Would you desire more Google bookings? Is your hotel’s social media account not producing the same results as your competitors’? Do you have an email list but aren’t sure how to make the most of it? Isn’t the positive feedback you get at the register reflected in your internet reviews?
If you’re in charge of hotel marketing, you already know that digital marketing is at the top of your priority list. You’re also aware that complete and effective digital hotel marketing plans entail a plethora of factors – and questions.
Would you like to see more Google reservations? Is your hotel’s social media account not achieving the same level of success as your competitors’? Do you have an email list but are unsure how to use it to its full potential? Isn’t it true that the positive feedback you receive at the register is mirrored in your online reviews?
You already know that digital marketing is at the top of your priority list if you’re in charge of hotel marketing. You’re also aware that comprehensive and effective digital hotel marketing strategies involve a slew of variables – and queries.
Your hotel’s digital marketing strategy
The hotel sector is defined as dynamic and competitive in today’s world. The challenges of the last decade have shifted marketing efforts squarely into the spotlight, from the rise of Airbnb-style operators to a global pandemic that has cost the global tourism industry an estimated $935 billion.
Effective marketing techniques are more important than ever for the success of hotel businesses, whether you’re opening a new hotel, increasing bookings, or bolstering your brand. In this case, digital is the way to go, because to its low cost and potential for broad reach.
Nearly 60% of the world’s population, or 4.66 billion individuals, now have access to the internet. The number of active users on social media continues to grow, with over 4 billion presently compared to little over 2 billion in 2015.
The possibilities are unlimited, and hotels can leverage the power of digital marketing to create marketing magic with the correct strategy and technology – and a little ingenuity.
Do you have visions of Paris? A virtual tour of the Hotel de Paris is available. Are you planning a family vacation? Kimpton Hotels’ Life is Suite blog can come in help.
Developing a digital marketing plan for your hotel
Consider your target demographic as the first step in developing a digital marketing strategy. Who are you targeting with your marketing? In order to comprehend and define that target audience, you must dig deep.
Creating guest identities that represent the individuals they wish to see at their check-in counter is a good approach for hotels to do this. Who do you picture as your ideal hotel guest? Do some study on These questions to get a more full and rounded understanding of these people:
What are their ages? What city do they call home?
With whom do they share a home? Who will accompany them on their journey?
What do they do for a living and how much do they earn?
What are some of their other favourite brands?
What are their interests and hobbies?
What exactly do they read?
What are the most important societal issues to them?
What stores do they frequent for food and clothing?
What are their long-term objectives? What drives them the most?
What is their preferred vacation spot?
How well-versed in technology are they?
What social media platforms do they prefer?
How do they communicate at work, at home, and with their friends and family?
The next step is to determine your long-term digital marketing objectives. These will be influenced by the company’s overall aims and strategy. For example, a corporate goal can be to increase revenue by 20% in the coming year while also strengthening your brand among millennials. That goal can then be used to design your digital marketing objectives. These bigger business goals may correlate with goals like doubling your Instagram followers to reach more millenials and creating a 50% increase in website traffic.
It’s time to delve into the meat and bolts of your digital marketing plan now that you’ve clearly established your goals and know who you’re marketing to.
You’ll need to create a strategy that includes the digital marketing tools that will best help you achieve your objectives and how you’ll use them to accomplish them.
Content marketing is one of the most popular and effective techniques
Use of social media
Marketing with influencers
Online critiques of email marketing
Google Hotel Ads, SEO, and local SEO
Hotels should use content marketing
The hotel and tourism sector has led the way with material that inspires and gives value, from blog posts to podcasts, online magazines, apps, e-books, short form video, and virtual reality. Great content may help you grow your audience, strengthen current customer relationships, increase brand loyalty, and book more appointments.
High-quality content is a critical aspect of other forms of digital marketing, including as SEO and social media marketing, and it may capture customers at various stages of the customer journey.
For effective content marketing, there are two steps to follow. To begin, you must first generate content that your target audience is eager to consume. Content that entices people to read more.
Take, for example, the Four Seasons Magazine’s ambitious and uplifting vacation pieces. High-end travellers will be enticed to click through with titles like “5 unique experiences around Europe,” “Stay another day in Paris,” and “Luxury of the workcation.”
Content gold can be discovered in packing lists and itinerary ideas for those already in the planning stages of a vacation. Want to get some exercise while visiting Perthshire, Scotland? Gleneagles has prepared a hiking guide that includes five great hikes, packing recommendations, and some Scottish terms you might need to know along the way.
The Intercontinental’s podcast, which promotes culture in an interesting way, and the instructive sustainability video content, which underlines the ideals of the Areias de Seixo hotel in Portugal, are two other fantastic instances of hotels handling content marketing well.
The hard sell must be forgotten in the second step of good content marketing. Rather, the content’s message and any call to action are hidden “between the lines” or as a casual “by the way.” For example, a useful link to the brand’s hotel in that location at the end of a post about a certain destination — something discreet and beneficial that doesn’t impede in any way from the content’s value.
Are you ready to start using content marketing? Here’s where you can learn more about content marketing strategy and best practises.
For hotels, the best social media sites include
Which social media channel is ideal for your hotel? Where will you find the greatest amount of success in the quickest amount of time?
It would be good to have a definitive answer, but there isn’t one available. However, there is a simple three-step approach for determining the best responses to these questions.
Get to know the various platforms
You must first gain a fundamental understanding of the most popular platforms available before making a decision:
Youtube: Allows hotels and visitors to generate informative and inspiring video content.
Pinterest is another visual platform where you may paint a picture of your company.
TikTok is a video-sharing app with 689 million monthly active users, more than half of them are under 34 years old.
Whatsapp: With over 2 billion users, this slick texting network has the potential to revolutionise guest communication.
Keep an eye on this one because social media is always changing and evolving.
Facebook: With 2.79 billion monthly active users, Facebook is still the most popular site for sharing information, communicating with guests, and organising events.
Instagram is a popular visual channel that is ideal for showcasing dreamy destinations and luxurious lobbies, as well as encouraging visitors and influencers to do so.
Twitter: Send out quick and snappy updates, communications, and dialogues (there is a 280-character restriction).
Consider who you’re writing for
Once again, it all boils down to knowing who you’re attempting to reach: your ideal guests. You’ll be in a better position to research the platforms on offer and make an informed decision about where to spend your marketing efforts and possible cash if you know who they are, what platforms they use the most (and why), and what type of content they appreciate.
Consider your objectives as well as the practicalities
The next stage is to consider your overarching objectives and how each social media platform might assist you in accomplishing them.
There are many practical considerations to be made:
How much time and money will you have to put in a platform in order to get the most out of it?
What is the frequency with which you will need to post on each platform?
What management and integration tools are available?
These considerations should assist you in deciding where to focus your efforts. Remember that it’s probably best to excel at one or two platforms rather than spread yourself too thin across all of them.
How to use social media to advertise your hotel
Consider the three Cs while promoting your hotel on your preferred platforms: consistency, creativity, and competition.
You must be consistent, posting on a regular basis with a clear message that reflects your brand’s personality.
You’ll also need to be a little inventive. Whatever platform you choose, there is so much going on that you must create a unique approach to stand out.
You don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time, though. Examine your competitors for inspiration for your own social media content and strategies. To get you started, consider the following suggestions:
Make sure your Facebook page’s cover image and about description, like this one from SIXTY Hotels, are catchy and on brand.
Use Instagram and Facebook Stories to share photographs and compliments from your guests.
Create a Facebook group to share behind-the-scenes facts and details about upcoming promotions.
Send out testimonials via Twitter.
Create a hashtag to re-share on-brand user-generated material, like this adorable #FairmontMoments Tweet.
Events, sunrises, and brief tours can all be streamed live.
Run a hashtag competition on Instagram to produce user content and grow your following.
To advertise important occasions and events, create a Facebook event page.
Share material from local restaurants, tourism providers, and attractions on Facebook.
To target a younger audience, collaborate with TikTok travel influencers.
Other aspects to consider when developing and implementing a social media strategy include how often to post, when to publish, how to monitor and respond to people who are talking about your company, how to optimise your profiles, and how to direct viewers to booking alternatives.
Another thing to think about when building a strategy is whether influencer marketing could be a good way to get closer to your objectives. This sort of marketing is based on endorsements, mentions, and recommendations from people who have earned the confidence of their loyal social following.
You’ll need to start by identifying influencers that are a good fit for your company and the message you want to spread. Have they already dealt with comparable hotels? Are their values and style similar to yours? Is their target audience similar to the people you’re seeking to reach? After that, you can contact the influencer directly through the social media network. If they are a well-known influencer, they may have particular contact information in their profile for someone who handles this type of partnership for them.
Is it necessary to use email marketing?
Email packs a serious marketing punch, even if it isn’t as flashy, sparkly, or intriguing as the latest social media platform. According to statistics, every dollar spent generates $38 in revenue. That’s a huge return on investment.
What is the significance of email marketing? Email is widely used these days, and it allows you to communicate directly with guests in a simple, fast, and cost-effective manner. Email marketing technology also makes it simple to personalise and target your messages, as well as track the performance of your campaigns.
Email marketing is also painted in a favourable light by statistics and surveys. More than half of a sample population stated marketing emails influence their purchase choice, and more than half of marketers think marketing emails are the most important source of ROI, and engagement is increasing. Meanwhile, 80% of company professionals agree that email marketing helps retain customers.
As you can see, it’s a subject that demands your attention. To get the most out of email marketing, pay attention to these three areas:
Creating an email list
One of the simplest ways to grow your email list is to invite customers to join your list throughout the booking process.
You may also add a signup form to your website and provide an incentive for people to sign up. Early check-in, a downloaded city guide, or the chance to win a hotel coupon might all help your list grow faster.
When you get to the next level — sending emails with maximum impact – segmenting your lists as you add new subscribers will come in handy. For example, the segments could be location-specific or just contain former guests. As a result, you’ll be able to communicate with that element of your list more directly via email.
Creating and sending emails that have the most impact
You want your emails to be opened, read, and acted upon. Again, knowing who you’re writing for will aid you in deciding how to craft and send emails. Why should your audience care about what you have to say? When do you think they’d like to hear from you?
Consider sending personalised and automated emails to your guests to help them through the pre-arrival, arrival, pre-departure, and post-departure stages of their trip. Alternatively, you might target former visitors with special seasonal offers and discounts.
Don’t forget to pay attention to the subject line (which will have a huge impact on whether or not your email is opened) and the call to action while writing your email (to make it easier for your audience to make bookings and increase conversions).
Keeping track of your campaigns
List growth, open rates, click rates, deliverability, unsubscribe rates, and inactive subscribers may all be tracked using email marketing tools. Use these stats to figure out what’s working and what’s not, so you can enhance and alter your email marketing campaigns over time.
Improving your hotel’s digital marketing by using online reviews
When it comes to organising a trip and reserving a hotel, the age-old power of word of mouth is amplified in the digital arena. More than eight out of ten individuals say they always or frequently read reviews before booking a hotel, and more than half say they would never book a hotel without them.
There are a plethora of venues where travellers can submit a review, with some of the more common alternatives being:
Tripadvisor
Reviews on Google
Booking.com
Expedia
Hotels.com
Trivago
Simply said, there are three things you should strive for when it comes to online reviews:
Increasing the number of good reviews
More bookings and earnings result from positive reviews. Nearly eight out of ten travellers say they are more likely to book a hotel with a higher review rating if all other factors are equal, and a higher rating has been demonstrated to increase occupancy and revenue per available room. Encourage positive feedback by providing a service that customers will want to brag about. Request that departing visitors complete a feedback form, and then invite those who provide favourable comments to submit a review online, guiding them to the platforms where you need more positive feedback the most.
Keeping negative feedback to a minimum
Nobody likes to stay in a filthy hotel room, so it’s no surprise that 90% of travellers will avoid booking hotels if the word “dirty” appears in online reviews. Hotel management is difficult, and there will always be complaints and unhappiness. However, by interacting effectively, you may settle many problems before they become a full-fledged vent on an internet review site.
Reviews are constantly monitored and responded to (the good and bad)
Responding to online evaluations, whether positive or negative, presents a huge opportunity. It’s an opportunity to demonstrate your commitment to excellent customer service while also reinforcing your brand values.
Get additional information from Google: SEO and Google Hotel Ads
Google, being the most popular search engine, processes about 3.5 billion searches every day. And, according to recent data, hotel and resort searches are rebounding well after the pandemic, with the greatest levels in a decade.
You should focus on search engine optimization to encourage more and better quality visitors to your hotel’s website from Google and other search engines (SEO). Keyword research, outstanding content creation, obtaining links from other websites, and ensuring that your website is fast and responsive to all types of devices are all part of SEO.
It’s a big topic , but the good news is that if you’re doing all of the above in terms of quality content, promoting great reviews, and communicating via social media and email, you’re already well on your way to search engine optimization. The wonderful part about SEO is that it’s a digital marketing strategy that keeps on giving. The traffic that comes in naturally after you spend in SEO is free.
Local SEO is an element of SEO that is particularly significant for hotels. When it comes to specific online queries, search engines recognise that the person conducting the search wants a local result – even if the inquiry does not include the words “near me.” As a result, they serve up the most local results, often accompanied by a local map indicating the location of the top results. A high ranking in local results is clearly SEO gold for hotels.
How essential are Google hotel advertisements?
While SEO is a valuable investment, getting results might take a long time. However, there is a way to bypass the line. Google Hotel Ads, formerly known as Google Hotel Finder, allows you to create a feed with the most up-to-date information on availability, room kinds, and pricing in order to reach people who are actively looking for hotels like yours. To get the greatest results, you might target guests in specific locales or focus on properties with lower occupancy rates.
AccorHotels increased year-over-year bookings by 65 percent and revenue by 84 percent thanks to a Google Hotel Ads campaign that drove more traffic to growing countries.
As you can see, hotel digital marketing strategy is a broad and often difficult topic. It is, nonetheless, an area with tremendous potential. We hope that after reading this, you will be motivated and confident to investigate the best ways to advertise your hotel online – and to develop a digital marketing strategy that will help you realise the potential and opportunity that there.