3 Steps to Becoming a Private Tour Guide

Becoming a tour guide can be easy and one of the most fulfilling activities, or even a career. Private guiding requires a few key skills, such as the ability to work with people from different walks of life and with many personalities. Speaking other languages can often help. If this is you, then you can become a private guide in 3 steps.

Benefits of Being a Private Guide

Guides get to show visitors from all over the world sights local people value and often deal in a particular area of interest. For some, wines or beverages might be their passion. Tours about culinary delights and even shopping are common. Others guides enjoy giving private tours of local battlefields or historic sites. Still more cater to a field of art or museums in general. If you are passionate about your local town or city, you can share that enthusiasm with likeminded individuals who come to visit and get paid for your time and expertise.

Private Guides—a Rising Trend

There is a growing desire for small-group guides in locations around the globe. People enjoy the closeness of having a private guide interested in designing a tour around the visitors’ personal interests. Tour groups like the ability to flex their schedule and get personal opinions about restaurants and shopping locations.

3 Steps

To become a tour guide, there are 3 steps to keep in mind:

1.The first step to becoming a tour guide is to develop knowledge about local areas of interest. Learn as much as you can and keep up to date on new developments. Upcoming and annual activities often draw visitors to the area, and keeping abreast of these events will not only prove beneficial when guiding tourists, but also in recognizing the desired sites they would like to visit and learn about.

2.The second step is to study and pass a tour-guide certification test. Various countries and locations around the world have different testing requirements and initial fees. Look up the tour-guide certification requirements for your location to get started.

3.The final step is to decide whether you would like to guide independently, marketing yourself or your personal tour-guide company. This can result in higher pay, but requires much more time and ongoing advertising expenses. The alternative is more common, joining a guide-service site like private-guides.com that markets and matches tourists with guides. This normally requires a small fee or percentage, but often brings more consistent scheduling from visitors who desire your particular services.