Search “boat tours in Santorini” or “food tour Hanoi” on Google right now. Before the regular search results, before the map pack, you’ll see a carousel of bookable tours — photos, prices, star ratings, and a booking button.
That’s Google Things to Do. And here’s what makes it different from every other placement in that search result: the organic listings are free. No 25% commission like Viator. No pay-per-click like the ads below it. A traveler taps your listing, lands on your website, books directly — and you keep everything.
Now the uncomfortable part: according to industry research, more than half of small and medium tour operators are either unaware Google Things to Do exists or simply haven’t activated it. Which means in most destinations, that premium real estate at the top of Google is being filled by OTAs reselling operators’ own tours back to them — at a 25% markup.
This guide covers what Google Things to Do is, the two ways to get listed, and the one prerequisite that determines whether the channel works for you at all.
What Google Things to Do Actually Is
Think of Google Things to Do (GTTD) as Google’s built-in tour marketplace — except Google isn’t charging commission on organic placements. Your tours can appear across four surfaces:
- Google Search — the “Tickets and tours” carousel for queries like “jeep tours in Colorado” or “things to do in [city]“
- Google Maps — when travelers explore a destination and tap “Things to do,” which is especially powerful for last-minute, already-in-town bookings
- Your Google Business Profile — an “Operator Booking Module” showing your tours, prices, and booking links directly on your own profile, with an Official Site badge
- Points of Interest — the “Experiences” module on landmark pages (think Edinburgh Castle, Ha Long Bay), listing tours that visit that POI
That last surface matters more than it looks. Here’s the brutal detail: if a traveler finds your business profile on Google Maps and you haven’t loaded your tours into GTTD, Google fills the space below your profile with similar products from third-party providers — meaning OTAs get the booking that started with someone searching for you.
Not being on GTTD isn’t neutral. It’s actively donating your own branded traffic to Viator.
The Two Ways to Get Listed
Google doesn’t let operators upload tours through some public form — there are exactly two paths in, and choosing correctly depends on your size.
Path 1: The Tickets & Activities Editor (free, self-serve)
If your Google Business Profile is claimed, includes your full business address, and is categorized as a tour operator or activity provider, you likely already have access to a Tickets & Activities Editor inside your Business Profile. It asks a few questions about each tour — title, description, price, and a booking link — and submits the listing for Google’s review, which typically takes a few business days.
The limitations are real but manageable for small operators:
- No real-time availability sync — prices and details are updated manually
- Google requires your data to be refreshed at least every 30 days, or listings can be pulled
- It doesn’t unlock GTTD paid ads or the full range of placements
Best for: operators with a handful of tours who want to claim the channel this week, for free, before deciding on anything bigger.
Path 2: Connectivity partners (full integration)
For operators with many tours, dynamic pricing, or changing availability, Google recommends going through a connectivity partner — either booking software with a native GTTD integration, or direct integration specialists who load and optimize your listings for a fee.
What the full integration adds: automatic price and availability updates, broader placement across POI and Experiences surfaces, eligibility for GTTD paid ads, and generally better listing hygiene (Google removes listings that violate data-quality policies, and a partner keeps you compliant).
A sensible strategy many operators follow: start with the free self-serve editor today, switch to a connectivity partner when volume justifies it. The two aren’t mutually exclusive over time.
The Prerequisite Nobody Mentions: Your Booking Page
Here’s where most GTTD guides stop — and where most operators actually fail.
Every path into Google Things to Do ends the same way: a link to a booking page on your website. Google’s listing gets the traveler interested; your website has to close the sale. And Google has standards for that landing page — it should lead directly to the specific tour (not your homepage), match the price shown on Google, and work flawlessly on mobile, since a large share of GTTD taps happen inside Google Maps on a phone.
This means the checklist for GTTD readiness is really a website checklist:
- A dedicated page for every tour with its own URL — one generic “Our Tours” page can’t receive deep links
- Visible, accurate pricing that matches what you submitted to Google
- Instant online booking on that page — a traveler arriving from a “Tickets” button expects to buy, not to fill out an inquiry form
- Fast, mobile-first loading — every second of load time on a phone bleeds bookings
This is precisely the architecture Togo is built around: every tour gets its own structured page with pricing, real-time availability, and one-page checkout, mobile-optimized out of the box. The theme’s built-in schema markup is a bonus on top — while GTTD listings themselves come from your Business Profile or partner feed, schema helps your tour pages earn rich results in regular search and improves how AI-powered search surfaces understand your products, which is increasingly where Google is headed.
In other words: GTTD is the free traffic source. Your website is the conversion machine. Setting up the first without the second is how operators conclude “GTTD doesn’t work” — when what didn’t work was sending Google’s traffic to a contact form.
Getting Listed: A Practical Sequence
- Claim and complete your Google Business Profile. Full address, correct category (“tour operator” or equivalent), photos, and hours. This alone triggers eligibility for the self-serve editor.
- Audit your tour pages. One URL per tour, prices displayed, booking functional on mobile. Fix this before submitting anything. (Our launch checklist covers the full pre-flight list.)
- Load your top 3–5 tours via the Tickets & Activities Editor. Start with your bestsellers — the ones with the strongest photos and reviews.
- Set a 30-day reminder to refresh listings, or Google may take them down.
- Watch the numbers. Traffic from GTTD is identifiable in your analytics; if it converts well and manual updates become the bottleneck, that’s your signal to move to a connectivity partner.
- Only then consider GTTD ads. The paid module works like Google Ads (pay-per-click) and can layer on top — but claim every free placement first.
Why the Timing Favors You
Two trends make 2026 the right moment to move on this.
First, Google has been steadily giving direct operator links more prominence in Things to Do results relative to OTA listings — travelers discovering tours through Search, Maps, and AI-generated answers are increasingly routed to operators’ own sites. Second, adoption among small operators remains low, which means in many destinations and niches, the carousel is still winnable by whoever shows up properly.
Free channels don’t stay uncrowded. The operators who claimed Google Business Profiles early dominated local search for years. GTTD is the same window, currently open.
The Bottom Line
Google Things to Do is the rare distribution channel that aligns perfectly with a direct booking strategy: Google supplies the audience, charges nothing for organic placement, and sends travelers straight to your website. The only real requirement — beyond an afternoon in your Business Profile — is a website that can catch what Google throws at it: dedicated tour pages, live pricing, and instant mobile booking.
If your current site can’t do that, fix that first. It costs $59 and a weekend.
Get Togo and Make Your Tours GTTD-Ready →
Questions about structuring your tour pages? Contact the Togo team — or explore the live demos to see the tour page architecture in action.
