Web design in Arusha for lodges and safaris

On Monday a tour operator in Germany emails for your rates and your child policy. On Tuesday a couple asks on WhatsApp for a photo of the family tent. On Wednesday your driver forwards a guest’s question about the road from Karatu. You have every answer, but they are spread across a PDF, a phone gallery and your manager’s memory.

A good lodge or safari website puts those answers on the page. This article covers what guests and agents check before they book, the pages and photos you need, how the website works on a phone, and what to prepare. It is for lodges, camps, safari and tour operators, hotels, schools and businesses in Arusha, Moshi, Karatu and Usa River.

What does a guest check before booking a lodge or safari?

Before guests send their dates, they look for these answers on the page:

• The rooms. Each room or tent type, with a photo of the bed, the bathroom and the view from the door. Say how many people each one sleeps.
• The photos. Recent, real photos of your place. Guest photos in reviews show the same rooms, so yours should be accurate.
• The price. Your rates, or at least a “from” price per person per night, with the months it covers.
• What is included. Meals, drinks, game drives, park fees, airport transfers and laundry. Say what costs extra too.
• How to get there. The drive from Kilimanjaro International Airport or Arusha town, what the road is like in the rains, and the nearest airstrip.
• Reviews. A few real reviews, with a link to where they were posted.
• WhatsApp. A button on every page that opens a chat with your reservations team.

If one of these is missing, the guest has to write and ask. Some will open the next lodge instead.

Agents and direct guests read the same website differently

Many safari guests come to you through an agent. In a survey of visitors leaving Tanzania in August 2025, 58.8% had come on a package tour. The report defines that as a trip arranged in advance, normally by a travel agent. Asked where they found information about Tanzania, 49.1% named a travel agent or tour operator. The same report gives 2,294,495 international tourist arrivals in 2025, up from 2,141,895 in 2024. Its authors include the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, the Bank of Tanzania and the National Bureau of Statistics, and I read it on 4 November 2026.

So your website has two readers.

An agent is putting together a trip for a client. They need facts they can copy into a proposal: your room types and how many of each, the child policy, what is included, a map and photos large enough to use. A fact sheet to download and a reservations email on every page save them a message.

A direct guest wants to see what the stay will be like. They look at the photos, read about the food and the guides, check the price and send a WhatsApp.

A short page for agents, linked in the footer, can hold the fact sheet, the rates and the photo downloads, and the main pages are for the guest.

The co-founder of Good Earth Tours wrote this about the rebrand I led in 2021, brand work from before websites became my main work.

Which pages and photos does a safari website need?

A lodge or camp website usually needs these pages:

• Home, with your best photo, where you are and a WhatsApp button
• Rooms or tents, with each type in its own section
• Rates, and what is included
• Activities, such as game drives, walks and village visits
• Getting here, with a map and honest drive times
• Gallery
• Enquire

A safari or tour operator needs a page for each trip. Each page gives the number of days, the parks, where guests sleep each night, the “from” price and what is included.

Plan your photos as a list before the shoot:

• each room type, wide, then the bed, the bathroom and the view
• the lounge, the dining area, the pool and the fire
• the food as guests are served it
• your guides, drivers and staff, with their permission
• the drive in, the gate and the arrival
• the same places at sunrise and after dark

For Planet Lodges in 2023, I directed new photography and the activity booklets.

Does your website open quickly on a phone?

In Tanzania, phones made up 69.15% of page views in October 2026 (StatCounter). StatCounter counts page views on the websites that use its tracking code. If you use Google Analytics, it shows which devices your guests abroad use.

On mobile data and a weak signal, these checks help:

• Make each photo smaller in file size, so the gallery opens quickly.
• Put your rates on the page as text. A large PDF is slow to open on a phone.
• Keep the WhatsApp button on screen as the guest scrolls.
• Test every page on mobile data, away from the office Wi-Fi.

My years with lodges and safari brands in the north

I studied in Arusha, at the Institute of Accountancy Arusha, and was a marketing designer at The School of St Jude there from 2016 to 2017. In 2020 I worked with KILIFAIR, the Kilimanjaro tourism fair in Arusha. In 2021, at Media Works, I worked on more than 2,000 branded items for the Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority.

From 2021 to 2022, as brand and digital consultant for Planet Lodges and Good Earth Tours, I led the rebrands of Good Earth Tours, Planet Lodges and the ADINA lodge brand. In 2022 I also led the redesign of the Good Earth Tours website. At Rivertrees Country Inn in Usa River, bookings rose 15% while I ran communications. In 2023, when I was brand marketing manager at Planet Lodges, booking enquiries rose 20%. Then I was brand executive at Nomad Tanzania, and I have managed brand projects for Lairs Camps, a group of luxury safari camps.

In those roles I wrote the briefs, chose photographers and designers, and checked the work before guests saw it. I have worked on websites since 2011, and today I design and build them myself.

The general manager of Planet Lodges wrote this about the brand rollout, print and brand work from before websites became my main work.

How a project runs from Dar es Salaam

I’m based in Dar es Salaam and I work online, so I don’t come to your lodge for meetings. A project runs on WhatsApp messages, voice notes and email, with Zoom or Google Meet when a video call helps. You can write a few notes about each room between game drives, and I turn them into the copy for that page.

Every website goes through research, strategy, copywriting, art direction, design, build, testing and handover. I build websites of up to 5, 10 or 20 pages, or a custom website designed from scratch, and Website Care looks after them each month once they are live. Services lists what each one includes, and Work shows the websites I designed and built as my own projects, and two redesigns I proposed.

If you also run a property on the coast, Web design in Zanzibar covers beach hotels and villas. Web design in Tanzania covers businesses across the country.

What to prepare before you send a brief

1. Your room or tent types, how many of each, and how many guests each one sleeps.
2. Your rates by season, or the “from” prices you are happy to publish.
3. What is included, what is extra, and your child policy.
4. Directions from the airport and from Arusha town, with honest drive times.
5. Your best photos, or a date for a new shoot.
6. Links to your reviews, and your agent fact sheet if you have one.
7. The WhatsApp number your reservations team answers.

What to prepare before a website project has the full list.

Short answers for lodges and safari companies in Arusha