Mitch Bach talks with Jenn Barbee, co-founder of Destination Innovate, about the real inner workings of DMOs, those three letters that every tour operator has an opinion about but few actually understand. Jenn has spent 30 years inside destination marketing, from a shoestring US Department of Commerce team trying to promote America on a $50,000 budget to her current work closing the gap between DMOs and the small businesses they are supposed to serve. The conversation covers how DMOs get funded, why they sit on valuable visitor data, and what tour operators can actually do to get beyond the dead-end website listing.

It goes further than the typical "how to work with your tourism board" advice. Jenn and Mitch get into the identity crisis hitting tour operators and DMOs at the same time: both are losing ground to OTA platforms, both need direct guest relationships, and neither is building enough local partnerships to fight back. They talk short-term rental hosts as untapped referral channels, guerrilla marketing tactics that cost almost nothing, and the hard truth about inbound tourism to the US heading into World Cup and the 250th anniversary.

Key Takeaways

1. Your DMO has expensive visitor data that could sharpen your product, pricing, and ads, but they will not hand it over unless you ask. 06:14 – 07:19 DMOs invest in data about visitor appetite, competing markets, and traveler clusters by neighborhood and interest type. That information rarely trickles down to small tour businesses because DMOs feel pressure to contextualize it or fear judgment on their numbers. Frame your ask around strengthening the destination's tourism product, not just helping your business, and you stand a real chance of getting access to insights you could never afford on your own.
2. The single best first move with your DMO is to find the community manager and introduce yourself with specific visitor language, not a sales pitch. 11:48 – 12:58 Audit your tour product against what the destination website is promoting in terms of itineraries or themes, then reach out where you see a match or a gap. Lead with collaboration. Once you have that baseline, you can inch toward higher-value asks like data sharing or co-promotion, but only after you have earned the relationship through showing up and being useful.
3. Survey your customers about whether they booked the experience before the hotel, then bring that data to the DMO. 56:29 – 56:39 If you can show a DMO that your tour attracted bed nights, you are speaking their only real language: occupancy and bed tax justification. Most tour operators never collect this data, and most DMOs have never seen it from a small business. It positions you as a strategic asset rather than another name on a listings page.
4. DMOs are shifting from marketing organizations to stewardship organizations, and that tension is something you can use. 08:50 – 09:59 Many DMOs now describe themselves as "destination management" or "stewardship" organizations, moving toward what is right for their communities. Their boards and bed tax collectors still want heads-in-beds KPIs. If your tour disperses visitors into underserved neighborhoods, supports local businesses, or tells a more honest destination story, you become the kind of partner that helps a DMO justify its new direction to the people holding the purse strings.
5. Getting listed on the DMO website is a win. Stop underestimating it. 13:10 – 13:45 Many operators treat a listing as table stakes, but some DMOs do not even offer that without a paid membership. If you are listed, follow up by tagging the DMO constantly on social media and feeding them content they can reshare within their brand guidelines. The social media managers have more flexibility than the executive staff and will amplify content that feels fresh or on-brand.
6. If your local DMO is stuck promoting only the marquee attractions, skip them and go to the state level. 17:38 – 18:32 A DMO locked into bread-and-butter promotion is usually in protection mode, worried about occupancy numbers. State tourism offices have embraced experience-driven programming and are more open to working with operators who tell a broader story. For most small tour businesses, the state governor's conference on tourism is where accessible DMO relationships start.
7. Short-term rental hosts are closer to the guest than any DMO, and tour operators should be building direct relationships with them now. 24:31 – 26:00 Short-term rentals nationally overtook hotels in occupancy as of September 2025. Those hosts talk directly to guests about what to do in town. A recommendation from a local Airbnb host is warmer than any OTA listing and costs zero commission. Finding them is manual (social media DMs, local searches), but the payoff is a direct referral channel with no middleman.
8. Stop chasing first-time visitors. Loyal, repeat visitors spend more, stay longer, and sustain the businesses that matter. 32:49 – 33:32 DMOs and operators both fixate on acquiring new customers while ignoring the people who already love the destination. Repeat visitors become patrons of smaller, niche experiences and local businesses. For multi-day operators especially, a returning guest who books a deeper or different tour is more profitable than constantly feeding the top of the funnel.
9. Identity beats branding. Know who you are and say no to the rest. 38:44 – 41:27 Jenn draws a hard line between brand (what you market) and identity (who you actually are and who you serve). When you lead with identity, you market less because the right people find you. That means turning down some customers and product ideas, which is terrifying for newer operators, but it prevents the bland, generic positioning that makes you invisible on platforms like Viator and GetYourGuide.
10. The "book direct" movement matters for tour operators just as much as it does for short-term rentals and hotels. 42:58 – 44:28 Hotels lost roughly 80% of their distribution to OTAs. Tours and activities sit around 40% OTA-controlled, which means there is still time to build direct channels. DMOs missed the OTA boat the first time and are caught in a relevancy crisis. That creates a shared interest: both of you need to reclaim the guest relationship before the platforms own it entirely.
11. Guerrilla, person-to-person marketing is the only thing worth betting on in this environment. 34:16 – 35:03 Replace coffee sleeves at a local shop for a week with a message like "next time mama's in town, try this." That costs almost nothing and puts your name in front of a local audience in a real, physical moment. Operators burning money on flashy ad campaigns and agencies are losing to the ones doing the manual work of building one relationship at a time.
12. Bring tour operators, short-term rental hosts, and local businesses into the same room. The collaboration that comes out of it is worth more than any campaign. 30:35 – 32:17 A 12-person Tourpreneur meetup in Dallas turned competitors into collaborators planning joint tours before they left the room. Those rooms should include short-term rental hosts, restaurants, coffee shops. Nobody is organizing these cross-sector local gatherings yet. That is the opportunity.
13. Rethink the "travel presentation at the library" model. Gather local people around something that is not your tour. 53:23 – 54:46 Jenn pitches a revival of the house-party model for travel: 10 to 15 people, food, conversation, then introduce the experience. For multi-day operators, this replaces the stale slide deck. Book clubs are surging. House gatherings are surging. The sale happens because you built trust in a personal setting, not because you ran a Facebook ad.
14. Quirky, unpolished video cuts through. But virality does not equal business success. 36:32 – 37:38 Behind-the-scenes, day-in-the-life content is what is actually getting traction on social right now. The less templated and less AI-generated it feels, the better it performs. Use that attention as a hook, then shift to collaborative content and real relationship-building that converts. A weird 30-second clip of your tour prep is worth more than a polished banner ad.
15. The inbound tourism situation in the US is worse than most operators realize, and pretending otherwise is a losing strategy. 48:28 – 50:43 Canadian airlines are pulling US routes for summer 2026. Sixteen countries now have travel advisories against the US. The World Cup and the 250th anniversary are approaching with a damaged international reputation. Operators who depend on inbound international visitors need to pivot hard toward domestic and loyal-visitor strategies now, and the ones who acknowledge reality in their messaging will build more trust than the ones still running sunset stock photos.

How do you scale a company without losing your soul or passion?

Mitch Bach talks this week with Paul Whitten, founder of Nashville Adventures, about how a former combat veteran, Peace Corps volunteer, UK Parliamentary Fellow, and Amazon project manager translated the learnings from his winding life path into a fast-growing tour company built at the intersection of passion, profitability, and public history.

Paul identified a “Paul-shaped hole” in Nashville’s bachelorette-heavy market by blending deep historical knowledge with an approachable, beer-in-hand delivery style. We discuss why he rejects over-scripted tours in favor of hiring obsessively passionate subject-matter nerds (bourbon, ghosts, coffee, Civil War) and giving them ownership; how early growth came from soft-launching, the power of relentless relationship-building with distilleries, chambers of commerce, concierges, and DMCs (and the power of simply responding to emails!). And why enthusiasm, not hacks or ad tricks, is the true differentiator.

The conversation dives into scaling without losing soul, balancing founder-led guiding with team development, leveraging community partnerships and veteran identity, experimenting with new formats like coffee crawls and XR-enhanced tours, and using books and potential city expansion as strategic next steps. We also tackle the harder edge of the job: the tour guide’s role as a public historian in polarized times, handling contentious Civil War and civil rights narratives responsibly, creating space for civil discourse on tour, and embracing risk, naivety, and “pirate” rule-breaking as essential traits for entrepreneurial success in the tours and activities industry.

1. Connect with Paul on LinkedIn
2. Nashville Adventures Home Page
3. See Reality XR tours mentioned
4. More show notes and takeaways on tourpreneur.com

This is an episode all about the hard stuff. Politics. Disagreement on tour. Tour sites where the truth itself is in debate. Confronting places with complicated, dark histories.

Most of the advice out there is: avoid this stuff at all costs. People just want to have fun, they're on vacation. Guides should stick to the script and make sure they don't say something that upsets the guests. I'm not here as a tour guide to shove my opinions down everyone's throats. Can't we all just get along? Can't we just keep the discourse civil?

Our guest this week, Mike Fishback, is a middle-school humanities educator and curriculum designer who thinks this instinct is exactly the problem. "Civil discourse" isn't about keeping things polite — it's about strategies for engaging with and managing disagreement and difficulty in learning situations, like a tour. Mike learned through experience that it's unwise to sit back, cross your fingers, and hope you don't upset a guest. That there are powerful ways to lean into difficult topics that make the whole experience more meaningful — intentionally creating dialogue through artful questioning and participatory techniques. And he has the educational frameworks and two decades of lived experience to back every word of it up.

Mike also happens to have spent years as a client of mine — I was the tour guide for his group of middle schoolers on trips to New York and DC, and I saw firsthand how he engaged his students with really meaty, difficult topics in a way that didn't shut them down but fired them up.

The lessons here aren't for kids. They're for everyone. And if you've ever told yourself that your job is just to deliver the facts and keep things light, this conversation might be the most useful hour you spend all week.

More takeaways and show notes on tourpreneur.com

What if the most powerful segment in travel has been hiding in plain sight for decades?

Tourpreneur's Mitch Bach talks with Carolyn Ray, CEO of Journey Woman, about her transformation from corporate executive to full-time traveler and advocate for the 50+ woman traveler—a demographic that represents half the world's population yet remains largely invisible to the travel industry.

After a life-changing trip to Kenya at age 50, Carolyn sold everything and reinvented herself, eventually acquiring Journey Woman in 2019 and transforming it from a 1990s-era newsletter into a multifaceted platform that includes research, advocacy, a women's travel directory, and speakers bureau.

Through her groundbreaking "Invisible No More" research, Carolyn became the first to quantify this market segment, revealing that operators who only market destinations are "doing half the job" because 50+ women travelers are looking for purposeful, intentional experiences beyond simple safety assurances.

She challenges the industry's obsession paid media and influencer marketing, and urges women entrepreneurs to reject outdated rules, trust their intuition, and put themselves unapologetically in the spotlight—embodying her company's core value to "make your own rules."

1. The "Invisible No More" study
2. Article mentioned: Is it safe to travel to the US right now?
3. The new Women's Travel Directory

This is a story of growth through creativity, experimentation, and using technology to stay lean.

Carlo Pandian (LinkedIn) is the founder of Slow Travel Italia. Four years ago he started with a single wine tasting in Verona, and today runs 160 experiences across 12 Italian cities, serving 15,000 guests a year with a very small team.

In this episode, he talks to TP host Mitch Bach about exactly how he did it: experimenting with neglected time slots (like 6pm) that competitors ignore, launching five tours at once instead of one to multiply his chances of finding a niche, using Airtable and automations to eliminate manual booking assignments and personalize communication at scale, and treating OTAs as a launchpad rather than a long-term home. Carlo shares how he identifies gaps in crowded markets by studying what's missing—not just in Italy but in places like Japan—and why he pulled out of Milan when the math didn't work. He explains his "requirements manifesto" for vetting partners, how he coaches food producers on storytelling for international audiences, and why the biggest trend he's seeing is travelers willing to spend half a day outside the city for a single product done deeply—visiting the olive grove, watching mozzarella pulled from boiling water, understanding one thing fully rather than tasting nine things superficially.

As always, more info and takeaways on tourpreneur.com.

In this episode Mitch Bach sits down with Marinel de Jesus, a former human rights lawyer turned tour operator.

She is filled with questions about the adventure tour industry:

Why do porters on the famous, touristy Inca Trail in Peru carry crushing loads for little pay and even less dignity? Why is it so difficult to find women adventure guides in so many parts of the world? What do indigenous communities actually want from tourism—and why doesn't anyone bother to ask them?

These are just some of the uncomfortable questions and themes she's carried with her as she's lived and trekked around the world. Originally from the Philippines, she became a human rights lawyer in Washington D.C., spending 15 years prosecuting child protection and mental health cases. Then her mother passed away—and she never went back to the office. But Marinel didn't just start a tour company. She moved into indigenous communities. She lived with Quechua porters in Peru and learned the dark truths behind the picture-perfect Inca Trail. She spent nearly 300 days in Mongolia during Covid, co-creating a nomad camp that started with tea and a blank piece of paper—not a business plan. She walked 100 days across Nepal with Mingmar, a female guide she searched for over a year and a half to find, proving that women belong on the Great Himalaya Trail.

This discussion challenges everything we assume about adventure tourism—the colonial narratives baked into our itineraries, the voices we never hear, the scripts we impose on communities who know how to welcome guests far better than we do. She makes the case for showing up with no agenda, listening before designing, and building something that matters more than scale.

Marinel's organizations:

1. Equity Global Treks (Brown Gal Trekker)
2. The Porter Voice Collective
3. Her vision for Himalayan Women Trail Leaders
4. Her film KM82 on the Quechuan Porters of Peru
5. The Khusvegi English & Nomadic Culture Camp she helped start in Mongolia

More show notes and resources on tourpreneur.com

This short episode was recorded live at GetYourGuide's Unlocked conference in September 2025.

When you meet Arturo Ardao Rivera, the first thing you feel is his energy. He doesn't come off as an engineer, which was his profession until he discovered a joy for tour guiding and running a tour business. Originally from Madrid, Arturo found his true passion when he created Rainbow Tours Stockholm. It has grown from a solo operation to employing 26 guides.

His story is one of rejecting some of his engineering tendencies (choosing feelings over numbers!) and leaning into strategies that appear unorthodox but have worked well for him.

You'll discover:

1. His unique "taxi tariff" model for private tours, and his approach to hyper-personalization.
2. Why he doesn't ask for reviews
3. Why he's not sold on the "get more bookings" industry mantra
4. Why he visits guides he's thinking of hiring in their comfort zone, not his
5. How guide applicants are asked to become undercover tour takers
6. How he leverages running two separate brands for pricing strategy
7. How he grow leveraging 10+ OTA partners, and how he's managing his distribution mix

Connect with Arturo on LinkedIn, and visit Rainbow Tours Stockholm!

It's 2026... welcome to a new year of Tourpreneur weekly travel business podcasts!

And we're starting the year off in a slightly different vein.

This episode is a must-listen to help you set a new and hopefully inspirational, deeper tone for your year ahead as a business owner or guide.

Our opening guest is the inimitable Dr. Anu Taranath, a professor, author, and facilitator. She's truly one of a kind. She gave the opening keynote at last year's Tourpreneur conference, and blew everyone away.

So Tourpreneur's Mitch Bach was excited to sit down with Anu to challenge Tourpreneurs to think new thoughts about what they're doing as business owners. Yes, our job is to bring joy and entertainment and storytelling to our guests. Yes, our job as business owners is to show up for the daily grind of practical, nuts and bolts business. That's the spine of many of our lives out there.

This episode will ask you to go deeper.

If you rest on only the level of entertainment, and 'customer service' and professionalism, you're missing an opportunity for greater meaning, both in your business and your guests' lives.

Anu asks you to think of your role as creating not only staged performances, but also spaces and containers to "rehumanize humans" and "normalize the normal"—that is, the kinds of human questions about culture and difference that are normal reactions to a travel experience that stretches people.

It's an invitation to take off the armor — yours and your guests, and create something more meaningful together, something deeply human.

As always, more show notes and links on tourpreneur.com.

1. Dr. Anu's Website
2. Connect with Anu on LinkedIn
3. Anu's Instagram
4. Anu's book, Beyond Guilt Trips

Pete Syme interviews Andrea Lamparini from WeRoad, a hybrid tech company and tour operator that's rewriting the rules of group travel for millennials and Gen Z. The conversation reveals how WeRoad has achieved exceptional growth by building a community-first model where strangers become friends through small group experiences, using travel coordinators instead of traditional guides, operating as a curated marketplace where top coordinators design their own trips, and leveraging technology to scale operations with one-third of their 200-person team dedicated to tech. Andrea shares how they maintain quality with 4,000+ casual travel coordinators who each lead just one trip per year, why they leave 30-40% of each itinerary unstructured for group decision-making, how their supply model works across 68-70 DMCs globally, and why they're expanding into B2B channels including travel agencies, employee benefit programs, and corporate partnerships that already represent 17-18% of revenue. The discussion covers their VC backing (rare for a tour operator), plans for US expansion in 2026, the power of their We Meet app hosting 50,000 community members at events this year, and Andrea's key lesson learned: curating their marketplace offering earlier would have prevented the conversion drop caused by overwhelming choice.

Top Ten Takeaways

1. Travel Coordinators Work Alongside Local Guides

WeRoad uses travel coordinators who are the same age as travelers, depart from the same home country, and focus on facilitating group dynamics rather than delivering local expertise. Local guides are still included for museums, parks, and other sites where specialized knowledge is needed. Travel coordinators create WhatsApp groups one month before departure, balance introverted and extroverted personalities, and coordinate the 30-40% of unstructured time built into every itinerary. WeRoad has 4,000+ coordinators working casual contracts with a commitment of just one trip per year.

2. Quality at Scale Without Full-Time Staff

Coordinators go through online applications, webinars, group interviews, and a final boot camp weekend with 100 candidates. Most visit destinations for the first time, but rigorous hiring and training ensure consistency. Local DMC partners provide backup if logistics fail. Top performers can become "producers" who design and scout their own trips.

3. Groups Decide 30-40% of Their Itinerary in Real Time

Accommodations, transport, and core experiences are fixed, but dinners, half-days, and optional activities are decided by the group during the trip based on their interests and budget. Travel coordinators provide options and handle bookings with local partners, personalizing the experience to match group energy.

4. A Curated Marketplace Scales the Portfolio 5x

WeRoad's internal team creates 200 itineraries while travel producers create 1,000+ more. This model scaled their catalog 5x without adding internal headcount. All producers use standardized supply agreements ensuring every DMC meets centralized requirements for safety, insurance, compliance, and capacity.

5. Supply Quality Is Non-Negotiable

WeRoad works with 68-70 DMCs globally, visits partner sites, and monitors quality constantly. The rule is simple: mess up once or twice and you're out. Because each group makes different choices during unstructured time, suppliers must be flexible enough to support varied activities in every destination.

6. Community Extends Beyond Travel Through We Meet

The We Meet app hosts 10,000+ events across Europe where 50,000 people connected this year. Travel coordinators organize pottery classes, running groups, hiking, pub quizzes, and weekend trips in their home cities. This keeps travelers engaged between their one or two annual trips and drives repeat bookings.

7. One-Third of Staff Are Tech People

WeRoad built their entire platform internally: booking websites, supply platforms for internal operators and external producers, and the We Meet app. They use AI for customer service, machine learning for demand forecasting that gives suppliers 12-month projections, and sentiment analysis to understand feedback at scale.

8. Growth Comes From Digital, Community, and B2B Channels

WeRoad started with digital acquisition through social media and paid channels, building massive accounts that visualize the beauty of trips and community. They recently launched a global partnership program targeting travel agencies, employee benefit platforms, corporate retreats, and associations. This B2B channel already represents 17-18% of total volume.

9. VCs Invest in Tour Operators That Look Like Tech Platforms

WeRoad is unusually VC-backed for a tour operator because investors see them as a tech platform sustaining a brand mission. Strong unit economics in mature markets mean they can self-finance growth, but external investment accelerates new market expansion. The focus remains on sustainable growth, not burning money short-term.

10. Overwhelming Choice Kills Conversion

Andrea's biggest lesson: curate your marketplace offering early. When WeRoad first opened to travel producers, the abundance of trips—including duplicates—confused customers and decreased conversion. They now prioritize how offerings are visualized and presented, not just experience quality. US expansion is planned for 2026 after strengthening European markets, followed by Asia and Middle East. Japan is currently their most popular destination.

Christy Hunter started Photo Walk Nashville seven years ago after discovering Airbnb Experiences, combining her photography skills with local knowledge to create tours that capture memories for travelers. What began as open photo shoots quickly evolved as she learned to segment products for different customer types—bachelorette parties, couples, solo travelers, dog owners, and corporate groups.

The conversation covers her product development journey, including early mistakes like mixing incompatible customer types and learning when to say no. Christy emphasizes the importance of local partnerships, sharing examples like teaming up with cosmetic brand Winky Lux for a home base and an apartment complex for rooftop access.

On marketing, Christy shares her successful TikTok strategy: having team member Gina speak directly to camera as if she were a past guest ("You have to do this one thing in Nashville..."), which drove multiple viral videos and direct bookings. She also discusses influencer marketing from both sides—as a tour operator and as an influencer herself—stressing the importance of clear communication, doing research on engagement rates, and not asking for specific deliverables.

Christy expanded to Charleston this year when a team member relocated, keeping the same operational model rather than franchising. She's also building Go To Nashville, an OTA reselling partner experiences through Tour Base's affiliate system. Looking ahead, she's focused on increasing capacity utilization rather than geographic expansion, and launching a consulting business to help other photographers and retailers enter the tourism space.

Top 10 Takeaways

1. She learned to segment products by customer type after mixing incompatible groups. Couples from Ohio and bachelorette parties on the same tour didn't work. She created separate experiences for bachelorette parties, dog owners, proposals, and corporate groups. She also had to add rules like no showing up intoxicated.
2. Local partnerships solved operational problems. She partnered with Winky Lux cosmetics to use their store as a tour base. She partnered with an apartment complex to do one event per month in exchange for building access, free parking, gym, pool, and exclusive rooftop access for a champagne add-on.
3. She met business partner Gina through Airbnb host meetups. Gina developed scheduling systems for Photo Walk and now leads their TikTok strategy. They found a part-time scheduling manager who is also one of their hosts to keep operations in the family.
4. Styled shoots solve the content creation problem. Designate one day per quarter or year, hire models (friends and family work), hire a photographer, and simulate the tour experience. Creating content during real tours is too difficult.
5. Their TikTok strategy: Gina speaks as if she's a past guest. She says "you have to do this one thing in Nashville" direct to camera. They had multiple viral videos and saw direct booking surges. They repeat the same hook for different demographics. TikTok shows it to different audiences each time.
6. Influencer marketing is about clear communication and research. Look at engagement rates, not follower counts. Check if they have real followers by looking at views relative to follower count. Don't ask for specific deliverables. Show them a good time and they'll naturally post. Get expectations in writing.
7. She hires photographers who are connectors and storytellers first. Technical skill matters, but being a people person is more important. She uses live view mode to avoid putting the camera between her and the guest. She tells guests upfront she has posing ideas so they relax.
8. She tracks booking sources through Peak's intake form. She asks "how did you hear about us?" Her biggest sources are Google, Facebook groups (Nashville visitors pages), and TikTok.
9. Her growth strategy is "fill the bus" not geographic expansion. Rather than opening in five cities in five years, she wants to get four or five people on tours that currently have two. Same time and overhead, better revenue. She still wants to be out leading tours, not behind a computer.
10. Charleston expansion happened organically when a Nashville team member relocated. They kept the same operational model rather than franchising. She handles scheduling and marketing centrally. Charleston is 40 minutes by plane, so she can support when needed.

Ryan Connolly went from finance analyst to glacier guide to co-founder of Hidden Iceland. In this episode, he shares the numbers behind their most pivotal business decision: cutting small group tours that represented 50% of their departures but only 10% of revenue.

That shift to exclusively premium and luxury private tours helped the company grow by 5% while improving quality and profitability. Ryan explains how relationship marketing drives 70% of their bookings directly without OTAs, why they lead with education when working with travel advisors, and why PR outperforms paid advertising when selling luxury experiences.

Plus, the story of how a three-year journey across 40 countries led him to Iceland, where he met his wife on a glacier tour and built a business with two partners.

Top 10 Takeaways for Tour Operators

1. Cut unprofitable segments ruthlessly

Small group tours accounted for 50% of Hidden Iceland's departures but only 10% of revenue. After eliminating that segment, they grew 5% by focusing resources on premium and luxury private tours where margins are higher.

2. Partner with competitors instead of viewing them as threats

When customers can't afford Hidden Iceland's luxury pricing, Ryan personally introduces them to partner companies that serve the budget segment. This maintains relationships and positions them as helpful experts rather than pushy salespeople.

3. PR drives better ROI than paid ads for high ticket sales

Over 450 articles in publications like Condé Nast, Forbes, and CNN have driven 70% direct bookings. For luxury trips ($20,000+), earned media builds trust better than Facebook or Google ads.

4. Lead with personal story in first customer contact

Ryan's initial email starts: "Hello, my name is Ryan. I'm originally Scottish. I've lived in Iceland since 2016. I originally trained as a glacier guide..." This builds immediate trust and differentiates from transactional competitors.

5. Educate travel advisors. Don't just sell to them

Hidden Iceland runs webinars teaching agents about Iceland's seasons, distances, and what each time of year offers. Not sales pitches. The education first approach builds meaningful advisor relationships that generate 30% of bookings.

6. Vet activity partners on safety and environmental standards

Before partnering with snowmobile companies, helicopter tours, or other providers, Hidden Iceland shares their own safety and environmental policies first, then asks partners to reciprocate. This creates collaboration, not just transactions.

7. Train guides to be themselves, not follow scripts

Instead of teaching guides what to say at each stop, Hidden Iceland tells them: "Be yourself in the most authentic way possible and create genuine connections." This leads to reviews that praise the guide more than the destination.

8. Choose conferences strategically. Avoid the herd

Ryan skips luxury travel conferences if more than 2 or 3 other Iceland companies will attend. Less competition means easier differentiation and more meaningful conversations with travel advisors.

9. Keep the sales process low tech and high touch

Despite having a CRM (LEMACS), Hidden Iceland puts key itinerary details in the body of emails and offers phone calls early. For luxury clients, human connection trumps slick automation.

10. Build the business with partners you trust implicitly

Ryan emphasizes: "Don't set up a company with anyone you don't trust inherently and that you believe will communicate effectively during the hardest times." Through pandemics and volcanic eruptions, Hidden Iceland's three owners have never shouted at each other because they chose partnership carefully.