ONLINE AND UP FOR ADVENTURE

If your idea of excitement is a hotel suite with 24-hour room service, you’re not AdventureBase’s target market.

But if you’re planning a solo, unguided kayaking trip in Costa Rica, that’s another story.

AdventureBase.com, which officially launched in August, is targeting both consumers (with an online community for thrill-seekers) and travel agents who want to market to those globetrotters.

In addition to links for a variety of travel resources, if AdventureBase offers features on destinations such as Banff in Alberta, Canada; discussion groups; book reviews; and links to partners such as charter sponsor Mountain Travel- Sobek.

The site’s first business-to-business mail campaign will drop late this fall, capitalizing on the idea of getting agents to offer travel content “powered by AdventureBase.”

The concept of an AdventureBase- powered trip could mean several things, says T.J. McCue, co-founder of the Seattle-based company, who came up with the idea for the site after unsuccessfully trying to find places online to rent kayaking gear in – you guessed it – Costa Rica.

In addition to free links, travel agents and other travel-related marketers will be offered several different opportunities to “power up” the site. Advertisers will be able to co-brand a customized version of the AdventureBase home page consumers would see if they entered AdventureBase via the advertiser’s site. McCue says advertisers can also opt to buy a “premium branded” version of the site, which would feature the advertiser’s logo rather than AdventureBase’s.

“This is good in that it generates revenue, but bad in that it doesn’t help build the brand,” he notes.

AdventureBase also plans on offering customized reports on specific destinations for agents trying to sell trips to groups.

McCue says the company has been working over the past year to develop a small but precise database of about 750 travel agents, outfitters and manufacturers who market to adventure travelers. Overall, there are about 25,000 travel agents in the U.S., but not all promote adventure travel, a term McCue describes as “defined by the consumer.”

While a stay at a swanky hotel in Paris isn’t really classified as an adventure because there’s little risk involved, he says, guided white-water rafting trips in the smooth water could be considered “soft” adventure travel. That’s opposed to “hard” adventure travel, which is usually on the spur of the moment, often unguided and frequently solo.

The Travel Industry Association of America estimates the adventure travel business as a $70 billion industry in the U.S. alone. Adventure travelers participate in activities such as backpacking, trekking, mountain biking, white water sports, fly-fishing and climbing. The “hard” adventurers tend to be younger and high income, while “soft” adventurers tend to more closely resemble the “average” adult.

The design of the site is purposefully text-heavy and low on graphics. This, says McCue, is to aid time-starved travel agents who can’t wait around for pictures to load, and an international audience that may be viewing the site via a lower bandwidth.

Within the next eight months, the company hopes to launch German, Japanese and Spanish versions to consumers. McCue, who operated an adventure travel business himself while stationed in the service in Guam, is unsure of the B-to-B opportunities for AdventureBase in those countries.

While at present the entire site can be accessed and used by both consumers and businesses, McCue says the possibility exists that a dedicated B-to-B area will be created. Eventually, the whole site will be database-driven and bring up relevant links to consumer and B-to-B inquiries.

To help promote the site – and create more business opportunities – McCue hopes to create partnerships with trade groups, allowing him and his associates to exhibit and speak. He’s also looking into partnering with travel destinations to create AdventureBase-branded packages.

While B-to-B e-mail marketing has been considered, McCue says he hasn’t yet found any e-mail lists for rental that suit the company’s purposes. AdventureBase does have a consumer database of several hundred names that it has compiled via online adventure discussion groups, bulletin boards and other sources that it may use for this purpose.

AdventureBase’s promotion strategy could be described as “guerrilla marketing,” says McCue, noting the bulk of the “advertising” will be centered on targeted efforts, such as small Web ads, blow-ins in magazines like Backpacker, and talking the site up in online discussion groups.

“We’re on a bootstrap budget,” he says, estimating start-up costs in the “five figure” range. He and his partners are currently talking to outside investors for additional financing.

Future consumer programs may include a paid membership program entitling those who join to discounts and benefits. But the main building block of AdventureBase will be the bond it creates with its customers on both the consumer and B-to-B sides, says McCue, who feels that many marketers have the “four Cs” of e-business – content, commerce, customization and community – backwards.

“You have to start with community and bolt the other things on,” he says.