Practical tips for earning revenue at eco-adventure resorts

How do we actually generate the revenue that we need to pay our bills, maintain our property, pay salaries, and generally keep things running smoothly? 

If anyone can share some wisdom here, please jump in…

Part of the concept that we are building on this pod is that an eco village can generate income from tourism.  People need to take vacations once in awhile - so there is a need here that can be met with simple lodges or accommodations at an eco village premises. 

There are a thousand ways to earn income, and here are just a few to consider:

• corporate functions - corporations have budgets for training and retreats.  With usually a single point of contact, this can be an efficient marketing exercise and can lead to longer term relationships with organizations. 
  
• field trips - for environmental science classes / biology field trips.  A focus on sustainability and seeing how sustainability works in practical terms rather than just theory is a hands on approach to education. 
  
• courses - anything from a weekend detox to an intensive thai massage course to a cooking course.  Team up with local teachers who already have a database of students and a solid reputation. 
  
• activities - earn income from rental of equipment and guided services.  On our island, we have snorkeling equipment, wind surfers, and canoes.  Besides adding to the attractiveness of the destination, activities offer a good source of income. 
  
• A la carte menus - once you have a decent kitchen in place, and if you are or can employ a good cook, meals are classic revenue generators.  Tasty organic foods straight from your farm.  Fresh fish from a nearby river / the sea. 
  

Re: Practical tips for earning revenue at eco-adventure resorts

Well, you have a situation where you basically have three different possible sources of income.

You can make money from tourists and visitors.
 
You can make money from the local population around the island.

You can make money from the outer world, either online or by selling some kind of mail order product.

I'd been assuming that you would make most of your money, 95% at least, by selling to tourists and visitors.

Selling to tourists and visitors is hard work, especially getting started out, but it's not rocket science - you need to invest money in lodgings and equipment (boats, scuba, etc) , which you rent. You invest money in a restaurant and beachside foodstand, and sell food to your captive audience. You create souvenier products, and sell them.

It's not rocket science, but it is pretty expensive.

I've suggested in the past making money with an online presence, selling an emotional membership in the island, setting up an online payment-plan option to buy vacations in the future, and selling souveniers online.

I think you could make enough money with the right online business to pay the bills during the slow times.

The Eden Project

I hadn't seen anything about this before - biomes in the British Isles - looks kind of interesting. I've known a few people who talked about the idea of a Green and Ecology Disneyland or Epcot Center - this is kind of like that.

http://www.edenproject.com/

Re: Practical tips for earning revenue at eco-adventure resorts

Just came back from another trip.  Two in the last two weeks.  One with 40 people! - A few friends decided to celebrate their birthdays there and invited their friends to come aboard.  And the one this last weekend with just 10 folks, but a great group.  Saw a turtle for the first time, a couple of curious octopus', and a strange creature that looks kind of like a stretched out seahorse.  Both trips were economically feasible, and I used some profits for the first trip to invest in more mattresses, sheets, pillows, and some renovations. 

I'd love to be creating value through a website which could generate income.  I've got the designs together for our website, and am planning to begin building it over the next few days during the Muslim Idul Fitri / Lebaran holidays.  But I still can't quite grasp how to make money over the site except to use it as a vehicle for marketing United Adventure's services, or to allow selected advertising.

I do have another idea on a type of membership that could generate income, however.  Basically, it combines adventure travel with personal mastery software and life planning (setting, keeping track of goals, etc), and a membership that generates priviliges at restaurants, bookstores, etc.. an alliance of concious partners. 

I like the payment plan option… but what would be the benefits of the emotional on-line membership?  Could you participate in forum discussions?  Could you vote on where to place the trampoline, or on the design of a new bathroom? 

As you said, Bill, making money from tourists and visitors is the focus for now - as it generates most of the income.  So all my efforts are focused on securing a contract that satisfies all the stakeholders - the existing partners who share time with me, the two owners who have separate interests (father and son), the investor who will put up usd 10 - 15 thousand for improvements, and the family on the island that looks after the place.  Besides that, renovation plans and marketing are the two secondary focuses.

Our next weekend is on the 4th-5th of November and will be an energizing weekend course.  More about this soon…

Re: Practical tips for earning revenue at eco-adventure resorts

Roderick,

Your website will obviously attract a certain type of people. Having advertisements in the website is an idea. The advertisements should be in-line with your website, maybe a diving gear company, diving lesson company, organic restaurants such as Healthy Choice,  Yoga lesson companies, Jocean's organic products?

The payment gateway will also be valuable for visitors who want to reserve and pay online with credit cards.

How about an online newsletter? Visitors can pick their area of interest, and you can send them newsletter along with your weekly/monthly/bi-weekly newsletter. You can make money by having advertisements in the newsletter that are in-line with the areas of interest that the visitors picked.

Maybe you can work together with Essence and Jocean, and also sell their products online. I know that Losari sells its organic products online, maybe you can check Losari's website for ideas.

Cheers :)

Re: Practical tips for earning revenue at eco-adventure resorts

Awesome tips, Nadia :~) you rock. 

“Your website will obviously attract a certain type of people. Having advertisements in the website is an idea. The advertisements should be in-line with your website, maybe a diving gear company, diving lesson company, organic restaurants such as Healthy Choice,  Yoga lesson companies, Jocean's organic products?”

Definitely in the plans… the resorts we cover, catering services, organic veggies, yoga classes, equipment, etc.  But it must be done unobtrusively, while maintaining the visual integrity and elegance of the website :~)

“The payment gateway will also be valuable for visitors who want to reserve and pay online with credit cards.”
We always have challenges with taking downpayments, and dealing with cash on the island, or having to do transfers with our regional partners.  An online payment gateway that is secure enough (Indonesia doesn't have the best reputation for secure online payments!) would be perfect for trip payments, for purchasing souvenirs and eco-gadgets, for membership fees, and for donations to regional (our destinations) charity / humanitarian / environmental projects.  Can Citibank help me arrange this?  Or other national banks like Mandiri? What about the credit card fraud issue? 

“How about an online newsletter? Visitors can pick their area of interest, and you can send them newsletter along with your weekly/monthly/bi-weekly newsletter. You can make money by having advertisements in the newsletter that are in-line with the areas of interest that the visitors picked.”

A customized newsletter.  Love it.  Like for the guy that loves Pelabuhan Ratu beach and wants to hear updates on that region, but also other areas where he could surf. 

Maybe you can work together with Essence and Jocean, and also sell their products online. I know that Losari sells its organic products online, maybe you can check Losari's website for ideas.

This is another major money making opportunity from the website.  Selling products.  Everything from organic veggies, to air purifiers, to adventure equipment, to speed boats, motocross bikes, adventure cell phones, camping gear, GPS systems, etc. 

Thanks for the contribution of your ideas! 

Re: Practical tips for earning revenue at eco-adventure resorts

Roderick,

The only Indonesian website that I know that features payment gateway is Indo.com. You should contact eka@indo.com">eka@indo.com for more information about what bank indo.com uses as a payment gateway. Have fun at your health workshop weekend :)

Cheers,

Re: Practical tips for earning revenue at eco-adventure resorts

Well, the first function of your website is to advertise your services, to serve as an online brochure, and as a contact point with your customers, so the first thing you would want to do is build a website that successfully fulfills that purpose.

After you have the advertising and selling tours part of the website up and working, you might want to use the site for booking. This could mean figuring out a way to take payments from your website, so that visitors can book a spot from the website, probably after an exchange of emails. How you handle this depends a bit on how you handle payments now.

So, the first thing is to get your business advertising and contact website up.

—

The nice thing about a business advertising website is that once it's up it doesn't take a lot of work to operate it. You answer the email, and maybe update the site once in a while.

I don't want to oversell to you the idea that money can be made from your website, and keep in mind my thinking was that the website would probably just make a little bit of money. For example, maybe you can get it to produce a thousand dollars a month for you (and maybe not, it's hard to tell without testing). Is that worth it to you, because it will take work to get it. 
 
Just to give examples of ways money can be made from websites:

1. advertising has already been mentioned - but the thing about advertising is this - in order to get enough traffic to your website to make advertising worthwhile, you have to do a fair amount of work to make your site more popular, and to get good search engine spots.

2. selling your sales material - something like making a pretty tropical island dvd with a sales pitch and selling it for about $14. (There's an old principle in mail order business - make sure you make a profit on your catalog - because people like to get catalogs. same principle should apply to tour information.)

3. sell a subscription vacation pacakage. People pay $20 a month or so to eventually get a ticket for a island vacation.

4. sell a membership to your island community, perhaps in combination with the above subscripttion vacation.