How To Promote Hotel Online [8 Expert Strategies]

The hospitality industry has evolved significantly over the years, mirroring guests’ changing demands and preferences. 

And guests today want to explore, find, check, and ultimately book their accommodation online.

To stay competitive, it’s crucial to adapt and embrace the digital era. An online presence is no longer a nice addition but a necessity for scaling your hotel business.

But where and how can you start with so many options available?

Read on to see how to promote a hotel online for greater revenue opportunities.

Let’s dive in!

Hotel Digital Marketing: What Is It?

All the digital channels and online strategies you use to promote a hotel and attract guests are part of hotel digital marketing.

The main goal is to enhance the overall online presence of your hotel property to:

• Reach potential guests
• Engage with current guests, 
• Increase bookings and, consequently, drive revenue.

What digital channels and online strategies are we referring to? Let’s find out!

How To Promote A Hotel Online in 8 Effective Ways?

The following digital marketing strategies should provide a great intro to boosting your online presence by raising brand awareness and loyalty.

1. Start With Your Website

1.1. Use Professional Photos

Did you know that high-quality photos of your hotel, rooms, and available amenities will likely increase bookings through your website by 15%?

It’s hardly surprising, considering that images are the first thing potential guests will see. Furthermore, they will not only see your images but also decide whether to continue browsing based on them.

This is why the photos you include:

• Must look professional, 
• Have sufficient light and 
• Showcase your property and everything that makes it special.

Have you got a centerpiece that your guests may like? 

Or decorations? 

Perhaps a stunning balcony view?

Or anything that gives your hotel that unique vibe? Include it in the photo.

1.2. Pay Attention to Loading Time

A slow-loading site can deter potential guests from waiting for your website to load, but it can also significantly hamper your search engine ranking.

In addition, make sure your website is mobile-responsive, as guests make the majority of bookings via their mobile devices.

Other important factors regarding your website are SEO optimization and a seamless booking process—we’ll cover those in greater length soon.

📌 Note:

You should always test your website to experience how it feels to be on the other side of the screen. In other words, put yourself in your guests’ shoes.

• Did you manage to capture your unique selling proposition, either in words or images, or both?
• Do your descriptions and images speak to potential guests? Do the descriptions feel inviting and welcoming?
• Is it easy to navigate the site and make a booking? Is it mobile-friendly?
• If you’re struggling to find what you need, and you know your “product” best, how will potential guests find their way around?

Replying honestly and objectively to these questions will help you optimize your website.

2. Optimize Your Website For Search Engines

SEO is a complex topic, but the result of not having an SEO-optimized site is simple—it’s literally like having no site at all.

It plays a crucial role in improving online visibility, driving organic traffic, and increasing bookings. 

The way it works is that it involves researching and selecting relevant keywords that potential guests are likely to use when searching for hotels. 

So, if you strategically incorporate these keywords throughout your website’s content, meta tags, and headings, the site becomes more searchable and likely to rank higher in search engine results.

Other factors that contribute to a better ranking revolve around the following:

🔥  High-quality, engaging content related to the hotel’s amenities, services, local attractions, and area information.

Fresh and relevant content can attract organic traffic and encourage guests to book directly on the website.

🔥 Local SEO is super important for hotels, as guests often search for accommodations in specific locations. 

It implies optimizing the website for local search terms, including location-based keywords, Google My Business listing, and map integrations. 

🔥  Link Building

Acquiring quality backlinks or referral links from reputable websites in your industry can boost your hotel website’s authority and improve its search engine rankings. 

You can achieve this through partnerships, collaborations, and creating shareable content that attracts links.

🔥 Optimizing meta tags and descriptions with relevant keywords and compelling information can increase click-through rates from search engine results pages (SERPs) and improve a website’s visibility.

📌 Note:

Make sure that your contact information and details are correct. 

An inaccurate location and contact number negatively impact search results.

3. Leverage Direct Bookings

If you have an SEO-optimized website, it will gradually attract guests and increase booking rates.

By now, you’ve probably realized that each digital marketing strategy is like a puzzle piece, unable to create a complete picture without the other parts.

Thus, an SEO-optimized website is great for increasing your online visibility, but it has to be backed up by a smooth booking experience.

The other missing part of our puzzle is the Booking Engine. 

The Booking Engine is usually part of the property management system (PMS) and benefits you and your guests.

For you, it means not having to pay hefty OTA commission rates, and for your guests, it provides a better experience since they can:

• Check room availability, 
• View pricing, and 
• Complete secure bookings in real time.

The tool, therefore, offers a convenient and efficient way for guests to secure accommodation. 

💡 ProTip

OTA SYNC’s Booking Engine provides an enhanced guest experience and serves as a powerful revenue management tool. 

How?

It enables you to upsell and cross-sell relevant services, amenities, etc., and provide specific offers and promotions.

Furthermore, its high customization options allow you to raise brand awareness and customize its appearance with your logo, colors, online booking form, emails, invoices, etc.

4. Distribute Your Hotel Across Multiple Channels

Your hotel’s website is invaluable since you can leverage direct booking and connect directly with potential guests.

However, to maximize your visibility and online hotel promotion, you should also consider advertising on OTAs, GDS systems, and other relevant third-party apps.

Yes, most of them, especially OTAs, come with a hefty price tag, but your exposure on these platforms is unparalleled. 

They can “open” your hotel to a much wider guest pool and new markets. 

Like creating your website, you must create a high-quality profile with relevant, accurate information and captivating images.

💡 ProTip:

Our Channel Manager lets you seamlessly connect with multiple OTAs and booking systems while it automatically updates and syncs all the changes across the channels.

Therefore, it acts as a centralized hub, allowing you to control room distribution and avoid overbooking or underselling efficiently.

5. Promote Your Hotel on Social Media

Besides promoting your hotel directly on your website and across multiple channels, don’t forget or underestimate the power of social media.

Which platform you’ll use will depend primarily on your guests’ demography and preferences.

Nonetheless, the most popular platforms remain Facebook, Instagram, and, as of lately, TikTok.

You should use social media the same way you’d use your website or any other advertising channel:

• To showcase the hotel, 
• Share updates, 
• Run promotions, and 
• Interact with guests to build relationships and brand loyalty.

Social media can also be a great place to find and connect with influencers and brand ambassadors.

They usually have a large follower base, and people generally find them trustworthy. Collaborating with the right influencers will allow you to tap into a new audience. Look for travel bloggers or lifestyle influencers who can showcase their stay at the hotel to their followers. 

They can promote your hotel through authentic content and personal recommendations, driving new bookings and increasing brand visibility. 

💡 ProTip

Did you know that with OTA SYNC, sharing your booking engine link with influencers or agencies allows them to earn commission on reservations they make for you?

For full transparency, they can monitor everything on their own dashboards.

6. Collaborate and Partner Up

Social media influencers aren’t the only ones you can team up with. A great promoting power lies in partnering with local guides, restaurants, cultural facilities, zoos, etc.

You can include tickets to those places at a special price or offer coupons or discounted prices for restaurants, spas, etc.

For example, food tourism has been growing in popularity, with most travelers finding food experience and cuisine to be significant decision-making factors.

Therefore, you can collaborate with a local restaurant and create joint packages and promotions to help each other and expand reach.

7. Benefit From Organic Marketing

Organic marketing refers to promoting and marketing efforts to attract guests and drive bookings through non-paid, natural methods. 

Thus, the focus lies on building a strong online presence, engaging with potential guests, and generating interest in your hotel without relying on paid advertising. 

Actually, some of the strategies we’ve mentioned, such as social media presence, SEO-optimized website, Google My Business, etc., are part of organic marketing.

Other key organic marketing methods include:

7.1. Content Marketing

Creating valuable and engaging content such as blog posts, articles, videos, and guides can help showcase your property, provide helpful information to travelers, and attract potential guests. 

7.2. Referral Marketing

Providing exceptional guest experiences, outstanding service, and exceeding guest expectations can lead to positive word-of-mouth marketing. 

Satisfied guests will likely recommend your hotel to others, generating organic referrals and bookings.

Same as with influencers, people tend to believe and trust other people much more than an impersonal ad.

This trustworthiness gets even more highlighted when referrals “spread” to friends, family members, colleagues, and the people we already trust.

For hoteliers like you, referral marketing represents an excellent way to retain existing guests by rewarding them for their loyalty.

Once you’ve signed up for OTA SYNC, you can use promotional and discount codes to say “thank you” to your old guests or attract new ones with promotional offers.

7.3. Email Marketing

Email marketing allows you to send targeted emails, newsletters, event promotions, etc., to engage with guests and nurture relationships.

It is a valuable tool to engage with past, present, and potential guests and to drive bookings.

• Welcome Emails—Thank guests who have recently booked, provide details about their upcoming stay, offer tips on local attractions or activities, etc.
• Exclusive Offers—To encourage return visits, send targeted emails to past guests with exclusive offers, discounts, or promotions for their next stay.
• Event Promotions—Inform guests about upcoming events, holiday specials, or seasonal packages.

Highlight unique experiences, dining options, or special activities at the hotel during specific times of the year.

• Loyalty Program Updates—Regular email updates keep loyal guests in the loop about the loyalty program benefits, rewards, and member-exclusive offers. They also encourage guests to engage with the loyalty program and earn points for future stays.
• Personalized Recommendations—Use guest data to personalize email recommendations based on past stays, preferences, and interests. 

This way, you can enhance a guest’s next booking and recommend special packages, room upgrades, or experiences that align with their profile.

• Holiday Greetings—Send guests holiday greetings, seasonal messages, or special offers during festive periods. 

8. Run Ads For a Greater Impact

Organic marketing is an amazing cost-saving strategy that allows you to be creative and explore all the possibilities to determine what works best for your audience.

As a result, it will be easier to choose a paid marketing strategy that resonates with your audience and has a quicker impact and reach.

3 most common paid marketing strategies include:

• Google Ads—Target relevant keywords related to your hotel, location, amenities, and services.

• Facebook Ads—Help you create ads based on specific demographics, interests, and behaviors, and also enable you to create ads for Instagram.
• Retargeting Ads—Display ads to previous website visitors and show personalized ad creatives and promotions to re-engage and encourage them to revisit the site and complete a booking.

Wrapping It Up

We hope that our list of ideas on how to promote a hotel online will help you see the incredible benefits and inspire you to find additional ways to boost your online presence.

And if you are looking for a solution to help you go digital while increasing your online visibility, we suggest OTA SYNC.

OTA SYNC—An All-in-One Solution For All Your Hotel Operations

OTA SYNC, all-encompassing property management software, streamlines everyday hotel operations without compromising the guest experience.

Packed with a robust Channel Manager and Booking Engine, it allows you to extend your reach and online visibility and reap the benefits of direct and multi-channel booking.

What else can you expect from OTA SYNC?

✨ View, manage, and edit all the reservations from all the channels and properties from a centralized dashboard without switching tabs.

✨ Create invoices quickly with automatic info pull and use advanced invoice operations to split or merge by item, room, guest, or amount.

✨ Get actionable insights into your hotel’s performance, occupancy, PACE reports, etc., from advanced reporting and analytics tools. 

✨ Increase room occupancy, close the gap between bookings with dynamic pricing, and adjust and adapt prices based on demand, peak or low seasons, etc.

✨ Automate and process the payments instantly, thanks to integration with major payment gateways.

✨ Boost guest experience with our Guest App that gives guests more flexibility and control over the online booking process.

In addition, the app provides valuable tips, recommendations, and suggestions to make your guests’ stay memorable.

Curious to see more of OTA SYNC’s benefits?

Start with OTA SYNC for free to elevate your hotel’s online presence to another level.

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