Travel has always been a "cure for what ails you", but if you haven't noticed - people are changing. Values are shifting. It's not enough to simply entertain visitors & guests today. Delivering a valuable experience requires understanding people and what really lights them up. People desire to feel good, to progress in life, and there are a multitude of ways to help them get there. But it has to be done with intention.
Every experience we have as humans takes us one step closer, or one step further, from wellbeing and a life of meaning. The best journeys take someone from point A (where they are) to point B (where they desire to be). When you create a storied experience for your guests and take them on a journey that leads to greater fulfillment, you're creating a valuable, purpose-driven brand that can stand the test of time.
Wellbeing is something all properties and experiences should be intentional about, regardless of your brand's positioning. You don’t need to be a wellness brand or have a million-dollar spa in order to embrace this movement. Because when you focus on creating an experience that caters to wellbeing, what you're really saying is: we care that our visitors & guests are flourishing. Not just in this moment, but even after they leave. Focusing on wellbeing is the most lucrative way to add value to guests.
Unfortunately, most hospitality & travel brands have fallen into the commoditization trap. They create experiences too similar to their competition, lacking originality, which forces them to compete on price and deliver less value. The more you pull your brand out of the commoditization trap and focus on delivering true value that aligns with your guests real desires, the greater monetary reward you can see for offering people something truly remarkable and life changing.
Looking at your experience through this lens forces you to ask yourself: Does the experience we provide uproot our visitors & guests from their mundane day-to-day existence and immerse them into a new, novel world? Does this experience take them on a journey that aligns with their desires? Do they highly value what we have to offer? Or is this the same old experience they can have anywhere? Take a moment to determine where your experience falls on the matrix.
Satisfactory: You’re doing everything by the book. You’re doing everything “right” and doing a fine job meeting the most basic of visitor expectations. Visitors tend to operate on autopilot, with minimal mental and emotional engagement. This is the industry standard, without a clear or compelling narrative being told.
Memorable: Something about the experience left a lasting impression on your visitor. There is a positive emotional charge to the experience. Visitors can easily pinpoint a novel moment that surprised & delighted them. There are bits & pieces of story playing out haphazardly, not always enough for people to take notice.
Meaningful: This authentic and immersive experience teaches the visitor something about themselves and expands their worldview. It helps them shift their perspective of themselves and others. These storied experiences have absorptive moments of discovery that stick with the visitor long after they leave.
Transformational: The visitor experiences a change in their life directly attributed to their experience. They leave a more evolved person than they arrived. These impactful experiences are often born out of one-of-a-kind experiences that people rarely come in contact with in their day-to-day life.
Our mission at The Storied Experience is to help hospitality, travel & leisure brands create immersive experience narratives that ensure their visitors & guests feel good and flourish. Narratives that bring people joy & deliver long-term value, enlighten and help shift people's perspectives, and take people on transformative journeys. Our aim is to help brands go from memorable to meaningful.
With a behavioral understanding of what leads to wellbeing, we can tell stories across the entire guest journey that are designed to have a lasting impact in people's lives. Are you ready to make YOUR story count?