Hotel Marketing

There are 525,600 minutes in every year. As I write this, most hotels amd most hotel customers appear to be conditioned to waiting until the last one to "get the best deal".

Hell, there's even a website (indeed, more than one website) dedicated to last minute, late availability or "distress" promotions.

They make money by promoting the rooms you didn't have sufficient wit to sell, to the people you didn't bother to engage with your promotion.

Controversial? Let's discuss.

Continue reading "There are more than 500,000 minutes every year - why wait until the last one to sell your hotel rooms?"

Posted by HotelBlogger

Are you sitting comfortably?

Then I'll begin.

Sometimes children, when hotel owners and managers close their eyes very, very tightly - they can imagine all sorts of wonderful things happening to their business. Because these wonderful things happen in their heads (but only when their eyes are closed very, very tightly remember) some hotel owners and managers can confuse them with reality and they think these things can really happen.

Aren't they silly boys and girls?

Continue reading ""Everybody welcome" means no target market"

Posted by HotelBlogger

A straw poll in the office today - completely unscientific and based on anecdotal evidence - suggests that a good many businesses (not just hotel businesses) don't actually have a marketing budget.

Nor do they have a marketing plan.

Or a strategy.

Ah.

We started off with the thought that we might find a figure that people think is a reasonable amount to spend on promoting and selling hotel bedrooms. We were a bit shocked (but not entirely surprised) by what we found.

Continue reading "How big should your marketing budget be?"

Posted by HotelBlogger

We know from our experience with hotel brochures that hotels don't sell furniture. We might be forgiven for thinking that they do. But they don't.

So what do hotels sell?

What does your hotel sell? Rooms? Beer? Wine? Sausages? Beds? Steaks? Pillows? Curtains?

Continue reading "Hotels don't sell furniture. Hotels sell...???"

Posted by HotelBlogger

It's good to have your opinions confirmed by other people

Tripadvisor is having to work hard to stop people "gaming" their system. Not exactly news to us is it?

Hotels with questionable ratings (this time on the part of the hotels themselves allegedly) are now marked with a red tag. Be advised - what you read might not be entirely accurate. I wonder if this applies to the ratings offered by customers too?

I'm with Mr Frommer on this one. Note his comments in the article.

Posted by HotelBlogger

Using social media networks, such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter - or even your own blog, is a good way to develop and talk to a community of people (followers) who might buy your products and services one day. You can build a community for your short breaks, a community for your restaurant and you can tell them all about what you're up to and where the great deals are to be had.

A hotel owner contacted me recently, he was quite excited about the possibilities of developing his presence on social media websites. He was all set to reap the benefits of tweeting and blogging. However he wasn't ready for this...

Continue reading "Important news about using social media in your business!"

Posted by HotelBlogger

One of the most frustrating things a hotel can do on the internet is to start a price war.

It does nobody any good.

It doesn't help the hotel - because you'll rarely get the additional business necessary to make up for the discounts you're offering.

It doesn't help the customer - because the discounted price means either they'll get bad service because you can't afford to staff the place properly, or because you're so annoyed they've bought "cheap" that you'll give them that grotty room next to the lift, on the top floor of the annexe with the banging fire door right outside - just like Thistle hotels did to me in London last year (not afraid to name names here - did I get a good nights' sleep? I think not.).

Suicidal discounting is not the way forward. Taks a look at Laterooms pages for any location where demand is weak and you'll see prices dropping like lead balloons. Yes, I know all about hotel rooms and their perishable nature. If you're promoting your rooms at crazy disounts it's because you've forgotten why people want to buy them in the first place.

Continue reading "People don't buy things because they're cheap"

Posted by HotelBlogger

Here's a nice article about why you shouldn't link to Tripadvisor from your website.

Take a look, then come back and join in the discussion.

Continue reading "Tripadvisor - the green peril"

Posted by HotelBlogger

Like everything else on the internet - there are examples of good and bad ways to do pay per click promotion of your hotel rooms.
I don't do much pay per click work with hotels. Not because I don't think it'll work, but because most hotel websites I come across aren't much use.

Continue reading "When pay per click goes bad"

Posted by HotelBlogger