Create an automatic thank you email for a successful visitor servicing strategy

First published on August 31, 2021

Last updated on May 23, 2023

Get more reviews from a successful visitor servicing strategy by setting up a "thank-you" email automation that directs them to the review platform of your choice.

Everyone knows how important it is to gather as many high quality 5 star reviews on your Google listing, Facebook page, Trip Advisor and any other review platforms your business appears. However, no matter how good your service may be, encouraging your customers to actually make the effort to leave their glowing feedback is easier said than done.

You can make the process as easy for them as possible by giving them all the tools they need to leave a review at the click of a button. Luckily, this is something that is easily achieved through simple email marketing automation!

Visitor Servicing Strategy

When to send your email

It’s important to get the timing of your thank you email right! Obviously, your email shouldn’t be sent straight after your customer makes a purchase or a booking. You need to give them time to experience the product before getting in touch to ask for their feedback but not so much time that the email loses its relevance.

Finding that sweet spot will depend on what kind of service you offer:

As a tour operator, you’d wait to send your email until after the tour has finished.
As a hotel, you will wait until the guest has checked out and completed their stay.
As an online retailer, you might want to wait until a couple of days after your courier confirms that the delivery has been received by your customer so that they have time to use their new product.
As a personal trainer, you might wish to wait until your client has had 5+ sessions before asking for a review so that you have time to build some rapport with them.

What email marketing platform to use

Of course, you need to be using an email marketing platform in order to get started. If you’re not already using one, consider checking out Mailerlite. We use this, it is a great platform for small businesses as it is intuitive to use and has great automation functionality. Another popular option is MailChimp. Our sister company Navii, actually wrote a short comparison of the two platforms which you can view on our Instagram if you feel undecided.

Sharing review links

Finally, you need to gather the review links that you’d like to share with your clients so that you can make the process as straightforward as possible!

Google has easy to follow instructions on how to generate a review link to send to your customers. You can view their how-to page here. Sharing a Facebook review link is easy, simply add /reviews to the end of your Facebook URL (e.g.https://www.facebook.com/TourismTribe/reviews/).

For Travel inspired experiences you can’t go past Trip Advisors nifty Review Express solution. With a Trip Advisor listing, you can head to the Trip Advisor Review Express hub “create an email” from the top menu and start to configure an email that you can send directly to your passenger or hotel guest list for the day or the week. For more information on how to set up a Review Express campaign directly from the Trip Advisor platform, check out this step by step Complete Review Express Guide.

If you are prioritising one platform over another then only send them that link, otherwise you can easily add to your “thank you strategy” and email from you with your social media options giving them the option to choose their preferred platform and separately a Trip Advisor inspires request to say thank you and share the love via the above-mentioned Review Express solution.

Hannah C

Hannah has plenty of experience on front lines of the tourism industry and now works as part of the Tourism Tribe team out of their Melbourne office. She loves supporting passionate tourism operators who want to up-skill and stay competitive in our digitally-driven world.