Your Guests Aren't Buying a Tour. They're Buying a Story About Themselves.

Your customers are not buying your product or experience.

If you're a winery, they're not buying wine. If you're five star accommodation, they're not buying a room. If you're a provedore, they're not buying boutique meats. If you're a tour operator, they're not buying a seat on the bus.

So what are they buying? And why is it critical that you have clarity about this?

What they're really buying

If you are a winery and they buy a bottle of wine, they're buying an identity. They're taking home the memory of the experience and a brag worthy moment for friends. A souvenir of sorts.

If you're a tour operator, they're buying an identity. The idea that they are an adventurer, an explorer or perhaps even a risk taker. Someone who leads an exciting or rich life.

If you're a provedore, they're buying an identity that connects with the idea of supporting makers and creators. A connection to provenance and personal stories.

I know it's a stretch to apply this to buying a carton of milk or chewing gum. But we're talking about tourism products and experiences, not everyday items. Sharing an experience becomes a story about us. There is brag worthiness about it.

When we discover something different, we want to share the story because it elevates our self worth. That's why word of mouth travels. The business connects us to our aspirational identity, and through the process, builds its brand too. We remember the brand because we remember how it made us feel.

Lon Retreat knows

There's a property on the Bellarine Peninsula in Victoria called Lon Retreat. Gorgeous gardens. A location close enough to hear the waves crashing. Only a handful of rooms. There are many accommodation choices in regional Victoria, so why would someone from Melbourne choose this one? Because from day one, the owner has had clarity about the brand she is building, whom she is making it for, and what it says about the guests who visit. You don't just get brag worthiness when you stay. You feel like you've arrived, or are arriving, in life.

What does engaging with your product or experience say about your customer?

Understanding this, articulating it and delivering on it is terribly important to your business. Yet if I stood in front of a room of one hundred tourism business owners and asked them to raise their hand if they could describe their ideal customer with certainty and clarity, I'm betting fewer than ten could.

Brand is the premium

The only way to rise above a commodity price in your segment is to build a brand that other people care about, want to talk about and want to share in, long term. To have incredible clarity about what your brand says about your ideal customer.

When you get this right, everything gets easier. How you describe and position your product becomes more effortless. The images you capture, the words on your website, the way staff speak to guests. All of it flows from knowing who the customer is and who they get to be when they book with you.

Great brands make for not only great businesses. They stand the test of time, and they're how you charge a premium.

Product plus brand is greater than product alone.

You want to be building a great brand, not just a great business.