Is it beautiful visuals of exotic locales and accommodations? How about riveting storytelling and tour videos? Or is it just content that’s relevant to readers.

Exceptional content has a richness that generates powerful feelings and activates travelers imaginations, and raises their confidence and esteem. It activates their intent to travel thus making their wishes real. It’s content that makes them believe in themselves and the value of their own experiences.

We might focus on photos and videos, but any content smartly designed can be great.

Powerful Effective Content

Technically, for us as marketers, it”s our material’s ability to reach audiences, impact visitors, engage them, and build your brand image as the only travel company for them.  Ultimately, for long-term value, it’s this “only one for me” exclusivity that builds our customer growth and loyalty.

But great content doesn’t just happen. It’s like a fine meal prepared by a chef. We have to know our customer’s unique mix of wants and intent more intimately, often via research and quality analytics software.

There are millions of unique experiences you could be communicating via words and images.

In this post, we explore what powers impact, captivation, emotion-generating, and trip-inducing feelings.

The Travelers Core Drive

It’s my belief that a core drive exists where all the key reasons they would like to travel are fused together and felt as though it’s one emotional impulse.  Consider the cluster of benefits they seek when they arrive at your site.  After a while, all the reasons they’d like to travel become fused.  Psychologically, they’re replaced by a few emotions (desire, fear, excitement) that represent the value they think your brand provides.  In fact, by the time they’re ready to buy, what they feel might be described as one emotion: confidence of certainty.

Okay, great, but what are all of the things they feel that draws their interest?

What might these Core Drivers be?

• the desire to feel good
• want to be re-energized and revitalized
• sense of accomplishment — I’m a world traveler!
• bored, want something interesting and exciting
• comfort, to escape cold unpleasant weather
• fun times with family or friends
• to share the joy of travel with others
• relaxing strolls through villages or on tropical beaches
• stress relief and no schedules or responsibilities
• spectacular scenery and locations
• experience adventure and challenge
• curiosity/explore the unknown – discover what other places are like
• relaxing times at the pool
• special concerts or events
• being part of a shared experience (tours, socializing)
• cultural immersion, food, drink, entertainment
• relaxing at a restaurant
• romantic getaway
• forget their miseries and the miseries of their own country
• dreaming of moving to investigate a future move there

 

The essence of stellar travel content might be in the resonance of your content to their core drive.

 

Travel brands that connect to this core drive will enjoy more success because they resolve more of their travel itch (via a coordinated, strategic mix of benefits and promises).  It’s not that travelers want it all. It’s that they have certain core needs that must be satisfied together. If one of them is not fulfilled, the trip may not happen.

It’s not just the emotional drive of all of them, but that it’s a unique puzzle of influences where if some are missing the big picture just doesn’t make sense.  They leave your site and forget about it.

That’s why so many people have no interest in travel. Because it has never resonated enough to make them feel compelled, to be interested and believe travel might benefit them.

And stellar travel content too might be customized to suit the peculiar drivers of each traveler’s travel dream.

Working with a Smart Strategy: Sweeteners and Nutrition

My thoughts are that great travel content is a goal you work toward.

Because it doesn’t come easy, and is usually the result of exhaustive research, personal experiences, product strategy, strategic thought, and painful editing. Because it isn’t just a celebration of a travel idea, it’s a marketing vehicle that must make impact, hook the reader, and convert them into a customer. You’re not creating a library with no purpose. It has to generate leads.

I was just reading some fluffy phrasing on a Cruiseline website, and it was like all icing on a cake. I couldn’t tell if it was produced via Generative AI or not, but it read like a celebration of a whimsical idea. It was all saccharine without any nutrition.

My own travel writing style is far more nutrition than sugar, however it’s acknowledged that the right kind of sweeteners are needed in our recipe. Sugar is part of the adrenaline rush that keeps your visitor engaged, addicted to the thought of the journey, and you need to capture them while they’re on their sugar high.

If we’re clever, have insight, and have an intense desire to give the reader/visitor the most intense emotional experience possible via digital media, then we can connect with them on a real, personal, action-based level.

Stimulating the Right NeuroTransmitters for Total Immersion

Some travel writers talk about authentic content and that’s definitely key because original, personal, real accounts do connect with travelers in a trusting, friendship way, which creates relaxation, and in that trusting state of relaxation, your visitor can sink deeper into their travel dream. Creating trust in travel content is important.

By combining trust with relevance in our content, we might stimulate alpha brainwaves and cause the release of dopamine, serotonin, endorphins, and oxytocin. Remember the 4 feel-good neurotransmitters? They are integral to feelings of well-being, joy, and happiness. They increase blood flow and induce a warm, open-minded, and engaging frame of mind.

Every word and image paints a powerful message. Let’s not forget that photographs are powerful and videos can paint a great experience. And themed graphic design styles can help bring things together too.

And if you fail to make this marvelous physical response happen, then the prospect may not engage or buy your travel product.  Again, the matter of authenticity, trust and relevance come into play when building a personal emotional connection with a customer which drives a subscription, booking or phone call.  Without that, you get annoying low-quality leads.

And I believe the phone call is the most important action because it’s more active, informative, and involves a real person who can make things happen.  A fillable form just doesn’t cut it and therefore is questionable travel content.

Your Content Should Exude the Joy of Travel

And a joy of travel, might also be a belief that it’s more important than buying a new car, major appliance, or a house one cannot afford.

I think it’s about capturing the minds and trust of an audience who are ready to accept travel almost as a religion and live out their dreams of a more interesting life.

And we just went through the pandemic, where tens of millions of people burned out, starved of fun things in their lives. The good was stripped out because of Covid. Yet, that is our business opportunity.

Travel is the antidote, and always has been.  It’s the journey and uplift, but it’s also the mental and physical break from tired routines. And travelers know this. Which is why I always mention it. Because, that may be the number one basic core driver — “I need a long break to my favorite place.”

People think they need big change in their lives, but it’s likely what they actually need is a break from the horrible, stifling monotony of their existence.

I have to laugh at a politically correct interpretation of travel demand today:

 

There are numerous reasons why your travel customers travel.  And perhaps great travel content touches very subtly on each of them to build a more intense purpose in the visitor’s mind.  The mind travels first, and the more your content pieces touch on their key intrinsic motivators, the more likely they’re going to buy from you and take that trip.

They could go to Expedia or Gadventures or other mega travel portal for an impersonal and less confident purchase from a vast pool of vacations.  But if your content writing brings your brand, people and unique, compelling, trusted services into that picture, they will book with you.

Travel consumers are buying a brand. The brand sells via words and images.

 

And it’s not enough to distribute all this motivation and messaging throughout your content. It has to be cleverly built into each blog post, video, or social posting. Because after they build up a big emotional potential, they’re not going to read much more of your content. It’s better to get their email and get them to return more later, or make it easy for them to buy now.

Once they get that euphoric feeling, it doesn’t last long, because it’s kind of like short-term memory. What stops them from reading/watching more is they’re full of emotional drive, and it’s time to make decisions (or at least commit to a future decision).

The essence of travel is that it’s very personal.  Each traveler has their own unique reasons for traveling including visiting a special country they’ve heard of, visiting family, getting relief from their life, pursuing relaxation and emotional growth, regaining their self-possession, health, and experiencing joy, thrills, and novelty.

The essence of stellar travel content is building the picture of your company being able to solve their core drive for travel and add on a few benefits they particularly like. Obviously, it’s not an easy puzzle to solve but we get better with more insight and experimentation.

So, what are you waiting for? You know I’m the travel content strategist who can enrich your content to make Google love it, bring in the traffic, get your brand exposed and boosted, and help you build an unparalleled value proposition for travel customers.