Top 5 FAQs to the TourDash support
Hello everybody! In this post we answer your most frequently asked questions to our support team. This information has been sent to all TourDash members in our regular newsletter. But if by any chance you missed it, here are full answers. If you still have any enquiries after reading the post please feel free to write us to support@tourdash.com.
Also we will be happy to get your feedback about most difficult technical moments during tours creation in TourDash. Write your questions here in comments or to support@tourdash.com.
And of course don’t forget to check our Support Page, we update information there regularly. There are over 50 articles, instructions and tutorials about all aspects of TourDash use. If you think that we need to include some more information to this section, please let us know!
Top 1. Can my client edit the TourDash tour by himself?
After you assign a tour to your client, a client receives a TD email with an activation link. By clicking that link he activates his account and creates the password. Then he can access the TD interface and edit his tour.
Learn more
Top 2. Does my TourDash license expire and should I pay any recurring fees?
TourDash tour licenses are valid for one year and they are being prolonged automatically every year without any additional recurring fees and charges. You only have to pay once for your license during the purchase process.
Learn more
Top 3. If I open the page with TD tour embedded on my mobile phone, I don’t see the tour. I only see the blue “Click to see the tour” button. Why?
This button is required for the mobile version of the tour and it was done for better user experience. Not all websites provide a good mobile versions and when you are looking at iframe with TourDash it can be very small, or large or require scrolling, etc. To eliminate this we show a button which will open the tour in another page/tab with fullscreen view.
Learn more
Top 4. What is multi-tour feature in Platinum license?
TourDash Multi-Tour allows you to create a large tour using several smaller tours. Adding multiple tours to a single TourDash tour can be done through the advanced navigation feature. TourDash Platinum licenses have the ability to add an unrestricted amount of virtual tours into a single tour.
Learn more
Top 5. Can I edit the CSS stylesheets for my tour?
The CSS-editing capabilities is a feature for advanced users and it can be enabled for your account by request. You should send an email to support@tourdash.com with a request for enabling the CSS panel and don’t forget to mention your TourDash login. We will do the rest.
TourDash tour of the month | April’16
Hello everybody! Today is the time for our regular column – TourDash tour of the month. As usually we’ve carefully investigated all the tours made during the last four weeks. We found several very well-done tours and it was difficult to choose the best one. But we did it! And we are happy to present you the winner: The Curiosity Box Tour!
What is so special about this tour? Everything! It gives a wow-effect because of some very unusual dodges.
First of all you see inverse coloring. A background of all hotspots is black and text colors are bright. It’s very attractive and what is very nice, that all the colors used in the tour are brand colors. Also this interesting coloring is used in an advanced navigation window.
Other notable elements are dynamic hotspots. All the hotspots are made as small logos of the company. Furthermore all the boundary and dynamic hotspots contain nice designed and useful information. That is a big advantage of The Curiosity Box Tour.
We are happy to share this remarkable tour! Enjoy watching it!
We’re always keeping an eye out for the tours to find the most elaborated and interesting tour of the month. Although, if you’re particularly proud of a tour, share it with us! If you have any tours you’d like to submit please send them to support@tourdash.com. If it wins we will show it in our blog and social media next month.
Thank you for working with TourDash! See you soon!
Need help?
Visit support.tourdash.com for all of our documentation. If you want to talk to us directly, you can reach out to us by sending an email to support@tourdash.com and we’ll get you started!
Not a TourDash reseller?
Not a problem! Visit the TourDash Registration page and get started with TourDash today.
Want a virtual tour for your business?
If you are a business owner and you want to create an advanced interactive virtual tour for your business, using the TourDash features and functionality, you can find a trusted TourDash reseller in your area by using this list.Â
We appreciate any and every comment we get so do not hesitate to write us right here under this post or on our Facebook page. Have a nice day! 
Top 6 digital marketing trends of 2016
Hello, there! How are you doing? Today we want to discuss with you new tendencies of online marketing in the world this year. All of you work with online businesses, so we consider this article will be useful and informative for you. Let us know what you think about development and changing of digital marketing during last years. Let’s begin!
1. Of course, responsiveness
There is nothing new in an idea of websites responsive design. But this year responsiveness is becoming not just eligible and showing that you are keeping up with the times. It is absolutely necessary for everybody who don’t want to loose a half of potential profit. Common statistics says that 45 percent of all internet users most of the time use mobile devises to get online and find sought-for information! Just imagine what a huge part of your audience you will never rich if you don’t have user-friendly mobile version of your website.
More and more online business owners develop responsiveness, but still only small percent of all websites in the USA and Europe have comfortable mobile version.
Read:Â Upgrades of TourDash tours mobile version
2. Modern web design and high speed
The era of ancient primitive websites is finally ending! The way that your website is designed and how quickly it is being loaded plays a key factor in whether the visitor stays on it. As old sites get redesigned in 2016 we can see a shift from just providing content that is useful to providing content that is useful, visually attractive, and quick to load on the end user’s screen (no matter the device). Also speed of a website loading is one the of the most important factors that influence Google ranking.
Read:Â TourDash: guide your visitors through your website
3. SEO and content marketing
Search Engine Optimization isn’t dead, it’s growing up. Search engines algorithms become more advanced and they are constantly able to filter what content is trying to game the system and what is genuinely useful for the end user. It means that in 2016Â SEO will continue its shift to content marketing. So the best way to get good positions in Google is to write high quality contents and be really useful for your audience. Getting to the first page of Google search is still a very big step for your online business.
Read:Â 3 ways how Google Business View can improve your positions in Google
4. New era of old email marketing
Email is quite possibly the oldest form of digital interaction. It may seem like an outdated model and not as flashy as social media or SEO. However, a recent email testing reveals that email marketing is extremely effective way to provide online sales!  Email marketing is constantly developing and today it is very technological communication channel, which allows you to bring useful and interesting information directly to the customers mailboxes. Nowadays for some business niches email gives much more engagement than social media and even a website!
Read:Â Cross channel marketing with TourDash
5. Video content is the future
Since 2015 YouTube has been continuing to dominate the web. Video proved that it is a key player as a content type. Long form content, such as blogging, will always have its place as a content marketing medium, but video is able to engage users at a much higher rate. In fact, studies have shown that visitors stay on a webpage at list for two minutes longer if there is a video on it.
Moreover video is easy to share across platforms. But video marketing isn’t all about going viral, as people think. There are many different ways you can effectively use video to drive awareness, engagement, and sales – through landing page videos, product demos, audience updates, etc.
Read:Â TourDash for your business. Combine video with virtual tour
6. Actually, this is all about more interactivity
Interactive content takes your digital marketing and online business to the next level. It works because of engaging the users in some unique experience with your content, making it more personal. In 2016 we can see more interactive content through the form of video (such as 360-degree video), virtual reality, and advertisements that are more two-way between the company and their target audience. In this point Google virtual tour with TourDash addons seems to be a very effective marketing channel for your business.
Read:Â 3 reasons to make a Google virtual tour for your company
What other digital marketing trends do you know? What do you think about online business development?
Cool borderless designed hotspot for embedded video
Good afternoon everybody! We continue our series of posts about advanced TourDash tours content formatting with CSS and HTML editing. We’ve already told you how to use custom fonts in your TourDash tour in one of the previous posts. We hope you enjoyed this feature! Today we will describe how to embed a video in your TourDash tour in a beautiful way.
Do you want to get the same cool borderless designed hotspot for embedded video? We’ll tell you how!
1. Create a new hotspot, switch to the HTML editing mode by pressing the <> and copy the embeded code for the desired video. Embeded code must be wrapped in an extra div element indicating its class, for example “video_bordeless”.
2. Turn off display of the title in the Properties tab as well as set the width the same as the width of your video in the embeded code. The best position for displaying video is the center of the screen.
3. Save the hotspot and open the CSS editor by clicking on the Labs icon in the TourDash editor panel. If you don’t see this icon, it means your account is not included to the enhanced CSS editing. To enable this feature for your account, please contact support@tourdash.com. In CSS Edit tab, you must specify the properties for “video_borderless” class. You can just copy the snippet we’ve prepared.
Then click “Apply styles”.
Voila! 🙂
[button target=”_blank” style=”” class=”btn-default” link=”https://live.tourdash.com/embed/f7f9d3c6ab99442b8d77fc741f49e0f5?pano=Hw3tGh9m-8PMOJutURbxoA&head=173.73108281058484&pitch=1.6097242905915867&zoom=1″]Watch an example[/button]
Advanced HTML and CSS editing gives you unlimited opportunities of your TourDash tour customization! Keep reading our blog, we will post more interesting code and design examples!
Upgrades of TourDash tours mobile version
Hello there! We have some awesome news for TourDash users! We have received a lot of questions about mobile capability of our tours and especially about customizing some mobile tours elements. So we finally implemented this feature. Now you are able to change the following properties of the first mobile screen which appears before the actual tour: button “Tap to view the virtual tour” color, font color and screen layout. We hope it helps to make your tours more attractive!
Let’s look at some print screens. This is how old button and first mobile screen look like:
You can change the button on the “Embed” page in a new “Mobile” tab:
Also instead of white background in old version you can set a preview for your tour which will be shown on a mobile screen under the button. All you need to do is to check “Show tour preview in mobile version” check box. In mobile preview your tour starting position will be shown:
Then final mobile screen will look like this:
Important note! After you have made all the changes copy the new embed-code and embed it to your website.
New mobile opportunities are already available. Go ahead and try it out!
10 best Google Street View galleries ever
Hello everybody! In this post we’ve collected all the best Google Street View galleries with plenty of amazing virtual tours of absolutely different world places. Most of the panoramas are just breathtaking! Enjoy it!
1. UNESCO World Heritage
A World Heritage Site is a place that is listed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization as being of special cultural or physical significance. Visit the wonders of world, the greatest buildings and nature places of different countries.
2. Remote Islands of the World
View the worlds most remote and isolated islands. The collection includes islands of the Chagos Marine Reserve (Indian Ocean), La Martinique (Carribbean), Pitcairns (Pacific), the Papahaumokuakea Marine National Monument (Pacific) and plenty of others.
3. Animals and Wildlife
Enjoy these images of animals in their natural habitats around the world.
4. Oceans
Inconceivable submarine world collection of all the oceans of this planet. Play with Sea Lions, spy on small exotic fish, swim with dolphins and feel the energy of the main force of the Earth – oceans.
5. The World’s Highest Peaks
The collection of World’s Highest Peaks maps multiple bases along the Mount Everest, the tallest mountain in the world, the highest point of Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest freestanding mountain in Africa. Other features include Mount Elbrus in Russia, and the Buddhist Tengboche Monastery nestled in the Sagarmatha National Park.
6. Ski Resorts and Slopes
Find yourself going down from the mountain skiing and watch marvelous winter landscapes.
7. Art Project
Art Project is a collection of art installations and exhibits throughout the world covering modern art to street art. Notable collections include those encased within the White House to the opulent designs of the Palace of Versailles. Awesome experience for art lovers!
8. Government Buildings and Residences
Virtually visit and explore the grandeur and history of legislative buildings and official residences from around the world.
9. University Campuses
Want to know how the best universities of the world look like? Watch where students of different counties study.
10. TV Studios and Sets
Explore famous television studios and sets from around the world on Street View.
TourDash tour of the month | March’16
Good afternoon everybody! As you might know a month ago we started a new column at our blog – TourDash tour of the month. Every month we post here the best tour made by our resellers. The main idea is to inspire and motivate other resellers and owners of businesses to make new interesting tours!
We’ve carefully investigated all the tours made during the last four weeks. There are a lot of really amazing tours! Thank you all for your creativity and imagination! We are proud to present you the winner: Interpolis – Galini Tour.
There are a lot of attractive elements in this tour such as custom layout and buttons colors, customized dynamic hotspots icons, common style the for whole tour with all the elements. This is a great example of using web design in a virtual tour. Also there is a video introduction, which provides small, but pleasant interaction with an online visitor.Â
We are happy to share this glorious tour! Enjoy watching it!
We’re always keeping an eye out for the tours to find the most elaborated and interesting tour of the month. Although, if you’re particularly proud of a tour, share it with us! If you have any tours you’d like to submit please send them to support@tourdash.com. If it wins we will show it in our blog and social media next month.
Thank you for working with TourDash! See you soon!
Need help?
Visit support.tourdash.com for all of our documentation. If you want to talk to us directly, you can reach out to us by sending an email to support@tourdash.com and we’ll get you started!
Not a TourDash reseller?
Not a problem! Visit the TourDash Registration page and get started with TourDash today.
Want a virtual tour for your business?
If you are a business owner and you want to create an advanced interactive virtual tour for your business, using the TourDash features and functionality, you can find a trusted TourDash reseller in your area by using this list.Â
We appreciate any and every comment we get so do not hesitate to write us right here under this post or on our Facebook page. Have a nice day! 🙂
Google Photo Spheres in TourDash tours
Hello, TourDash community! Today we are happy to announce a new era of Google Photo Spheres use in TourDash tours!
A Google Photo Sphere itself is basically a panorama photo that is viewable as a 360-degree image. Users can enjoy them by swiping around to determine the directionality of the view. Any person in the world can create his own Photo Sphere and contribute it to Google Street View to share with all Google Maps users.
Google Photo Spheres is a great opportunity to add some interesting external location to your virtual tour. In this case you can show your online visitors the panorama of the street area which is situated outside of your company. It is becoming very important for those businesses that have outside points such as veranda, terrace, roof-cafe, etc.
Currently TourDash has an experimental support of Google Photo Spheres. The current stable version of Google Maps API does not give us full possibilities to work with photospheres, that has been created after September 2015. But, we were able to solve this problem, and now you can use any photospheres in your TourDash tour, no matter when this photosphere has been created.
On our support page you can find an instruction about how to add Google Photo Sphere to your TourDash tour.
[button target=”_blank” style=”” class=”btn-default” link=”https://support.tourdash.com/hc/en-us/articles/218343907-Does-TourDash-support-Google-Photo-Spheres-“]Read an instruction[/button]
Custom fonts for your TourDash tour
Useful information for those who want to use custom fonts in TourDash tours.
First of all, to use the custom fonts, you should convert your font to web-compatible formats. You can’t use OTF or TTF directly. For example, you can use fontsquirrel’s tool to convert the font (www.fontsquirrel.com/tools/webfont-generator).
Then you should access the TourDash Asset Manager (live.tourdash.com/assets) and upload “.eot” “.ttf” and “.woff” versions of the fonts. It will be useful to create a separate folder for fonts (e.g. “fonts”) and upload the files there.
After that you should copy the URL’s for the fonts from the asset manager and write them down. Just right-click the font files and choose “Copy link address”. You will use that URL’s later to setup the @font-face section.
The next step is to define a custom css styles for your fonts. Go to the Tour Editor and open the CSS panel (you can find it under the “Labs” icon). If you can’t find the “Labs” icon then you should send a request for enabling the advanced CSS functionality to support@tourdash.com
We have prepared a code snippet for you, that can be used as a base for your custom styles.
After creating custom styles you can save your tour and start editing the popup contents. To apply a custom font for a paragraph of text, for example, you should turn on the HTML editing mode of the popup editor (click the “<>” button) and use the following code:
If you want to apply your font to popup titles, your should copy this snippet to the custom CSS panel. Don’t forget to change “OpenSans” to the name of font that you are using.
This is an example of customized tour. Custom font is a very important part of brand-management and also it’s just beautiful. Make your own tour with your own fonts and look how easy it is!
For any technical questions about custom CSS please contact support@tourdash.com.
Google Street View: interesting facts and ideas for inspiration
Hello there! Today we want to share with you our inspiration from Google Street View and work their team has been doing. Take a little break from your work and get some interesting information that can help you to catch fresh motivation and creativity wave.Â
What is Google Street View?
Google Street View is a technology featured in Google Maps and Google Earth that provides panoramic views from positions along many streets in the world. It was launched in 2007 in several cities in the United States, and has since expanded to include cities and rural areas worldwide. Streets with Street View imagery available are shown as blue lines on Google Maps.
Today Google Street View includes:
- 7 continents
- 65+ countries
- 7 million+ miles traveled
How does all this work?
Google Street View displays panoramas of stitched images. Most photography is done by car, but some of it is done by trekker, tricycle, walking, boat, snowmobile, and underwater equipment. How to explore?
With Google Street View you can explore world landmarks, discover natural wonders, and step inside locations such as museums, arenas, restaurants and small businesses.Â
- Track the Loch Ness monster, scale the famed rock wall El Capitan in Yosemite, and hike Mt. Fuji in this gallery of Google’s best contributions.
- Also you can use special Google Street View application for Android or iPhone and explore content from others, and create your own.
To be in touch and get all the news from Google Maps and Google Street View you can also follow the official blog and Facebook page.
Hope you enjoy exploring all these amazing things about Google Street View and watching several unbelievable places just sitting in your room. And please don’t forget that any tour can be even more awesome with Tourdash. 🙂