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Promotion strategies that get a response (literally!)
Trova's travel preferences survey (should you opt to use it) is a powerful tool for Hosts, as it can help lay the foundation for successful trips with your community. Here's how to boost engagement and gather valuable insights from your audience just by sharing it.
Key takeaways
- Meet your community where they’re at! Share your Host Profile Page link on the social channel(s) where your community is most engaged. And don’t be afraid to break into non-social media promotions as well. That email list you’ve built from blogging over the years? A survey gold mine!
- Promote across various platforms. The more potential Travelers you reach, the better. Plus, who wouldn’t jump at the opportunity to travel the world with you!
- Video is king. Announce your survey with a video featuring you speaking directly to your audience, and issuing a clear call to action to respond
- Plan to actively survey for at least a week, if not longer. Follow the posting cadence outlined below to engage your community effectively using Q+A, polls, and aspirational travel content.
- Surveying is not required to host, but is a great way to set yourself up for success, now and in the future. Stay true to your personality and brand, and your community will respond well!
The importance of survey promotion
TLDR; Conducting a survey tells you if your community is actually interested in traveling. If they are, it shows definitively where they want to go, what they want to do, and exactly how much they’re willing to spend. The more survey responses you get, the more your mathematical odds of confirming (successfully selling your trip) go up AND the more data you’ll have to base future trips on.
If you’re wondering which platform is best for surveying, the answer will always be: wherever your community is strongest. It’s true that most of our Hosts trend toward Instagram, but many have also found success across a variety of social channels. So if you have an active Facebook group or TikTok following, go there first. Concentrate your efforts on making sure your community is engaged, then cross-promote on other platforms to ensure no potential Travelers miss the memo.
And although every Creator has a main social channel where their community is the strongest, chances are you probably have a few others with at least a handful of followers and content. Don’t ignore them!
You can even find success off of social media if you have a mailing list or another network of people to contact. It might feel a little awkward or old-fashioned but, considering some of the things that find their way to our inboxes these days, a few travel questions from a friend are almost always a welcome diversion!
And remember, the more survey responses you collect the more likely you’ll be to successfully sell your trip. By the numbers, Hosts that collect 150-299 responses are nearly 3x more likely to confirm a trip than those who only get 100-149.
What to post and when
Surveying your community isn’t an exact science but, after booking over 25,000 Travelers on trips around the world, we’ve figured out a posting cadence that makes promotion easy and impactful. The survey itself is pretty simple: a handful of basic questions for potential Travelers that literally takes a couple minutes to complete. The insights from this survey allow you to plan the perfect trip by narrowing down destination, dates, price, and more.
Make sure your Host Profile link is pinned somewhere for the duration of the promotion. Link it in your bio, on your website, saved to an Instagram story highlight…you get the picture. Then record a video sharing why you want to host a trip and what excites you about bringing your community. Hit on the fact that this is a group experience and their feedback about destinations, budget, activities, etc. will actually determine what the trip looks like. In short, their feedback on destinations, budgets, and activities will play a pivotal role in selecting the perfect itinerary.
The #1 thing to keep in mind with your initial post is “be direct and make it personal.” Record the video with you front and center, speaking directly to your audience. Then, once you have your community’s attention (more on what kind of content connects in a little bit) capitalize on the moment with a clear call to action. Painting a pretty travel picture is great but it will only become reality if you ask your audience directly to participate by going to your Host Profile Page and answering the questions.
Check out how some of these Trova Hosts used video to effectively survey and excite their communities!
💡Trova Tip: Using text overlay will help get your message across no matter when or how your audience watches, and it makes for more dynamic content overall.
TrovaTrip Host Brae Hunziker shared his survey in the intro of his video to capture viewers' attention. He positioned the survey as an opportunity for him and his community to connect with other people who love film/photography and the outdoors.
Day 2
Follow up with another post (doesn’t necessarily need to be a video) to keep the momentum going and remind your followers that this trip won’t be possible without their feedback. Algorithms are unpredictable and not everyone will have seen your announcement on day 1. Or they may just need you to nudge them again, ever so gently, to take action.
Day 4
After a brief pause to let the engagement simmer, check the responses you've received in your Host portal and gauge the community's interest so far, then kick engagement up a notch. We recommend inviting your community to ask questions and answering as many as you can, as well as sharing the most popular destination picks and favorite activities. At this point, the potential trip will be coming into focus and there will be plenty for you and your community to be excited about and discuss.
Day 6
As the potential trip destinations come into clearer focus, it's time to involve your community in the decision-making process. Share what excites you about each of the top 2 or 3 destinations, then encourage people to have the final say by sharing their thoughts in the comments or DMs.
Day 7
Finally, wrap it all up by thanking your community for participating. Send a handwritten letter in your best cursive to each person that…jk, but post something telling everyone how much you appreciate their time and opinions. Whatever feels most heartfelt to share on your platforms of choice. Be sure to let folks know that more details will be coming soon as you craft an experience based on their input.
Posting so much over a week-long period can feel like you’re spamming or coming off thirsty but, trust us, you’re not. Not everyone sees everything you post, so what feels like repetition is actually just covering your bases. In fact, the average organic view rate for Instagram stories is only 4.4%, so posting more—within reason—is definitely a good thing.
Ultimately, whichever platform or platforms you decide to focus on, what really matters is staying true to yourself and your brand. Some aspiring Hosts worry way too much about making a perfect, “professional” sales pitch that appeals to everyone. That’s a lot of pressure!
The truth is, no matter what happens, the survey is a chance to get to know your community even better. So stick with what brought them to you in the first place—your personality, creativity, weird sense of humor, shared interests—and see if they’re ready to take this whole online thing into the real world. 🫶