Most South West operators do not have a visibility problem in summer. They have one in August, when the search traffic drops, the bookings thin out, and the only thing still working for you is whatever is sitting online while you sleep.

Winter is when you fix that infrastructure, because nobody has time to do it in December. Eight things worth working through this week.

1. Update your Google Business Profile like it is a social account

It is the single highest leverage asset most small tourism businesses own, and most of them set it up once and never touched it again. Add photos monthly, post your winter hours, answer the questions section yourself, and use the updates feature. Google rewards profiles that show recent activity, and for local searches it outranks your website nearly every time.

2. Check that your details match everywhere

Business name, address, phone, hours. Compare your Google profile against your website, Facebook, TripAdvisor, booking platforms, and your visitor centre listing. Old phone numbers and closed down addresses sitting on directory sites quietly undermine your local search rankings and send travellers to voicemail.

3. Ask for reviews properly

Not a sign on the counter. A message sent two days after checkout or the day after the tour, with a direct link, from a real person. Winter guests are usually your most engaged ones and they are the most likely to write something specific. Reply to every review you get, including the good ones, because those replies are indexed too.

4. Photograph the season you are actually in

If every image on your website shows blue sky and bare feet, you are selling January in August. Fireplaces, rain on windows, coats and boots, steaming coffee, empty beaches. Travellers booking a winter trip want to see what winter looks like at your place, and most of your competitors have nothing to show them.

5. Test how long it takes to book you

Open your own site on your phone, on mobile data, and try to make a booking. Count the taps. Count the seconds. If your booking button sits below three screens of scrolling, or your enquiry form asks for eleven fields, you are losing people who were ready to pay you.

6. Write the pages that answer real questions

What is there to do in Margaret River when it rains. Is it worth visiting Dunsborough in winter. Where to stay in Busselton with a dog. These are the phrases people actually type, and they are the phrases AI search tools pull from when they assemble an answer. One useful page per month compounds far faster than daily posting.

7. Treat your Instagram bio as a landing page

Say what you do and where you are in the first line, because that line is searchable. Location tag every post. Keep the link in your bio pointing at something specific and current rather than a generic homepage. Your profile gets visited far more than your feed gets scrolled.

8. Start collecting email addresses now

Social platforms rent you your audience. Email is the only list you own outright, and it is the cheapest way to fill a quiet week later in the year. Even a simple form offering a local guide or an early access booking window will build something worth having by summer.

Your action for the week

Search your own business name on Google, in an incognito window, on your phone. Then search what you sell plus your town, without your name in it. Whatever comes back is what a traveller sees when they are deciding between you and someone twenty minutes down the road. Fix the worst thing on that page first.

Weekly South West Visibility Ideas is a series for tourism, accommodation, and hospitality operators across the South West of Western Australia.