For better or for worse - How are your guests impacting your local ecosystems?
Encouraging tourists to embrace Leave No Trace (LNT) principles as they explore your destination is not just an important part of promoting sustainable tourism–it’s foundational to preserving what you have to offer. You have an amazing place for people to visit, right? Well, it will only stay that way if thoroughly protected. To put it bluntly, encouraging your visitors to practice LNT principles is as good for business as it is for the earth.
Let’s explore how you can inspire responsibility in your guests and build your sustainable tourism brand at the same time:
Photo by Florida-Guidebook.com
Marketing & Management
The old strategy of focusing on huge marketing pushes, designed only to fill beds and sell tickets, needs to die.
GLP’s own Rob Holmes says it this way: “Amid the global tourism development boom, more destinations need to place greater emphasis on protecting nature and increasing their conservation efforts… Current and future travelers now want unique and authentic experiences. And many of them can be achieved through nature-based experiences… Nature is our holding grounds. It is where we reset ourselves and our communities.”
In fact, the GLP team was even able to put that mentality to work in a recent campaign.
The Chamber of Commerce of Sedona, Arizona began to recognize issues cropping up from overtourism in 2020. A record number of visitors had descended on the region, and the local community and natural ecosystems were bearing the strain. Sedona depends on tourism to sustain the local economy, but the explosion of activity was damaging the natural wonders and inconveniencing the locals.
It was a complex and multifaceted problem.
It took creative collaboration and intentional messaging to confront these challenges. The result? A comprehensive package of videos for Visit Sedona, which provided the chamber what they needed to appeal to conscious consumers and encourage visitors to tread lightly.
Shifting their strategies from one that drew huge crowds to one that catered to specific interests made Sedona a destination for the mindful tourist. The focus is on destination management, not marketing.
Education
“I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better.”
It’s a quote attributed to Maya Angelou and used all over the web. Educating people on how certain actions cause harm can be a key motivator in curbing those actions. The hope is that, as people become more aware about a particular topic, they’ll alter their behavior accordingly.
Maybe it’s a flawed hope… but it’s still hope.
Of course, it’s also just hard to correct old habits. That’s a simple fact. Habitual behaviors often stand in the way of travelers changing their tourism traditions.
But it’s also true that a lack of understanding surrounding sustainability has severely hindered the general public from changing their consumption behaviors over the last few decades. Many people are still unaware of how they impact the world and the communities they visit. So when it comes to protecting your local ecosystems and natural wonders, you might want to evaluate how much effort you’re putting into educating your audience.
Ways to Educate
Website
Your website is a great place to start. You can dedicate a full page to education, sprinkle informative articles into your blog, and/or encourage visitors to learn more by linking to environmental organizations. Visit the Oregon Coast has a page full of helpful sustainability information.
If you’re not sure what to include on your website, consider these options.
Information specific to your local species of flora and fauna
Permitting requirements
City ordinances
Park rules
Resources for further education
Trail maps & restrictions
Up to date burn ban maps and weather advisories
Your own brand’s initiatives and language
All of the above would be helpful in making sure visitors are well informed before traveling to your locale. And each one offers an opportunity to encourage your guests to Leave No Trace.
2. Print-Outs
Sometimes, people just need a physical reminder to do something they sincerely want to do. There’s a reason pamphlets are still a thing, even in this digital age! In some cases it makes sense to cater to this need and create something tangible for people to hold onto.
For instance, the guides at Down River Equipment, a manufacturing and distribution company that also offers river excursions, always present laminated handouts before heading downstream. They go beyond the traditional principles of LNT and get into the details of how to recreate responsibly specifically while on a river. Another company going physical is Osprey, a popular outdoor gear brand. Instead of using paper they got creative and printed the 7 LNT principles inside their products.
Feel free to think outside the box!
3. Social Media
Your social media page could arguably be the best place to consistently encourage your visitors to be conscious consumers. Consider it your steady, drip-drip-drip education platform. You can mix in your nuggets of LNT wisdom with all the great visuals and other information your audience needs.
The big dogs themselves offer great examples of this practice.
Leave No Trace’s instagram account is filled not only with educational content regarding the 7 principles, but also beautiful imagery and fun pictures of mindful people enjoying nature. And Recreate Responsibly, a coalition formed during the lockdown period of the pandemic in the United States, offers deep dives into their own principles through easy-to-read graphics.
You’ll be able to make this balance of education, marketing, and visual appeal exactly what you need it to be.
As you go about this process, do pay attention to the tone of your messaging. People don’t want to hear a doom-and-gloom outlook on the environment. And when it comes to economical sustainability, no one needs to feel shamed for unintentionally hurting local communities in their past interactions. Instead of placing blame, focus on offering ways they can help. Believe in the goodness of your audience.
Help your visitors know better so they can do better.
Photo by SivaSankara Reddy Bommireddy
Inspiration
When you’ve marketed to the right people and educated your audience, all that’s left is a little inspiration.
The city of Bend, Oregon, encourages visitors to take the Bend Pledge. How? By not only educating tourists with content about their sustainability pillars, but with quarterly drawings that award pledge takers with a weekend get-away! It doesn’t get much more inspiring than that, right?
And Travel Wyoming made waves on social media by pushing the use of the hashtag #WYResponsibly. Visitors and residents alike used it over and over to show support, educate their respective audiences, and inspire others to practice responsibility when visiting the state’s many natural tourist hotspots.
Storytelling through visuals like video, or innovative offerings like a give-away are just two of many ways to inspire your visitors to tread lightly and protect your destination!
After all, when you have a good thing going, taking care of it should be a key part of your business strategy. Encouraging your guests to partner with you in preservation efforts is a forward-thinking method of business that protects your investments and gives your brand a stable foundation on which to build.
Market with management in mind.
Educate with compassion.
Inspire with creativity.
About GLP Films
GLP Films (GLP) is an award-winning, full-service content marketing agency that empowers brands to accelerate growth, positive impact, and sustainability through strategic storytelling. Since 2008 GLP has been telling local stories globally through beautifully crafted video, engaging content and communications campaigns, and a people-first approach.
Want to inspire, create change, and embrace sustainability through storytelling? Send us a note at team@glpfilms.com and check out our work at glpfilms.com.