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London is bursting with activities for tourists. For operators offering experiences that sidestep mainstream tourist traps, though, finding the right audience can be challenging.
Key Takeaways
Prioritize the channels that bring you bookings. Almost 60% of Gorgeous Events’ bookings come through OTAs, with GetYourGuide accounting for about 80% of that total.
Reach beyond your established audience. GetYourGuide has helped Gorgeous Events attract more of its core American audience while also bringing in guests from Germany and other markets.
Use influencer campaigns to introduce your tours to new customers. GetYourGuide’s campaigns brought Gorgeous Events more attention and bookings, showing Obi the value of investing in social media.
Show your experience at its best. Free photography and video support from GetYourGuide replaced Obi’s phone pictures with professional content, giving his listing a more appealing presence.
Build demand to support your next hire. Gorgeous Events now welcomes around 10 times as many guests as it did six years ago, putting Obi in a position to take on another member of staff.
Six years ago, Gorgeous Events welcomed just one or two guests a week. Today, founder Obi Opara has grown his audience by over 1,000% for his top-rated African and Caribbean food tours through Brixton.
Obi says that his mission is “to do something to celebrate the legacy of black British culture and the black British people that came over and settled in this country. To share those stories and to provide people with unique experiences from the real heart and soul of London.”
Obi adds, “A lot of people come to London, and they do Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, and Trafalgar Square, but there's more to London than that. I want to try to pay respects to the legacy of those who came before us.”
What are the main challenges of being a small operator?
You've got to be consistent. There are always going to be good days where you've got 10-12 people on the tour, and then there are days that you might have one or two bookings. You still have to turn up and have the same energy for one or two people that you'd have for a full 12 people.
So, whether I've got a broken leg, being a solo practitioner, I still go out, because what I've noticed is that many people say, this is the thing that they're most looking forward to doing. So, for me not to turn up and to let them down, I would also be doing my neighborhood a disservice.
How has collaborating with OTAs such as GetYourGuide expanded your audience?
Collaborating with GetYourGuide has been very beneficial to me because of the markets it targets. I get a lot of American customers on my tour. About 90% of my audience are black American females aged around 35-45. Many of them are professionals, such as doctors, lawyers, and pharmacists. They generally bring their partners with them, or they're traveling with their girlfriends
When I first started, it was still mostly black people, but slightly older. Now, I’m also getting a lot more white people on the tour as well. I have probably two or three a week from German-speaking countries. I ask them to leave the review in German, so other German speakers know this is for them too.
How many guests do you typically welcome each year? And has that changed recently?
When I first started, six years ago, it was dire. I had maybe one or two people a week in my first year, and then, I lost a few years to COVID. When people started traveling again, I jumped in with full force, and I’ve noticed a steady increase.
Now, I'm averaging 20-25 people a week. I was non-stop to the point where, this year, I’m looking to take on another member of staff to help with the tours.
Notably, in May 2023, Beyoncé came for the Renaissance concerts, and there was a huge spike in all my tours, and then, I got a lot more reviews. Concerts had a big impact on the bookings on GetYourGuide. Last year, you had Usher coming over, Beyoncé again, Kendrick Lamar, and Taylor Swift; they brought over these crowds from the US to London, and I find that those fans are constantly looking for things to do in London.
What inspired you to partner with GetYourGuide?
An American lady who took my tour mentioned that it is really big in the States and that I should look into getting on it. I went to the website, and I liked the interface. It looked really cool and simple. I applied, and within three or four days, it was approved.
How has GetYourGuide supported your operation?
There has been so much willingness to support what I'm doing. All the pictures you see on my profile now are from GetYourGuide. Beforehand, I had basic pictures taken on my phone, and they weren’t high-quality.
GetYourGuide said that I have an amazing product, and we think we can help you. We want to bring a photographer and a videographer down to handle all your pictures and everything else. We want to do this so that your platform page looks more appealing, and it's completely free. You can keep the pictures and all the video footage. We just want to use it to help increase your profile on the page.
GetYourGuide also sent influencers to take my tour. They had huge followings, like 600-700,000 followers, and I just saw a tick up across my channels. It was amazing and helped to put the tour out in a different sphere, because up until then, I wasn't really using social media like that, and to see how powerful it could be made me think, “Okay, I need to improve my game in this area here, and it's definitely helping my business.”
What percentage of your bookings come through OTAs rather than direct channels?
When I first started, it was about 90% OTAs, and now that’s decreased since my new website launched. Currently, OTAs account for almost 60% of my bookings, with GetYourGuide leading the way at 80% of that. I do still assign most of my availability to GetYourGuide.
The biggest impact comes from the reviews. As tour operators, we live and die by reviews. I'm always asking people to please leave a review, and GetYourGuide has an automated feature that, within four or five hours of the tour ending, sends a notification asking for a review. Reviews really do help to sell the tours.
How have you adapted your offering recently?
Yes, I was originally doing tours that ran from 3.5 to 4 hours, and now I’ve scaled them down. What I find is that people don't want to walk for three hours on a food tour.
Instead, we spend the first hour on the conventional food tour, which involves walking through Brixton Market and having small bites. Then we spend the next hour and a half sitting down at a restaurant, where we actually break bread with each other.
We tell more stories, and we honor the legacy of the Caribbeans and Africans who came to the country.
