Q&A | GuideTalk: Campus Tours for Remote & Socially Distant Audiences

Thank you for joining GuideTalk: Campus Tours for Remote & Socially Distant Audiences. 

We hope you enjoyed this webinar on using Guidebook to build and maintain connections with Self-Guided Tours.

Let’s look at the questions you wanted to learn more about: 

Tour Use Cases 

We know Tours are great for admissions, do you see Self-Guided Tours used for other use cases (like Welcome Week or Orientation) or to support other departments (ie Housing, Sports Rec, etc)? using Self-Guided Tours?

Definitely! Our Self-Guided Tours can be created for any use-case as long as the locations are outdoors, have a Google Map recognized address, and can be safely visited without required supervision. 

We see clients using Self-Guided Tours for a variety of reasons. Here are a few examples:

• Welcome Week/Orientation – Introduce new students with tailored tours 
• Commencement – Help visitors orient themselves on campus as they visit for key events
• Student Life – Useful resources for clubs, rec sports, and student activities  
• Alumni Relations –  Keep remote alumni in the loop with up-to-date virtual tours 

The great thing about our product is that it is very easy to make things work for you! As long as the locations have a Google Maps recognized address, you can add any information and images at each stop you want! 

Our Virtual Tours feature is currently catered to campus or venue tours. We do have other engagement options available, such as our QR Scavenger Hunt feature, but nothing related to Tours specifically, at the moment. We recommend reaching out to your Account Manager or sales@guidebook.com to discuss our engagement features!

Creating a Self-Guided Tour 

How do you create the route?

With Guidebook, you’ll drop pins along your tour route, and Google maps will map your path.  Get started with an address, and build out your tour with dropped pins from there. Whether your campus is large or small, you’ve got the tools to create a tour that brings students along to every key landmark, building, or site!

For more on building a tour, visit our Self-Guided Tours support article. 

You’ve got control to edit your path and ensure it makes sense for your institution. Each stop gives you the opportunity to add audio, imagery, and text to tell your story. Your tour can have as many or as few stops as you desire!

How customizable is the app, besides customizing the tour itself? I am curious if it can look more branded for the institution?

Guidebook offers a few options for hosting Guides –  you can create a unique Guide within the Guidebook mobile app or we’ll work with you to publish your own branded app to the Apple app store and Google Play store.

Whether you choose a Guide within the Guidebook app or a stand-alone, branded Guide – you’ll have access to branding and customizations including Guide icon, colors, and imagery. 

For institutions that choose a branded app, you have additional control over your branding. We recommend reaching out to sales@guidebook.com for pricing.

Campus Tour Promotion 

Do you have advice on how to promote our tour on our campus for people who just drop by unannounced?

We’ve seen institutions promote their Tours in a number of ways! From email and social media to printouts and posters. 

For drop-in visitors, we recommend having posters around Campus promoting your Tour guide with a QR code. That will allow visiting students and guardians to download your guide with ease and get started, all on their own. 

Students Using Your Tour 

How do students access an institution’s tour? 

Depending on how you’re hosting your Guide, students will be required to download the corresponding app. 

Are your tours ADA compliant? 

To make sure you’re serving the needs of everyone, we recommend that your description text is the same as the audio so the tour is accessible. This is easy to copy in if you’ve written out scripts for your stops.

Pricing 

Our Tours product is different from our traditional guides. We offer the Tours product at a cost relative to the size of the school’s student population. We encourage you to contact sales@guidebook.com for more on Self-Guided Tours.