3 COMMON ONLINE MISTAKES OF SMALL HOTELIERS
It is not easy to be on many places at the same time. But that’s what Internet makes us to do – to be everywhere, anytime, always available to our clients when they need us. Maintaining a good online presence is a challenge especially for small hoteliers who have to deal with many things simultaneously. In order to keep our online presence effective and to attract more hotel guests through Internet, we should avoid the following 3 common online mistakes of small hoteliers. MISTAKE #1: The customer can’t find you As a manager of small hotel we can’t expect our clients to find us if we are not where they are looking for. First, we must link our business in the main online directories for local searches such as Google Local and Facebook, too. Second, our hotel should be on at least the most popular online travel agencies (such as Booking.com) and meta-search engines (such as TripAdvisor). This not only gives authority to our hotel but is a huge place to reach travellers who spend hours searching the best deal on those websites. MISTAKE #2: You are not active online The only bigger mistake than not being online is to be online but not actively – i.e. not to update our accounts or answer to user’s questions and queries. It is really important to be active and post regularly new information for our hotel online. The regular update of the strategy for online marketing of our small hotel is crucial for our success. We should monitor our competitors strategies and to be better than them, to post on schedule and to update the hotel’s information on the web. MISTAKE #3: You don’t manage your online reputation Many online platforms let our guests to leave an honest feedback and reviews. It is important to monitor those online opinions and to show our guests that we care what they think of us by responding fast and appropriately. When we have a positive feedback we should thank the user, appreciate his or her opinion and time and invite them over again. When we have a negative feedback we should stay calm, apologize for the inconvenience and to compensate the guest if needed. Our answers will show how we treat our guests and they can be seen by future potential customers anytime. The strong online presence will increase the brand awareness of your small hotel and will bring many new reservations. We know how busy can be a hotelier but investing in your web presence you invest in the future of your hotel business. Travel Mind can help you create and maintain social media profiles, listing your small hotel in online directories, optimize your website for search engines and everything else you need for an effective online presence! Get in touch! Read more: What you should know about SEO for hotels Online marketing for travel agencies: important tips How to turn our hotel guest’s into loyal customers
What should you know about successful SEO for hotels
Almost every trip now begins in the Internet – in searching a new destination, buying tickets or looking for the best hotel… Usually people go on Google and expect to find the best offer in the first search results. If we don’t have a good SEO strategy it is very unlikely our hotel’s website to appear on the first page of search engines. That’s why we need to work hard to get there. What is SEO? SEO or Search Engine Optimization is a set of good marketing and technical tools and practices for improving the visibility of a webpage on the organic search engine results. The goal is to get more website traffic, more bookings and, hence, more revenue. Unlike paid search results, organic SEO has long-term results which are probably not going to be noticed immediately. However, they are extremely helpful if SEO is done permanently. Search engine optimization can be considered as a combination of several different elements – from on-page optimization, off-page optimization to technical characteristics. It is important to know that search engines index all web pages and rank them in the search results according to the certain criteria. The role of SEO is to make sure that a website meets these criteria as much as possible. Of course, people can only meet part of these criteria to help the website visibility but it’s still better than not doing anything. What are the elements of a good SEO? Among the main elements of search engine optimization is the use of the keywords we want to be found in the search engines. Another criterion is the use of unique, useful and update content in our website. Maintaining a blog on the hotel’s website is one of the best ways to do that and bring our site higher on the search results on the Internet. The use of internal links to other useful pages on our website, and external links – those that lead to our website from third parties websites, are also an important factor for the food SEO. On the other hand, social networks have indirect effect on the search engine optimization for hotels. If we know how to engage users in those platforms we can attract higher traffic to our website which is also very good for SEO. Local SEO is extremely important for the travel industry. This is basically the more personalized search engine results according to a specific location. This can be done by creating a page on Google Places which can also connect to Google+ profile. The advantages of Google+ presence are many, most importantly because the account is connected to all the other Google services. There is no doubt that the organic SEO is an important element of the hotel’s online presence. The improvement of the visibility in search engines is going to bring more website traffic, more bookings and more guests and revenue. Read more: How to turn our hotel’s guests into loyal customers Why every hotel should have a blog 5 ways to improve our hotel’s online reputation
Facebook for Hoteliers – 5 key trends
No matter if you are manager or owner of small family hotel or famous beach resort, the one thing you should definitely do for your online presence is to be on Facebook – the biggest social network in the world. With its 1,4 bln users in 2015 Facebook is the perfect place to connect with your previous and present guests and to attract new visitors. But only running a Facebook page for your hotel is not quite enough in order to turn the social media in a profitable marketing tool. You need to create a good strategy for your online presence which should follow the 5 key Facebook trends for hoteliers. Here they are: 1. Visuals rule Facebook If you should change one thing in your Facebook strategy, it is to add even more catchy visuals in your posts. Photos, galleries and short videos will become more and more important because of the huge information flows in people’s everyday life. Users are more attracted to visuals because their message is easier to convert. 2. Show what happens behind the scenes Facebook is not exactly a promotion tool. You should not use it to only offer your products and services. You need to create deeper connection with your fans. You can do that with showing them what happens behind the scenes in your hotel. Show them that behind the virtual presence real people there are real people and real stories. 3. Don’t be afraid to pay Facebook Facebook is showing less and less companies’ content on users feed in order to increase the quality of content and to stimulate paid content. In order to keep up with Facebook’s pace you shouldn’t be afraid to pay for promote your posts and reach broader audience. The data shows that Facebook ads become more successful. There was a significant increase in CTR during the first quarter of 2015 – with 17%, compared to the previous quarter and with 260% compared to the first quarter of 2014. 4. Facebook reputation matters Leaving hotel reviews on Facebook is easy. Furthermore, people love to share where they spent pictures from their holiday on the social network so it’s a great way to use their content in order to build a good reputation for your hotel. You can stimulate people to share photos on Facebook and review your hotel with a contest or a complimentary threat. That way your potential guests can see how well your guests spend their time in your hotel. 5. Quality over quantity We can repeat this one over and over again and it will never get old. Newsfeeds are full of content and people are not attention on every post they see. You have to make sure you post quality stuff in order to engage users with your content. The key to create a long lasting online relationship with your Facebook fans and turning them into real guests is in the right marketing strategy. The social network should definitely be part of your online presence but it should be developed in an engaging and thoughtful way.
5 Key Digital Marketing Trends for Hotels
Digital marketing is already a substantial part of every hotel’s marketing strategy. For some it is even the leading tool for reaching the right audience. And not without a reason – about 80% of people who are planning a trip do a preliminary Internet research and even book accommodation, tickets and tours online. But like everything else Internet is also changing and so do digital marketing strategies for hotels. It is therefore important that you are consistent with the trends in the dynamic travel industry. Rise of Mobile Mobile searches are the key trend in the digital marketing for 2015 which will increase even more in the future. Mobile users can become an entirely new segment of visitors to your hotel if you apply the right mobile marketing strategy. The most important step is to get a mobile website. This will also help you rank higher in search results as Google announced it will prioritize mobile websites. In order to meet mobile customers’ needs you can also provide an opportunity for direct online booking and payments via mobile devices. Rise of content marketing Content as part of hotel’s digital marketing strategy will become more and more important. The idea is to create unique content for your website in order to create emotional relationship with customers and to improve your SEO, of course. Content can be everything from information about your hotel, about nearby sights or upcoming events in the area, photo galleries or even interesting travel news. It is important to know how to optimize your content for search engines and focus on your target audience. Need for speed You will have less and less time to keep the attention of online users. In order to make them choose your hotel and stay on your website, you have to grab their attention at the beginning. After that you have to facilitate the navigation of your website so they don’t lose patience. Important elements such as loading speed, menu structure, colors and call to action buttons must be taken into account. Be unique on social media Social media marketing for hotels positions your brand and creates connection with your past, present and future guests. Your online presence in those websites is what will differentiate your hotel from your competitors. But you need to plan your social media strategy well. Social networks such as Facebook provide good opportunities for advertising, strong targeting and create more personalized relationships. Understanding the tourist behavior Understanding the tourist behavior on the Internet is an important part of your digital marketing planning process. Your hotel should appear at any stage of the journey for your guests – from the beginning of the idea to travel to the accommodation research and activities after the trip. The process of creating a digital marketing strategy for hotels require a deep understanding of online users behavior, audience targeting and your hotel’s goals. Travel Mind can help you create an effective digital marketing strategy and manage your online reputation.
