How to become a tour guide?

Welcome to a wonderful world of tourism jobs. If you want to become a tour guide, there are some things you need to consider and do first. The title Tour Guide is an opening to many tour guide jobs: local museum guide, tour director, tour leader, tour escort and so on. With over-tourism in many places, rules and regulations are getting stricter. The Corona virus will also change the way we are able to do our job.

Many cities and nature parks only allow licensed guides. E.g.: Vienna in Europe; Washington D.C. in the USA. Growing popularity and sites with many UNESCO World Heritage treasures, like Samarkand and Bhukara in Uzbekistan are applying training and requesting tour guide certification more and more.

Before becoming a tourguide So you want to become a tour guide?

Consider this first before becoming a tourguide

Working as a tour guide means organising your work-life balance, especially if you are a tour director travelling with guests. That’s what the owners of EastguidesWest do: we travel up to 140 days per year: weekends, weeks and holidays! But: We LOVE our job and if you know that you want to become a tour guide, this is what you need to consider first:

Realise that this is NOT an ongoing vacation
There is no such thing as to “wing” it
People travel all over the world to come and meet YOU!
You can make or break their dream tour: You are responsible for your guests’ experiences

So you want to become a tour guide?

Your next steps are to find your niche in the tourism industry:

What is your passion: Nature tours, historical tours, city walks, adventures, expeditions?
Which tour operators sell products in your field of interest?
What type of tourists visit your town, region, country?
Are you bi- or multi-lingual?
Do you want to be employed or independent? Organising your own special tour?
Find out more about tour guide training today! Trainings and licences instil trust in your potential employer and your foreign guests

Do you want to know more about how to become a tourguide?

Are you a new or experienced local guide? Are you passionate and knowledgeable about your country? We are offering tour guide courses, on site and online.

Follow our 3-day tour leader training

Are you looking to make more money from tour guiding? Or do you want to get better tour guide jobs? Work more days? If your answer is yes to those questions, check out our 3-day training course.

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Online Tour Guide Training Courses

Are you a new or experienced local guide? Are you passionate and knowledgeable about your country? Do you strive to show visitors your city’s unique and memorable places? Do you want to stick out as a preferred tour guide? Check our online courses.

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Workshop Testimonials

“Awesome from the beginning”

Thanks a lot for the whole squad of the Tour Agency OOO C.A.T.I.A SILK ROAD DESTINATIONS as well as Michael Shamshidov & Sjannie & Sergey who shared their best unforgettable experience.

It was awesome from the beginning of the first Samarkand Guide Forum with EastguidesWest. All what we want has been displayed in a higher level of professionalism, and exchanging our personal feedbacks during the Forum made all of us to be more attentive in a way of giving the appropriate answers to the natural questions. Organizing such fabulous and astonishing Guides-gathering can be handy for us during our work. As a new guide, i discovered a new world and a new history on my life-book.

Samarkand Guide Forum ParticipantSamarkand, January 2020