Self-guided tours offer a unique and personalized way to explore cities, museums, and attractions. These tours provide a more flexible and engaging option compared to traditional guided tours. With the added benefits of reduced staffing costs, increased capacity, and enhanced accessibility, self-guided tours have become an increasingly popular choice for businesses seeking to attract and retain visitors.
However, creating these experiences requires both time and technical expertise. Platforms often require the visitor to install an app too.
That’s where Wintor comes in. Wintor’s innovative online editor empowers organizations to craft immersive, self-guided tours easily. Visitors can view the content of your tour via their browser, without installing any apps!
This blog post explains how that works and how to create a self-guided tour in a day.
Step 1: Prepare your tour
Before creating your self-guided tour, it’s essential to define its purpose clearly.
Understanding the goal of the tour will shape its structure and storyline. We always suggest having one key theme in your tour, that you can use to structure the entire storyline.
The goal might be to tell the story of one specific painter, an era, a historical event, or a particular subject. The story might also be the highlights of your destination, but explain why these subjects are your highlights. Visitors want to understand that.
Equally important is knowing your visitor. Who will be taking your self-guided tour? A tour designed for families might focus on storytelling and interactive quizzes for example. Another tour designed for experts might include longer texts and more details.
The next step is planning the route and identify points of interest that align with the tour’s goal and story. The self-guided tour should be logical, easy to follow, and accessible to all visitors. Remember: because it's a self-guided tour, there's no-one to help when they get lost. It should be incredibly simple to follow.
Step 2: create and collect the media
For each spot on your route, do your research and write up the texts of the story. The texts can be narrated later using a text-to-voice system of Wintor by the way!
From our experience we have learned that people prefer concise and short texts. You might want to use AI tools such as ChatGPT to help you write the text in simpler language. Simply copy and paste the text and ask the AI to rewrite in B1 level. That's the same level most governmental websites use to make their texts accessible.
When you have written the texts, collect or create the media. You can use pictures, videos, quizzes, YouTube videos, 3D models, and audio.
Next up: go to web.wintor.com, create an account, and upload all your files.
Step 3: create the tour with Wintor
Now that everything is prepared and the media you want to use is uploaded, you can create the tour.
Step 1) Click on 'create tour' and follow the steps to create a blank tour.
Step 2) Click on 'add' and create a new standard spot.
Step 3) Add a title of the spot and enter the text you want people to read into the description. Then select an image for this spot and click 'save'
Step 4) Now you can use the 'import media' or 'add media' buttons to attach media to the spot.
Now that your first spot is almost done. Navigate to the tour menu and select 'maps'. Here you can add the spot to a location. You can also upload a custom indoor map (as an image) and use that.
If you click the button next to the title of the tour, you can try it yourself! Or via the link in the share menu.
Step 4: Market Your Tour
Once your tour is ready, it’s time to share it with the world! Wintor makes it easy to promote your tour to tourists visiting your city. Here’s how you can effectively market your tour:
Shareable Link: Wintor generates a unique link for each tour, which you can share via social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Post this link on your website or blog and encourage tourists to explore your tour before they arrive in the city. Simply create the shareable link using the 'share'-button.
Collaborate with Local Businesses: Partner with local hotels, cafes, and visitor centers to display your tour link on their websites or brochures. Many travelers rely on recommendations from local spots, and this can drive more tourists to your guide.
Tourism Boards and City Websites: Reach out to your city’s tourism board and get your tour featured on official visitor guides or city websites. This adds credibility and makes it easier for tourists to find your tour while planning their trips.
Targeted Ads: Use social media ads or Google Ads to reach tourists who are searching for things to do in your city. You can target ads based on location, interests, and travel intent, making sure your tour is seen by potential travelers.
Engage with Influencers: Work with travel bloggers or local influencers who can feature your tour in their content. A positive review or mention can boost the visibility of your tour among their followers.
With these strategies, you’ll be able to attract more tourists to your city’s highlights and offer them an engaging, self-guided experience!
Create a self-guided tour today
And there you have it! In just a short time, we've created a fully interactive online guide using Wintor. From gathering your content and organizing your story to building and customizing each spot with media, quizzes, and more—Wintor offers a straightforward way to bring your ideas to life. Whether you're creating a city tour, museum guide, or any other self-guided experience, the platform helps you easily upload media, set up locations, and enhance each spot with rich multimedia. With Wintor, you're only a few steps away from sharing your story with the world!
Now it's your turn to create a stunning online guide. Happy exploring!
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