Zip Line Marketing Hits and Misses

In the last year, visitors posted 65 reviews on TripAdvisor compared to 262 on Facebook, and the social media giant refers 1.8 times the number of customers as TripAdvisor.

It’s hard to know if The Gorge’s reviews specifically cause more customers to come from Facebook, or if other posted content also plays a large role. Moreover, despite having hundreds more reviews on Facebook, TripAdvisor still beats it in a Google search.

Caveats aside, The Gorge nails a fundamental online marketing tenet: find out where your customers spend their time, and insert yourself into
their conversations.

VIDEO

Now for one of the single-biggest changemakers in marketing this year. It’s infiltrating marketing from all sides: web design, social media, and even tour offerings. Yes, I’m talking about video.

Last summer, Facebook overtook YouTube as the platform with the most video views. Then there’s GoPro, the company leading the way in a changing era of media production, to consider. Video is only going to grow more important in the future.

For zip lines and aerial parks, there is no medium more effective than video at capturing a stunning, action-packed tour.

Sure enough, video has crept into zip line and aerial park websites, though to varying degrees. In a sample of 10 of the top zip lines on TripAdvisor, more than half showcase video footage somewhere on the home page. For adventure parks, however, the story reads slightly differently. Just 40 percent of a small TripAdvisor sample utilize videos on the home page.

As with anything, however, more does not always mean better.

The Overkill Award: Navitat Canopy Adventures, N.C.

If a picture is worth 1,000 words, video is worth 10,000. So: if what you’re hoping to convey can easily be summed up in a paragraph, don’t beat web visitors over their heads with videos. Do you really need three minutes to talk about every different element of your business and tour?

All that excess can be confusing and distracting. In fact, packing your home page with this type of content might even distract a potential customer from the ultimate goal—getting them to book a tour.

Video, just like your marketing strategy as a whole, should be used deliberately. Plastering your website with videos for videos’ sake won’t automatically drive more sales. The videos should wow your customers—not make them wonder why they’re still watching.