Marketing your hotel and attracting new and repeat guests can feel overwhelming, like rowing across the ocean with only a pair of oars for company. The concept of marketing is best approached like a many-pronged project encompassing different platforms and strategies, but arguably one of the most important tentacles of the advertising octopus is blogging.
Let's talk about blogging for your hotel...
You sea, having a great blog not only helps with your SEO to show Google you exist and are open for business, but it also helps draw guests in through engaging content; they may discover your hotel via a blog post about the local area, for example. Here, I’m going to cover the essentials of blogging for hotels, including what to write about, how to promote your blog and so much more!
Contents:
Tip #1: Know Your Audience
The first drop in the ocean of any marketing strategy is understanding your audience, and blogging is no different. You’ll need to understand who your hotel guests are to create content that resonates with them.
For example, do you mainly attract families at your British seaside resort hotel, or are you situated perfectly near a city and so host a lot of business travellers? Perhaps you mainly market towards honeymooners, backpackers, couples with no children, and groups of friends. Once you have identified this, you’ll be better placed to start creating content they’ll love.
Tip #2: Write What's Relevant
To start making a splash, when blogging for hotels it’s so important that everything you write about is highly relevant to your audience. Consider covering topics such as 'Frequently Asked Questions', local attractions or activities, special amenities in your hotel and travel tips for the area.
Leverage what makes your hotel unique, as this is what will draw guests in time and time again. Try to avoid repeating content that is already readily available; if you’re writing a guide to the local area for example, try to tease out the things your guests will love that might be harder to stumble across and require local knowledge to find.
If your hotel is special because of its location (oceanside/on a game reserve/surrounded by olive groves), a particular amenity (rooftop bar/luxury spa/great social opportunities) or known for something specific, really capitalise on that and try to make it a standout feature of your blogs.
Tip #3: Have A Blog Strategy
I highly recommend setting up a ‘content calendar’ for consistent posting, by taking some time to plot out your topics for the next few months. This saves a lot of wading through a flood of ideas next time you come to blog.
Once your topics are nailed, the next step to blogging for hotels is making the content engaging. Use storytelling techniques to take your readers on a journey, and back it up with high-quality images and videos that compliment the text. The travel industry is highly visual and often guests will book (or not!) based on what they see online, particularly if it is their first visit or they haven’t had a recommendation for your hotel.
It's also worth investing in some basic SEO research and training to ensure your blog is discoverable online; it doesn’t need to be rocket science, but it does need a little bit of thought! Find out what your target audience is talking about or wants to know through 'social listening' - keeping your eyes peeled for topics on social media and search enginges like Google.
Tip #4: Use Your Expertise
It’s a great idea to leverage local expertise and make use of cross-promotion opportunities with local attractions and businesses; the more people shouting about your hotel, the better! This includes using guest testimonials and stories, addressing FAQs to tackle popular queries and encouraging interaction in the comment section of your blog. The majority of people will head straight for the reviews of your hotel before they book, so making sure there is lots of genuinely positive noise around is key in your blogging for hotels.
Check out my TripAdvisor management services to help with this!
Tip #5: Promote Your Blog
Last but not least, what do you do once you’ve written your winning content and added it to your website? You’ll need a solid strategy for promoting your blog, and three easy ways to do this are through social media, email newsletters and LinkedIn.
You’ve done the hard work writing the blog piece, so now break it down into cohesive, bitesize chunks and share, share, share! Give people direct links to the blog where possible, and tell them what value they’ll find when they read it; the travel industry is perfect to capitalise on people’s desire to research their destination ahead of time.
Where to sail to next...
I understand that you might not have much time in the travel bag, which is why I’ve developed some packages perfect for blogging for hotels. Reach out to find out more about them and how you can say Aloha to easier, better guest advertising. You can also browse my blog for lots more tips, advice and insider knowledge about marketing for your hotel…see what I did there?