How to enhance Totoco Ecolodge online visibility towards international clients? This document was elaborated for the Totoco Ecolodge in Ometepe Island, Nicaragua, by Hopinoer Florie Thielin, in a serie of works and studies allowing tourism professional to make their activity more sustainable.

1. Become Hopinoer
Spread the awareness, get together and act for a responsible tourism.
Hopineo for Totoco Ecolodge, Nicaragua - September 2014

2. Become Hopinoer 2 1. Understand Well your Market Segmentation
2. Develop a Pertinent Marketing Strategy
3. Develop an Efficient Digital Communication Plan
4. List clearly your Sustainable Practices

3. Become Hopinoer
3 Exclusive Weddings
Solo travelers
Couples
Friends
Families
Tour Operators NGO
Ecotourism
Rural-Community
Volcano
Birdwatching
North America
Europe
(Germany, Netherlands, UK, France, Scandinavia)
Nica & Costa Rica

4. Become Hopinoer
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Hotel Website & SEO Communication
Revenue Management
Sales
HOTEL Clear Understanding of the Market
Tour Operators
Travel Agencies
Companies
Events Agencies
Magazines
Blogs
Travel Guides
Social Media
OTAs
Dynamic Rates
Guests Reviews
KPIs

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Location + View + really in the middle of the biosphere jungle
Really very complete sustainable practices policy within the ecolodge
Eco-farm & Social foundation with volunteering program
Facebook page strategy
Blog (also good for SEO)
Travel forums (also good for SEO)
Travel guides
Press releases, bloggers and magazines (also good for SEO)
Presentation of all the sustainable practices

6. Become Hopinoer
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To keep the link with past customers: so they’ll come back, or at least, they won’t forget to recommend Nicaragua, Ometepe and Totoco around them.
To reassure potential future guests about Totoco (as you have already a lot of « Likes », are regularly active and they can see additional nice pic)
To better target specific niche markets creating other pages (Ometepe Bird Watching, Ometepe Ecotourism, Ometepe Wild Nature…).
Publish on the Totoco FB page nice pictures at least twice a week, no more than once a day: share emotions (Beauty or Fun facts).
Invite current guests to publish their best moment in Ometepe (and give them a free cocktail).
Create and publish on other thematic FB pages (Ometepe Bird Watching etc…) related content, and twice a month publish one picture which tells more specifically about Totoco.
Link the « place » and the « FB page » : http://www.quora.com/How-do-you-merge-a-Facebook-Page-and-a-Facebook-Place
Like Ka’Ana Resort Page on Facebook.
Selva Negra is not just a eco-hotel, it’s a « place of interest » to visit.

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To attract future niche market customers by publishing very specific interesting article.
To get a great google ranking (SEO), because Google likes new contents (vs. static websites), and your articles will be more shared than your website’s pages.
To make your future and current customers more satisfied because your help them to better organise their trip and answer in details to some questions that they are asking.
Write pertinent interesting articles with unique content (magazine-style) and include a reference towards Totoco within the article (don’t duplicate content, Google hates it!)
Share the article on social networks (also Google+ Page) and work well the SEO for each of them with smart pertinent keywords.
Watch out on Google Analytics the traffic indeed generated!

8. Become Hopinoer 8
Top 10 most « recherché » birds in Ometepe Island (to attract birdwatchers)
The top 5 volcanoes to be climbed in Nicaragua (including Concepcion and Maderas)
The best of Nicaragua Nature in 10 days (travel route including Totoco)
3 true eco-tourism initiatives in Nicaragua (selva negra, mariposa,totoco for example!)
How to cook a delicous gallo-pinto? (better with eco-farm products, cf eco-farm Totoco)
Do you like better Leon or Granada? (and conclude with ometepe)
…Top lists and provocating questions work usually well. To get inspired, for example: http://moon.com/destinations/central-america/nicaragua/

9. Become Hopinoer 9
To attract future customers who are doing some reasearch on Internet to get recommandation when organizing their future trip to Nicaragua.
To get a great google ranking (SEO), because Google likes to see that other websites are talking about you, it increases your e-reputation (Page Ranking).
Create yourself a profil on the main travel forums.
Answer well to questions of travelers about tips to organize their trip in Nicaragua / Central America and include a recommandation and link towards Totoco Edolodge.
Answer on a pertinent way, no SPAMMING!
Never copy paste an answer used for a previous forum, Google hates duplicated content!
Don’t do it once for all, Google prefers to see « normal activity », so go for example every week to write on forums for an hour.
When you make the link towards your website, use keywords in the hyperlink text.
You can aslo start new conversation on a specific topic.
To choose the travel forums and discussion that you may want to take part, make a research on the Google from the country you are targeting with pertinent keywords (in their language) and see which discussions appear on the first page.
Some websites like Lonely Planet have one specific forum in each language.
It can be interesting to take part to the discussion on forums for your continent/country, but as well to thematic forums (volunterring, ecotourism, adventure… etc)

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Travel Website
Country
Link to forum
Lonely Planet
International (different forums for different languages!!)
https://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/forums/americas-central- america/nicaragua
http://www.lonelyplanet.fr/forums/nicaragua
TripAdvisor
International
http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowForum-g294477-i2982-Nicaragua.html
Frommers
North America
http://www.frommers.com/community/forum-main
Voyage Forum
France
http://voyageforum.com/forum/nicaragua/
Le Routard
France
http://www.routard.com/forum/nicaragua/178.htm
E-Voyageur
France
http://www.e-voyageur.com/forum/voyage/nicaragua.136/
…

11. Become Hopinoer 11
To attract future customers who are doing some reasearch on Internet or who bought a travel guide book to help them organizing their future trip to Nicaragua.
For all these travel books, the writer in charge of the region updates the book version around every 2 years. You can’t really make him choosing to list your hotel, all what you can do is to recommend your hotel in the « accomodation suggestion » page. They say that they will then forward the form to the writer. But really the writer makes his own investigation as a traveler would do it, reading travel forums, trip advisor and talking with people once onsite.
Some of these travel books have as well an online version where they usually list more hotels than in the book version. You can usually fill in the « add a hotel » form to list your property.
On these travel guides websites, it’s usually possible to check the availability and rates of hotels. They make a selection of hotel and load their information directly from Booking.com, Expedia, Hostelworld, Hostelbookers… another reason to sell though Booking.com and Expedia (at least).

12. Become Hopinoer 12
Travel Guide
Country
Link to suggest hotel listing
Lonely Planet
International
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/contact/business_listing/new
Frommers
North America
http://www.frommers.com/contact_us#sthash.zYZWoITA.ShC9OsPb.dpbs
Le Routard
France
http://www.routard.com/hebergement_ajout.asp?
Le Petit Futé
France
http://www.petitfute.com/information/suggestion.html
Moon Travel
USA
http://moon.com/contact/
…

13. Become Hopinoer 13
List online magazines and blogs which are pertinent to your positioning (eco-tourism, bird-watching, travel in central america…)
When you’ve got an original content which could be pertinent for them to write an article about, send them an email with a short press release (in the email body and also as a PDF enclosed).
Better for your SEO if the blog/magazine has a high Page Ranking.
Better for you if the website has a good Google ranking itself and many readers (check out its twitter and facebook account).
To attract future customers who are doing some reasearch on Internet to get recommandation when organizing their future trip to Nicaragua.
To get a great google ranking (SEO), because Google likes to see that other websites are talking about you, it increases your e-reputation (Page Ranking).
http://moon.com/eco/
In french: http://www.geo.fr/voyages/guides-de-voyage/amerique/nicaragua/%28onglet%29/articles

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Cf. for example the enclosed PowerPoint presentation using the Hopineo categories to order and present the different practices.
You can then easily integrate it in your website (with an embed iframe from SlideShare.com for example), send it by emails to your customers & partners when needed, or even share it in social media.
To show to your future guests and partners that you are a true « eco » hotel with concrete practices implemented or on project.
To use it as part of your media kit if magazines want to write articles about Totoco.
To share your good practices with other hotels and businesses so they can get inspired and implement as well more sustainable practices.

15. Become Hopinoer 15
Contact :
Florie Thielin
floriethielin@gmail.com
www.hopineo.org
www.thehospitalitytour.com
www.facebook.com/thehospitalitytour
This document was elaborated for the Totoco Ecolodge in Ometepe Island, Nicaragua, in a serie of works and studies allowing tourism professional to make their activity more sustainable. What is missing? Which improvments could be done? Please, feel to free to share with us your feedback to continue building together a better future for Hopineo, its partners, and more globally for a more responsible tourism. « The recognition of tourism as an economic powerhouse and contributor to all three pillars of sustainable development – economic, environmental and social – underlined the enduring relevance of UNWTO’s mission to promote responsible, sustainable and universally accessible tourism. » World Tourism Organization, 2013