Wish You Were Here: 5 Marketing Tips for Destinations and Attractions to Reach Prospective Visitors

When it comes to des­ti­na­tions and attrac­tions, there are more options for poten­tial vis­i­tors than ever before. There’s also a strong con­sumer appetite, with 91% of Amer­i­can leisure trav­el­ers plan­ning to trav­el with­in the next six months, accord­ing to a recent Long­woods Inter­na­tion­al study. With prospec­tive cus­tomers care­ful­ly con­sid­er­ing where they want to go and how they want to spend their mon­ey, it can be tough to stand out among the crowd. Here we share five tips to reach con­sumers, earn their busi­ness, and keep them com­ing back.

Own What Sets You Apart 

One of the things we love about work­ing in the tourism and hos­pi­tal­i­ty space is how unique des­ti­na­tions and attrac­tions are. From can’t‑miss road­side stops, to jaw-drop­ping views, to world-class arts and cul­ture, to one-of-a-kind inter­ac­tive expe­ri­ences, we love get­ting to know what makes our clients spe­cial and turn­ing that into a mar­ket­ing superpower.

Con­sid­er the fol­low­ing questions:

• How would you describe your destination/attraction to some­one who’s nev­er been?
• What can vis­i­tors do at your destination/attraction that they can’t do any­where else?
• Who are your top com­peti­tors? How are you dif­fer­ent from them?
• What are your values?
• What’s new at your destination/attraction?

Use the answers to these ques­tions to devel­op your unique val­ue propo­si­tion and mes­sag­ing to serve as the guid­ing light to your tourism mar­ket­ing efforts. This helps ensure you and your team stay on mes­sage and own what makes you spe­cial, and why cus­tomers should choose you.

Nar­row In on Your Ide­al Guest List 

This sum­mer alone, more than 117 mil­lion Amer­i­cans were expect­ed to trav­el, spend­ing an esti­mat­ed total of more than $452 bil­lion on flights and hotel stays, accord­ing to NerdWallet’s 2025 Sum­mer Trav­el Report. It’s cru­cial to iden­ti­fy your pri­or­i­ty prospec­tive vis­i­tors and focus on efforts that will reach them and move the nee­dle for your des­ti­na­tion or business.

Think about dif­fer­ent poten­tial cus­tomers, includ­ing locals, folks with­in dri­ving dis­tance and those who would trav­el by air, rail or boat. Care­ful­ly assess his­tor­i­cal reser­va­tion and tick­et data, along with any oth­er research or insights you have avail­able, to iden­ti­fy and pri­or­i­tize your key audiences.

Make the News: Earn Third-Par­ty Credibility 

Earned media is a great way to reach wide audi­ences and stretch mar­ket­ing dol­lars. In addi­tion, accord­ing to anoth­er recent Long­woods study, 40% of trav­el­er respon­dents said they are either some­what like­ly or very like­ly to use Chat­G­PT or sim­i­lar AI soft­ware in the plan­ning process for their next trip. What do these two things have to do with each oth­er? Research from Hard Num­bers states Large Lan­guage Mod­els, or LLMs, rely on edi­to­r­i­al media for 61% of their con­tent about brand reputation.

With earned media’s increas­ing impor­tance in reach­ing poten­tial cus­tomers, gen­er­at­ing a con­tent cal­en­dar of time­ly top­ics to pitch to media is cru­cial. Con­sid­er when you need to get in front of short-lead media con­tacts, along with how far in advance long-lead out­lets, like mag­a­zines, work ahead. Cre­at­ing a cal­en­dar will help pri­or­i­tize when to reach out and what to share with your key audi­ences, help­ing deliv­er results.

Inspire, Inform and Engage Through Con­tent and Social Media

Cre­at­ing con­tent that res­onates with poten­tial vis­i­tors is key. Owned chan­nels, such as your web­site, blog and newslet­ter, should be reg­u­lar­ly eval­u­at­ed to ensure accu­ra­cy and up-to-date infor­ma­tion. Accord­ing to Hard Num­bers’ research, owned media is not only anoth­er top source for LLMs to get infor­ma­tion about brand rep­u­ta­tion, it also helps con­sumers con­nect with you and start to for­mu­late their opin­ions on if they want to spend their hard-earned dol­lars with you. New con­tent should be devel­oped fre­quent­ly, whether that’s sam­ple itin­er­aries, vis­i­tor guides, FAQs, roundups of activ­i­ties, places to go, things to do, where to eat, etc. At the root of it all, focus on how you can pro­vide prospec­tive vis­i­tors with inspi­ra­tion and the info they need to plan a trip.

In addi­tion, the Amer­i­can Express’ 2025 Glob­al Trav­el Trends Report shares that 80% of mil­len­ni­als and Gen Zers sur­veyed like the con­ve­nience of using trav­el plan­ning apps or social media to help plan their jour­neys, so it’s impor­tant to give social media con­tent the atten­tion it deserves. That means more than just post­ing reg­u­lar­ly. It means hav­ing a clear strat­e­gy plan­ning out thought­ful con­tent, engag­ing with your com­mu­ni­ty and inspir­ing vis­i­tors to devel­op their own con­tent. While planning’s impor­tant, don’t be afraid of jump­ing on appro­pri­ate trends and quick-turn oppor­tu­ni­ties, too.

Afford­able = Accessible 

While tout­ing free or low-cost options may feel coun­ter­in­tu­itive for des­ti­na­tions who are look­ing to dri­ve rev­enue, we encour­age lean­ing into these offer­ings. The recent Long­woods study reports that infla­tion, per­son­al finan­cial sit­u­a­tions, gas prices and air­fare costs are con­cerns impact­ing trav­el deci­sions. In fact, 22–32% of respon­dents rat­ed each of these four top­ics as “great­ly impact­ing” their trav­el plans. Pro­vid­ing insid­er tips on bud­get-friend­ly ideas can help expand your poten­tial cus­tomer pool and leave con­sumers feel­ing proud of how they can stretch their dol­lars. For exam­ple, clear­ly com­mu­ni­cat­ing to prospec­tive vis­i­tors about days of the week and/or times of year where rates are low­er is a win-win: it helps con­sumers find some­thing that works for their bud­get, and it dri­ves traf­fic to you dur­ing off-peak times.

High­light­ing free or low-cost options doesn’t mean trav­el­ers won’t come vis­it or won’t spend any mon­ey – in fact, it may mean they can make a trip work after all. Plus, it shows that all are wel­come at your des­ti­na­tion or attrac­tion, regard­less of the size of their pocketbook.

These five tips can help you reach your goals as you plan for the remain­der of the year and think ahead to 2026. If you’d like to learn more about how our team can help, we’d love to chat. Drop us a note at info@bellmontpartners.com, and we’ll be hap­py to connect!