How Tour and Attraction Software can Unleash the Power of Business Automation

It allows business owners to automate many processes associated with running a successful tourism or attractions business, including customer service, marketing, sales, operations, and more. Automation not only helps reduce costs but also increases efficiency and productivity throughout your organization.

Here are some common Tour and Attraction Software Automations:

• Booking flows
• Price changes
• Customer outreach (SMS, Email, WhatsApp)
• Automatic reporting
• Refunding or Store Credit
• Membership renewals
• Departure cancellations

In this article, we will discuss how tour and attraction software can unleash the power of business automation for your company. We'll look at some of its features as well as how it can benefit your bottom line in the long run. So if you're looking to take advantage of automation technology to stand out from the crowd, read on!

Tour and Attraction Software Automations 

Automation is the act of increasing efficiency by performing routine tasks with technology. The implication for businesses is that skilled humans will have more time to perform value added services as routine tasks are automated.

We are currently in the golden age of automation, as software-as-a-service business models are deploying custom B2B software at an incredible rate of growth. At RocketRez, we have spent over a decade examining processes from all types of Tours and Attractions businesses and building tools to increase output through automation.

It is a useful exercise to examine the flow of all processes and functions performed in your business by people and assess which can be improved by technology.

• What processes are most important to your customer’s experience?
• What processes does a human being add value to beyond a machine?
• What processes can a machine perform better?

Here are our suggestions for functions that can be automated to increase revenue and reduce costs for Tour and Attraction businesses.

Forms and Waivers 

Many Tour and Attraction operators must cover their bases of liability by taking a waiver when there is an element of risk to customers – such as a boat tour or amusement park ride. This is a case where automation not only eliminates the human error of taking and collecting paper forms and signatures, but also improves customer experience through “on-your-time" signing with convenient email documentation.

Another form of customer information is collecting reviews and surveys, which is never an easy task. Customers in an involved experience like a Tour or Attraction can be difficult to corral for a round of questions, to the point that it is highly effective to send them an automated email to collect information after the fact. Net Promoter Scores are a very effective measurement of customer success and can do wonders for understanding your customers and how to improve your offering. In addition, a high NPS score can be used as a marketing tool, as hospitality businesses are judged largely based on customer reviews.

Automation tools are particularly adept at performing functions that require collecting and documenting information from many different people and can provide an immediate boost in staff capacity and organization in a Tour or Attraction setting.

Analytics

A company with as many moving parts as a theme park, zoo or aquarium is tracking many inputs to understand the health of their organization. In many mid-market operations, it is common to track metrics with a set of different spreadsheets and software that does not communicate with each other. Garnering useful information about your business can be difficult in this scenario as it requires a human to clean, sort and present data between departments.

All-in-one enterprise software provides a large advantage by automating these human functions into instant reports, dashboards and downloadable spreadsheets. The effect of having your data visualized simply, and shared easily, is that all managers across different departments can now easily adopt a data driven decision making process.

The result of enabling and upskilling teams to make better decisions by department is often an improved bottom line for the company.

Sales and Marketing 

The most powerful automation that modern businesses are experiencing is the ability to sell products and services direct to customers online. In the early days of the internet, this was a cumbersome process that required technical ability to perform effectively. In the current era, it is simple and inexpensive to launch a fully functional website, send invoices and take payments.

Automating online sales allows for significant advantages over a human interaction in that the system can run 24/7. Tours and Attractions companies with streamlined online sales are at an advantage when it comes to vacation booking, running on different time zones and impulse upsell purchases which all add up to a meaningful increase in revenue. Referrals through OTAs and booking agents are also seamless from a customer’s perspective.

Sales and Marketing teams can also meaningfully increase their close rate and capacity by automating documentation and follow up cadences using a Customer Relationship Management system. These are particularly effective for budgeting and revenue forecasting, as a simple graphical representation of expected revenue at each stage in your pipeline is readily available to all stakeholders.

RocketRez Top Automations  

RocketRez powers the online booking and ticketing for many boat and car tours across the world. Tour operators need many touch points with customers before and after they are on their tour, thus rely on email and SMS automations that are easily coded into your sales process using an “if this, then that” automation trigger.

Sending customers a series of Trip Reminder emails allows customers a last chance to cancel their trip (allowing you to fill their seat) putting you in control of “no-shows”, remind customers of any documentation or requirements they must bring and give them a chance to follow your email list or social media accounts.

Many RocketRez customers have a retail store or gift shop that drives significant revenue with upsell purchases through the RocketRez Web Engine. Equipped with all the best tools of modern eCommerce, RocketRez customers enjoy the Cart Abandonment automated email that sends a reminder to customers to finish the online purchase they previously began. Online customers get distracted easily – thus it is imperative to ensure a smooth buying experience and additional touch points to convert all customers who have interest.

Harnessing the power of automation with your Tour and Attraction software can super-charge your business and empower your people with a reasonable up-front investment.