Twenty Years of Growth:
How Bulldog Tours Enhanced Their Success Through Guest Focus
Founded by John LaVerne, Bulldog Tours has become a cornerstone of Charleston’s tourism industry over the past 21 years. What started as a hobby has grown into a comprehensive tour operation serving over 100,000 visitors annually. The company offers an extensive range of experiences – from ghost tours in Charleston’s historic jail and USS Yorktown to culinary adventures on Upper King Street, and historical walks through antebellum homes and cobblestone streets.
Notably, Bulldog Tours operates with a mission beyond tourism. The company has raised $6 million for the preservation of historic site affiliates in Charleston through their sustainable tourism model, which invests a portion of all ticket proceeds back into the properties they tour. This commitment to preservation began with their first partnership to raise funds for The Old Exchange Building and has expanded to support numerous historically significant landmarks.
Despite this impressive growth and community impact, John recognized that having expert guidance earlier could have accelerated his success and helped avoid common pitfalls in the industry.
The Challenge
The tourism industry has evolved significantly since Bulldog Tours’ early days. “This industry’s gotten really complicated in the last twenty years,” John explains. “You now have OTAs that you have to deal with, whether it’s Viator or Get Your Guide. We’ve got social media, which is a bottomless pit. You have email marketing, which is a bottomless pit. You have to do video blogs and it’s very involved.”
Without structured guidance, John built his business through trial and error.
“I just had to learn off of hundreds and hundreds of mistakes,” he recalls. “Had a program such as Guest Focus existed twenty-one years ago, it would have been the best money that I would have ever spent. It would have saved me a lot of heartache.”
The Solution
John first encountered Kelsey from Guest Focus at an industry conference eight years ago. “I heard him speak and I quickly realized – smartest guy in the room,” John shares. “He had a passion much like myself that truly believes giving great tours is possibly the best experience that a person can have as far as a career.”
Initially joining Guest Focus as a coach, John soon found himself learning as much as he was teaching. The program provided:
- Structured frameworks for goal setting
- Prioritization of essential business elements
- Step-by-step guidance for growth
- Expertise in tour description optimization
- Strategic approaches to marketing and social media
The Results
Working with Guest Focus yielded several significant improvements for Bulldog Tours, even as a well-established operator:
Tour Description Optimization:
- Complete overhaul of Bulldog’s tour description sales pages using the Guest Focus methodology
- Measurably improved conversion rates from website visitors to bookings – jumping them up to a 6.54% conversion rate. (In A/B tests the Guest Focus version of the pages should a consistent lift of over 0.5%
- Enhanced ability to communicate unique value propositions for each tour type
The Value of Industry-Specific Guidance
The program’s tourism-focused approach proved particularly valuable for Bulldog Tours. With their diverse offering of ghost, food, history, and private tours, having guidance specifically tailored to tour operations was crucial.
“This is dedicated to exactly what we do,” John emphasizes. “I don’t care if you have six MBAs from Ivy League Colleges. Kelsey knows from his experience what’s most important.”
Immediate Focus Areas for Bulldog Tours:
- Website optimization
- Tour description refinement
- Email marketing systems
- Booking process improvement
- Core operational efficiencies
This structured approach ensures operators focus on foundational elements before expanding into more complex initiatives. “Yes, it would be great to have a million followers on YouTube,” John explains, “but right now you gotta build a rock star website. You have to have great email marketing. You have to have some other kind of basics in place before you could focus on that stuff.”
The guidance extends beyond just business strategy. Guest Focus provided frameworks for every aspect of tour operations, from crafting compelling tour descriptions to developing effective marketing campaigns. “The level of detail, the level of perfection that he could make our tour descriptions phenomenal – I was so blown away,” John notes.
Looking Forward
Despite his two decades of success, John continues to find value in the Guest Focus program. “For new tour operators, a program like Guest Focus would save you an incredible amount of time and money and frustration,” he notes. “If I had more time, I would start from scratch going through this program because I’ve learned a lot.”
The experience demonstrates that even successful, established tour operators can benefit from structured, industry-specific guidance. As John concludes, “I can’t say enough good things about it because he truly has developed this incredible playbook and these exercises to help you formulate great goals, to formulate the best email marketing campaign, how to structure your social media, and it’s just so invaluable.”
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