It’s the question every busy marketer fears. You knew it was coming – it happens every year – but budget season was hectic so you pushed it to the bottom of your to-do list until… “What are we doing for Black Friday this year?”
NB: This is an article from Triptease, one of our Expert Partners
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No matter the size of your marketing team, there are certain calendar dates when the workload ramps up, steep goals are set and everyone feels just that little bit more frantic. Whether it’s Black Friday, Singles’ Day or the January sales, those peak shopping days that present incredible sales opportunities also bring their fair share of panic and stress.
But it doesn’t have to be this way! Automation and generative A.I. tools have never been more accessible to hoteliers. The trick is working out where they can be most effectively applied to take the strain off your team. Below we’ll outline how automation and A.I. can be used to save you time (and budget!) at every stage of the customer booking journey.
Use ChatGPT to revolutionize your organic SEO strategy
Over 90% of online experiences begin with a search engine but 75% of searchers don’t click past the first page of results. That means your SEO strategy is incredibly important – but it’s also incredibly time consuming. Keyword research and content creation takes a lot of time and effort – until now. The launch of ChatGPT means hoteliers can create SEO-boosting content in record time.
At the Direct Booking Summit Chicago, SEO expert and Vice President, Digital Marketing at Westgate Resorts, Alex Velazquez, provided a, step-by-step guide to creating SEO content that will drive a hotel’s rankings up the results list. The best bit? You can follow his steps in just 30 minutes.
Alex explained how global media and hospitality brand, Time Out, dominate organic rankings for ‘New York Hotels’ by using list-type articles that live on their blog. They use the EAT model: Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness. Hotels should focus on building search engine expertise and authority for their destination. Write about your city lifestyle, guest interests, and your hotel’s unique selling points. Search engines like Google are focused on authority. If you can create a blog full of content that shows expertise on things to do, places to eat, nightlife, local beaches, etc. your website will rank higher. With the right prompts – which Alex shared in his presentation – ChatGPT can write all this content for you.
Let customers preview your price on Paid Search to boost qualified traffic
It’s hard to have a competitive edge in Paid Search ads. Most hotels lose traffic to OTAs with huge marketing budgets and ultimately lose bookings as a result. But what if your branded ads automatically highlighted the one thing customers care about most when booking?
Finding the right hotel at the right price is crucial for all guests. Triptease’s Price Preview functionality highlights the direct ‘from’ price automatically in Paid Search ads, providing a competitive edge over OTAs who don’t have access to this data.
Price Preview offers a great experience for customers too. People who click on your ads already know that your price is right for them – you’ve saved them a step of having to check if your hotel is within their budget. The price they see in Paid Search ads will be reflected on the booking engine too, providing a consistent, premium experience that helps to build trust in your brand.
