How an Ocean Rafting Business is Using Google Ads to Rebuild and Reinvest in their Community

My husband, Peter, and I met on Maui, and after managing another rafting company for a little over six years, a rare opportunity came up: The owner of Hawaii Ocean Rafting was considering retiring and approached us about taking it over, knowing we’d keep the small group ocean experience of these whale, dolphin, and snorkeling tours alive. In Maui, this opportunity to acquire a boating business is a unique dream because there are limited commercial permits. So we purchased it in October of 2021.

It’s definitely been a challenging couple of years—first with the ups and downs post-Covid and then with the Lahaina fires. We lost our place of business, all of our boats, our home, everything. Thankfully, the community aspect of rebuilding has been really awesome. The first year after the fire, we had a borrowed boat and a makeshift boat, and the community on Maui supported us with everything from a place to check people in for boat rides to a rental house where we could live. I think of the core group of us here in Lahaina as this next generation of small business owners who hope to be pillars in our community.

With no business location in Lahaina Harbor, which brought in a lot of walk-up traffic, we had to make sure that people could find us online. And as a small business, with a very small marketing budget, we had to be creative with our marketing strategies. Google’s AI-powered Performance Max ad campaigns have worked really well for us.

Our tour offerings change seasonally, so it's difficult to determine where you want your budget to go when you’re working on keyword-specific ads for people who are booking three to six months out. Allocating more of our budget to Performance Max gives us flexibility to target potential visitors that are looking for our style of experience rather than spreading our resources across multiple campaigns.

One of my goals was for us to pull in more direct bookings than affiliate bookings because it increases our profit margin anywhere from 10 to 30%. I’m already seeing that happen much more quickly than I expected. The gravity of what that small percentage can do means a lot to us. We can then use those better margins for community programs and growth in other areas like research, education, and other engagement programs around culture awareness—all things we've been wanting to do as a small, native Hawaiian-owned tour company.I’ve also found Google Analytics incredibly helpful for understanding the customer’s needs and where those searches are coming from—particularly as the industry and visitor trends have changed so dramatically in recent years.

We’re living proof that you can use opportunity and hard work to reach your goals and make dreams come true. I’d love to encourage people and show them that sometimes the road less traveled, the road that is pulling on your heart, is the one that's going to give you the most magic and fulfillment. For us, growing this business is exactly that.