Isle of Wight guide creates wanderlust during lockdown with Maybe* and Local Rewards

Right now travel is sadly a very distant possibility, but there's no harm in creating a sense of wanderlust with your social content to keep your customers engaged and entertained. We all have a part to play in helping the UK High Street recover from the devastating impact of COVID-19 and its encouraging to see that since COVID struck last year,  consumers are increasingly compelled to shop local and support and protect local businesses. More than ever businesses have a captive audience of customers who want to spend time engaging. Maybe* can help you get in front of that audience. 

Maybe* has created Local Rewards. It's a nationwide program that increases local spend by connecting shoppers, local businesses and places via social media, transactions and chat. 

Local Rewards connects every UK High Street with:

• A live local shopping guide that updates automatically
• A way to reach shoppers when they are nearby
• An infrastructure that rewards shoppers for their local spend 

Here we share some much-needed travel inspiration from the Newport and Carrisbrook County Council, Isle of Wight Guide, detailing exactly what you need to do to ensure you appear in your Town Guide.

Isle of Wight guide and offers

The Isle of Wight Guide is loaded with local and national businesses in the area. But it's a travel agent which caught our attention and sunshine-deprived imaginations.

Think of the Guide as a live and interactive curation of all the social media content showing exactly what the town has to offer shoppers. And at the moment with businesses locked down, the Guides shine a light on every business, and exactly how they are trading at the moment.

The beauty of combining national with local retailers is that the Guides make all businesses in places discoverable to local people, and inspire shoppers to try somewhere new as well as their old favourites.

Explore the Isle of Wight Local Guide for ideas and inspiration to bring your own town to life with Local Rewards

How to replicate this technique

Barrhead Travel may not be able to get anyone on a plane to warmer climes anytime soon, but they are still taking online bookings for when travel corridors are open and overseas destinations are ready to welcome us to their shores once more.

Creating content with powerful images of beaches, seascapes and inviting pools is the kind of content you might want to dip your toes into if you are in the leisure, travel or tourism industry or a food business inspired by exotic menus. Whatever sector you are in, is there a way you can inspire and incorporate with travel imagery? Think outside the box!

How to ensure your business appears in the Local Guide

The Local Rewards Town Guides have been designed to make every business in any UK place discoverable. In order to appear in your Local Town Guide you need to do two things.

1) Register your business on Google My Business so our magic tech can find you and list your business in your Town Guide

2) Ensure you are on Instagram and actively creating content 

Google My Business powers the Local Guides listings, and Instagram ensures the Guides have glorious, up-to-date content to showcase your business and what you have to offer.