Building an Adventure Brand: Growth Hacks from Plan The Unplanned

Building an Adventure Brand: Growth Hacks from Plan The Unplanned

What’s Plan The Unplanned

Plan The Unplanned (PTU) is an adventure travel company that organizes curated trips, treks, and events across India and abroad. PTU is known for its vibrant community of travelers, having organized over 2,500 trips and served more than 20,000 customers. It has also won the Tripadvisor Certificate of Excellence for six consecutive years since 2018, making it one of the highest-rated adventure travel companies in Bengaluru.

What’s Plan The Unplanned

Plan The Unplanned (PTU) is an adventure travel company that organizes curated trips, treks, and events across India and abroad. PTU is known for its vibrant community of travelers, having organized over 2,500 trips and served more than 20,000 customers. It has also won the Tripadvisor Certificate of Excellence for six consecutive years since 2018, making it one of the highest-rated adventure travel companies in Bengaluru.

Tarun's Role at Plan The Unplanned

As Co-Founder and Chief Marketing Officer, Tarun built PTU from the ground up, managing all aspects of product development, marketing, and business strategy. He led the company to serve 20,000+ travelers and generated nearly $400,000 in revenue. Tarun oversaw digital marketing, community building, partnerships, and customer experience, helping to grow PTU into a top-rated travel brand. His work included building a strong brand identity, leading SEO strategies, and creating a thriving online and offline community.

Tarun's Role at Plan The Unplanned

As Co-Founder and Chief Marketing Officer, Tarun built PTU from the ground up, managing all aspects of product development, marketing, and business strategy. He led the company to serve 20,000+ travelers and generated nearly $400,000 in revenue. Tarun oversaw digital marketing, community building, partnerships, and customer experience, helping to grow PTU into a top-rated travel brand. His work included building a strong brand identity, leading SEO strategies, and creating a thriving online and offline community.

Growth Hacks at Plan The Unplanned

  • Website & Backlinks: The company prioritized its website and used backlinks, primarily through Quora posts and event listings, to drive organic traffic. Optimizing expired event pages also boosted backlinks, resulting in high levels of organic search traffic.
  • SEO & Content Strategy: Focused on optimizing product pages rather than relying on blogs, the team listed events across multiple platforms to capitalize on organic search. This strategy, combined with the use of videos, helped improve SEO rankings and allowed PTU to outrank competitors like Thrillophilia.
  • Meetup Growth: The company leveraged Meetup to grow its group to 15,000+ members in Bangalore. They strategically linked Meetup albums on their website, which helped engage users and increase traffic.
  • Customer Retention: PTU introduced a membership model where customers earned a free trip after attending three, boosting customer loyalty and retention. The focus was on delivering an exceptional experience to keep customers coming back.
  • Video Marketing: Videos were used as a growth tool, improving SEO and engagement while giving PTU a competitive edge in search rankings.
  • Event Listings & Brand Awareness: When listing events on platforms like Eventshigh, BookMyShow, and Meetup, PTU always included its brand name at the end of the event description. Additionally, images were watermarked with the brand’s logo. This branding tactic provided a lot of free outreach and increased the company’s visibility across various platforms.
  • Competitor Data Scraping & Retargeting: PTU scrapped publicly available data from competitor social media, such as email addresses left in comments when people asked for itineraries. This data was then used for retargeting campaigns, achieving excellent results—with ad spends of ₹30,000, PTU generated returns of ₹10 lakh.

    • Collaborations:
  • Trell: A giveaway with Trell gained PTU over 5,000 followers in just one week.
  • Decathlon: A long-term collaboration with Decathlon included placing standees at stores, generating recurring business and traffic boosts.
  • Insider: Collaborated with Paytm Insider, where PTU consistently ranked as the highest traffic page in India, contributing to increased brand recall and greater reach.

    • Growth Hacks at Plan The Unplanned

  • Website & Backlinks: The company prioritized its website and used backlinks, primarily through Quora posts and event listings, to drive organic traffic. Optimizing expired event pages also boosted backlinks, resulting in high levels of organic search traffic.
  • SEO & Content Strategy: Focused on optimizing product pages rather than relying on blogs, the team listed events across multiple platforms to capitalize on organic search. This strategy, combined with the use of videos, helped improve SEO rankings and allowed PTU to outrank competitors like Thrillophilia.
  • Meetup Growth: The company leveraged Meetup to grow its group to 15,000+ members in Bangalore. They strategically linked Meetup albums on their website, which helped engage users and increase traffic.
  • Customer Retention: PTU introduced a membership model where customers earned a free trip after attending three, boosting customer loyalty and retention. The focus was on delivering an exceptional experience to keep customers coming back.
  • Video Marketing: Videos were used as a growth tool, improving SEO and engagement while giving PTU a competitive edge in search rankings.
  • Event Listings & Brand Awareness: When listing events on platforms like Eventshigh, BookMyShow, and Meetup, PTU always included its brand name at the end of the event description. Additionally, images were watermarked with the brand’s logo. This branding tactic provided a lot of free outreach and increased the company’s visibility across various platforms.
  • Competitor Data Scraping & Retargeting: PTU scrapped publicly available data from competitor social media, such as email addresses left in comments when people asked for itineraries. This data was then used for retargeting campaigns, achieving excellent results—with ad spends of ₹30,000, PTU generated returns of ₹10 lakh.

    • Collaborations:
  • Trell: A giveaway with Trell gained PTU over 5,000 followers in just one week.
  • Decathlon: A long-term collaboration with Decathlon included placing standees at stores, generating recurring business and traffic boosts.
  • Insider: Collaborated with Paytm Insider, where PTU consistently ranked as the highest traffic page in India, contributing to increased brand recall and greater reach.

    • Overall, the company adopted a diversified, multi-channel strategy focused on user engagement, organic growth, and strategic partnerships to drive consistent traffic, boost retention, and build a strong community.

    Overall, the company adopted a diversified, multi-channel strategy focused on user engagement, organic growth, and strategic partnerships to drive consistent traffic, boost retention, and build a strong community.

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