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WEBSITE STRATEGY PROCESS IMPLEMENTATION
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W E B S I T E S T R A T E G Y I M P L E M E T A T I O N
Marketing Hotels & Tourism Book Series
Introduction
The Website Strategy Process is a system to effectively analyze, develop and
implement objective of the website. It starts by systematically gathering,
evaluating and prioritizing all aspects of the market, clients needs,
competition and resources to establish feasible objective for effective
website design and messaging.
For basic background information on this, see the blog “What is Website
Strategy Process” at http://markhat.com/what-is-website-strategy-process/
The journey has 3 phases - Discovery, Innovation and Strategy. It starts
starts with the Discovery Process.
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Addendum to 3 Book Series - Website | Digital Media |Technology

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Discovery Process
The Website Strategy Process is an integrated system that pulls together
strategies from the leading marketing professionals, sales experts,
psychology and neuroscience. It is a proprietary system of know-how and
technology developed by the founder of the largest international network of
independent marketing consultants: The Power Marketing Consultants
Network (PMCN).
The “Discovery Process” includes a series of
questions that will reveal background
information, target market insights,
benefits, objections and competition. It will
ask questions and dig deep into the
answers.
Example: “Why should someone buy from
you instead of your competitor?”.
The Typical Answers is often: “Because our
service is better”.
That is a platitude! Marketing is full of
them. You need to dig deeper to reveal
exactly how and why it is better.
The discovery process is intense. It will
gather specifics on current marketing, target
markets, objections, benefits and
comparison.
When completed, it can lead to “AHA!”
moments and innovation in the way you
market and do business.
Need For Innovation
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Paradise is a Platitude, much like saying,
“we are the best”.

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Consider the travel and tourism industry and look at a typical advertisement
or marketing campaign. The typical advertisement and search technology
feature location, the view, the beach, rates, rooms and amenities. All
are important but they are not going to differentiate your product from the
others out there. These are commodities and, like all commodities, they tend
to be very similar from one place to the next. What is always unique is
personality.
Hospitality is a cultural experience. A vacation is personal: Who you
are and who your clients are are vital pieces of information you need to
know in order to innovate. Source: matchmaker.travel
The Travel Industry has not had any major innovations over the last decade.
Everyone is reinventing the wheel. Two decades ago, the big step forward
was the Online Travel Agent (OTAs). That changed the game and OTAs were
so successful that they now account for about 50% of bookings. No one has
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Think Differently

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any incentive to innovate because the system works. New entries simply do
the same thing with variations in commissions and packages.
AirBnb was the next major disrupter, bringing every homeowner into the
business. They competed with traditional hotel rooms and muddied the
water on alternative accommodation.
Alternative Accommodation - including Independent Hotels, Apartments and
Villas - must now compete with OTAs, AirBNB and Hotel Chains that are
rapidly adopting self-catering options.
So, the big question is: how can the traditional players innovate and
especially, how can the independent alternative accommodation compete?
The first step is the Discovery Process.
Conducting the Discovery Process
With skillful analysis the messaging system for your website will create a
distinct personal advantage and strategy that will permeate throughout the
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Research and evaluation to reveal insights – Source: KEXINO Biz Planning

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website, online and offline. It will direct your website design, navigation,
advertising and content marketing.
This Discovery Phase needs to be coordinated by a skilled market and
business analyst. You can find a trained and certified consultant near you by
searching the Power Marketing Consultant Network (PMCN).
https://www.powermarketing.net/find-consultant/
Business managers and owners are not typically the best people to do this.
Internal business professionals have preconceptions and biases that will
skew vital research. The Discovery Process requires new skills, knowledge
and a fresh outsider prospective.
Website Strategy Process
The discovery process leads to clarity in marketing objectives and creates a
framework. Its aim is to uncover anything that is unique about the company
service or product. Next is to fine tune this for the Website Strategy Process
in order to fine tune the website and marketing message.
Again, this is a series of questions used to reveal insights:
The first series of questions is to help clarify what you want your
prospects to do on entering the website. That may seem trivial but
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Implementing the Website Strategy Process

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understanding who your customers are can require a lot of soul searching.
Are your website visitors ready to buy or are they looking for information
and is that what you want?
Here you come to grips with what exactly you want them to do and if is this
is reasonable. Possible actions are calling, leaving contact information,
watching a video, reading an article, asking a question, downloading a
brochure or researching papers or booking a vacation. It’s not always that
easy but the exercise will bring clarity.
The second series of questions will focus on what you want prospects
to learn about your offer. Here you may focus on some objections,
like people not understanding your uniqueness. In this case, you will need to
explain it in a way that resonates.
In the process for one of the hotels we worked with, this meant changing the
name, band and internet address, as well as creating content that addressed
and corrected the objections. The solution may be bold and out of the box. If
you want to be unique you must act differently.
Diego Rodriguez, CEO of the Power Marketing Consultant Network (PMCN,)
tells a story of an agricultural product company that had developed a
product to enhance crops. Framers just did not believe them, saying: “It’s all
Snake Oil; everyone says that.” The solution was an ad campaign and trade
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Travel Lighter to go Further - It covers the feature (lighter), benefit (to travel
further) and negates a problem (luggage is heavy).

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show strategy that shouted out: “NOT SNAKE OIL!” – It was a resounding
success.
Question three focuses on the reasons why prospects visit your site.
What information are they seeking or what is it that they want to find on
your website? You can see how these questions build on each other and
demand clarity. If the answer is that most visit because of your ads, – then
you will need specific landing pages for those ads. The strategy will be very
different if they are coming from social media, search or referrals.
Each of these questions look for information about the brand and the
destination. The website navigation must be designed to accommodate and
direct people accordingly.
Prioritizing Actions & Hot Buttons
The next task it to put your answer in order of important.
-The order of the answers to Question 1 will be based on what action you
want prospects to take.
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Hot Buttons Messaging - Chapter 5 of WEBSITE

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- Answers to Question 2 will be put in order according to what you want
them to learn
- Answers to Question 3 will be in order according to what you think they
want and the reason why they visit your site.
The next task is to be clear on how you will satisfy these needs. From
this your team will be clear on the motivators and you messaging.
- Question 1 can give you an insight into Hot Button #1.
Similarly, questions two and three are good subjects for Hot Buttons 2 & 3.
Your answers are good assets for the ‘Benefits’, ‘Objection’ and
‘Comparisons’ hot buttons. They are the three things that your prospects
most care about. You may consider using them in a video that tell your story
and your value proposition.
Innovation in Hospitality Website Strategy
So, how do you get to the Snake Oil breakthrough? Is there a great tag line
like “It’s “NOT SNAKE OIL” for hotels and tourism? For the hotel that is
quiet and out of the way, it’s something along the lines of: ᕼOᒪIᗪᗩYᔕ
ᗯITᕼOᑌT ᑕᖇOᗯᗪᔕ.
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Come to Disappear - Celebrities love this

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The Crane Resort took this a step further with:
ᗯE ᗪOᑎ’T ᑕOᗰE ᕼEᖇE TO ᗷE ᔕEEᑎ, ᗯE ᑕOᗰE ᕼEᖇE TO ᗪIᔕᗩᑭᑭEᗩᖇ.
The Crane Resort also supplemented that with: “When You Get Here, -
You’ll Know.” The tag line should become clear in the Strategy Process and
Hot Buttons.
For the independent hotel and tourism company, it’s a real struggle to get
direct bookings. - You may check out services like TripTease and
TravelTripper that have widgets that will compete by comparing rates with
all OTAs. This may cause problems with the rate parity rules of your OTAs so
you need to check that out.
There are sales funnel strategies that will help you use the right language
for booking buttons (Why Book With Us? Because we know this Island better
than anybody else).
There are opt-out widgets that will pop up a with special offer or a reason
to stay, leave contact details or get in contact with prospects when they are
leaving you site.
But 95% Don’t Book: The fundament flaw in tourism bookings is that no
more than 5% of site visitors will book. So, what to do about the other 95%?
- That is a really a big piece of the pie.
In the discovery and strategy process, you should gain insight into why
people are visiting your site. In a lot of cases, people are just exploring
options. They may be still pondering on which destination to go to and what
kind of a holiday they need.
Information is key: Just about all of the prospects are in the market for
excellent and insightful information about the destination and alternative
options.
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So, here is an idea. It’s not new but it’s not used extensively or well in
tourism. If prospects want information, - funnel them off to a page that
gives them an inkling of what you know- and get them to log in for a full
impartial report, guide or app.
It could be your own unique guide of your destination with secret things to
do; a destination guide you write from personal experience. You can get
ideas of what your guests liked and document it. The report may contain
first-person accounts. It could be an exclusive app with package options for
your guests.
Once you have an email contact, you can send them notices of news and
events that will interest them. Always add tour specials, current promotions
and exclusive promos that can only be booked via your site.
Reviews
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Lead Magnet - Gift Real Value In Exchange For Contact

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The final step is to gather 5-star reviews that validate the benefits and
comparisons, as well as invalidate the objections. All of the research and
insights are merged to create a strategy for content, navigation and design.
Conclusion
Many websites are designed by graphic artists first with graphics first. This is
putting the cart before the horse. Few artists are professional marketers and
a website can be the most important marketing instrument you will own!
Take the time to do it right. Put aside at least 4 hours to work with brand
marketing experts. It takes deep serious thought and evaluation to build an
effective website marketing and design strategy.
The website design, theme and navigation are the last items in the website
strategy. Your brand identity, target market and messaging will dictate the
feel, design, colour, photography, videos and graphics of the site.
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Don’t make the mistake of putting your design before the message

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More on Hotel & Tourism Marketing Today
This report was created for buyers of the book WEBSITE, one of 3 books in
the series of Marketing Hotels and Tourism.
The Books are available on Amazon in Digital format for download and
Paperback.
WEBSITE | DIGITAL MEDIA | TECHNOLOGY - soon
Learn more about the books:
http://marketinghotelstourismonline.com
© Ian R. Clayton
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Marketing Hotels & Tourism Series - Learn More