BloggerOn
For a hotel owner, marketing efforts are focused on three objectives: to gain visibility, to attract customers, and to get more bookings.
Now more than ever, with the advent of technology and constant change in consumer behavior, it’s important to utilize new and effective strategies to attract customers and gain more bookings.
That’s why a digital marketing strategy is fast becoming the new territory for businesses who want to stay ahead in their industries – and hotels aren’t left behind in the race.
Hotel digital marketing simply means building and maintaining an online distribution inventory using platforms like Google, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and other search engines to grow revenue.
With an effective digital marketing strategy, it’ll be easier to attract the right audience and convert them to customers, which in the end, is the goal of a hotel business.
This article is put together to walk you through the effective digital marketing strategies that you need to place your hotel business ahead.
Visible Online Presence
Having a hotel business without an online presence in 2020 is almost the same as not having a business at all. Again, having an online presence that isn’t functional is virtually the same as not having anything. It’s as simple as ‘a hotel business can’t work without a visible online presence’.
The first thing to do is design a website that projects everything your hotel stands for, and get it to work. Your hotel website should be regarded as your hotel on the internet. It should showcase your amenities, services, perks, location, rooms, and everything else representing your hotel.
If your website contains one thing, it should be attractive pictures of the hotel because this usually draws visitors’ attention. For tourists, they like to take a lot of photos while on vacation. This includes pictures from the hotels where they stay.
One way to attract visitors is to incentivize checking into your hotel and taking pictures on the premises. When they do this, they can post the pictures on their different online platforms and give credits, which will, in turn, increase your visibility. Wingate by Wyndham Los Angeles International Airport LAX provides free pick-up and drop-off services for all International guests. Makes checking in so much easier.
Integrating SEO into your website plan is as important as building the website itself.
Advertising
There are several advertising strategies that you can utilize, but top on the list is Meta-Search Marketing. This is because over 70% of hotel bookings come from online travel agencies (OTA) like TripAdvisor, Kayak, Expedia, Trivago, and many others. They primarily boost your visibility and direct bookings, giving you improved brand value as a bonus.
Google Hotel Ads is also making waves in the metasearch market, providing a relatively low competitive and budget-friendly environment (at the moment).
However, you can’t solely depend on the leads you get from OTAs. Your hotel can set regular advertising campaigns and use click-based ads to expose yourself to millions of online users. Run (and optimize) ads everywhere possible.
From Google Ads campaigns, to Facebook (and Instagram) Ads and retargeting ads, it’s important to keep pushing your hotel in the faces of the right audience. The more they see your brand, the higher the chances of booking your hotel.
Social Media Marketing
Social media is the ultimate machine for driving the digital marketing strategy for your hotel.
Before launching any social media marketing campaign, you need to figure out the platforms that’ll bring in the best engagement and reach your target audience. For hotel businesses, having a presence on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube is important. However, utilizing these platforms to their greatest potential is what makes your digital marketing strategy effective.
These different platforms are all unique parts of the marketing story you’re telling.
- Facebook sales now allow business owners to take bookings and even payments through the platform.
- Instagram provides the opportunity to reach an incredibly big market and with the right attractive images and eye-catching designs.
- Twitter, on the other hand, can also allow you to reach a specific audience (you can take advantage of this since it’s usually overlooked!).
- YouTube channel videos can be your customers’ view of real hotel experiences and testimonials.
One platform shouldn’t be neglected for the other. Instead, develop a strategy that allows you to schedule and rotate social media posts.
One thing you should never forget is that aesthetics run the social media business, and the current generation is more intrigued by eye-catching designs and videos. This implies that you need the best help in creating social media posts to highlight your hotel’s services.
An online graphic design tool like PosterMyWall makes it easier and affordable to create these professional designs through its social media posts template. With PosterMyWall, you don’t have to create the designs to suit different platforms’ various sizes. This tool also provides automatic resizing through its resize feature to suit the different needs you may have.
Also, scheduling and publishing posts can be a herculean task if you have different work platforms. However, a Premium plan with PosterMyWall takes full care of that. Just put in your caption, schedule the post for a specific time, and move on to other tasks that you have. PosterMyWall has it all covered.
Influential Marketing
Another great strategy that hotel businesses can use to attract the right audience is influential marketing.
Certain groups of people have a huge following and influence on other people, especially on social media. Hotel contacts can get in touch with a number, invite them to patronize your hotel (with incentives), and then persuade them to recommend and review your hotel through their blogs or social media channels.
This way, their audience becomes aware of your hotel. The influencers are largely able to influence their audience’s purchasing decisions. Starwood Resorts worked together with top French instagram influencers to massively promote the hotel’s new property in Paris, Le Metropolitan and Le Dokhan. The influencers were able to help increase the hotel bookings by posting their experience and photos at the hotels on instagram.
It’s an easier option that can bring in the best results when done the right way. Be sure to pick out the right kind of influencers, particularly those in industries related to luxury, tourism, and hospitality.
Social Responsibility
With the events of 2020 so far, if there’s one thing that it has taught business owners, the unexpected can happen at any time. When it does, we shouldn’t be too scared to change directions and make new plans that fit the situation.
Businesses, especially those in the hotel industry, are majorly about the experiences that their customers have. Therefore, when the world is tilting in one direction, they shouldn’t be scared to follow and take on social responsibility.
In times of crisis, hotels should make plans to offer social aid, like shelters during hurricanes, support for health officials, and substantial discounts for those stuck in certain places due to specific issues (like a pandemic or unrest).
Adaptability
Even if a particular system has worked out well for you in the past, times are changing, and plans that would sync with the current tide need to be implemented.
For example, changes to menu design can be made to see what works best for your audience. Digital signage at your hotel should be changed from time to time also. PosterMyWall offers different menu template options that you can choose from to redesign your menu easily. There are also Digital Signage options available to pick from.
Conclusion
In all you do, never forget that hotel digital marketing plays a vital role in the number of bookings your hotel gets, and ultimately the ROI. Implement these strategies and place your hotel at the forefront of the hotel business competition.
