Your hotel’s digital presence is more than just your website. Studies show that people check between 7 and 35 sites before booking a hotel. Therefore, potential guests need to see you multiple times before your hotel is a part of their consideration set. Your hotel needs both exposure to the right target audience as well as a consistent presence to get them to check rates then book.
NB: This is an article from Cogwheel Marketing, one of our Expert Partners
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Are you telling a consistent story across all your digital channels?
This 25-point checklist is intended to identify gaps in your total online digital strategy for most branded hotels. Once you identify where your needs are, you can begin planning a tactical strategy and implementation to increase your hotel’s total online presence.
1. Market Trends
Visit Trends.Google.com (free) to search for “hotels in [Insert hotel city]” to view the search volume for your area. You can do multiple searches to see recovery for searches for particular markets and compare as many as 5 years of searches.
2. Unique Selling Propositions (USPs)
Define what makes your hotel unique against the competitive set as well as other hotels in your name brand. Remember, not all guests know your “brand standards” and most guests need to have information repeated to them. Unique Selling Propositions in the content of your hotel website, your on-page search engine optimization strategy, imagery, copy in your ads, social media and prominent throughout your entire online presence.
3. Content
Content is relevant and up to date, including relevant Demand Generators that might have changed during the pandemic. Ensure amenities are accurate across all channels, including OTAs and local listings like Google My Business. Ensure all fields and characters are maximized in your hotel Content Management System. Room descriptions should showcase the differences in room type offerings. Highlight uniqueness in the room name, including balcony, sofa bed or views.
4. Imagery
Imagery is a type of content and is the number one conversion metric and should be done every 3 to 5 years. Ensure your imagery meets or exceeds brand standards as well as respective OTA image standards to maximize your content score. Imagery should accurately represent your hotel, including any unique amenities. Consider images to represent pet-friendly, views, and in-room amenities as well as images that show the depth and size of the guest rooms and bathroom.
5. Demand Generators
Who stays at your hotel and competitor hotels have likely changed. Those transient demand generators were previously overlooked and now need more attention. Ensure hotel demand generators are represented in content and on-page and off-page search engine optimization opportunities.
6. Room Types
All of your room types should be represented and selling on your hotel website and OTAs. Highlight content that showcases differences between room types. Room type amenities should be accurate on all channels, including OTAs and your hotel website.
