Nowadays, people heavily rely on the use of the internet to find information. They crave instant and complete information.
Having your own hotel website can be so much helpful to your hotel business. It can be one of your marketing strategies, how your hotel can be different from your competitors and how to stay competitive in the market.
Why is it important to have a hotel website?
1) Source of Information
Usually, people will visit the hotel website at least one time to take a glance around what a hotel offers, to know the room rate, the hotel's concept, the facilities that the hotel provides, and more.
Besides social media, a hotel website can be another platform that a hotel uses to relay any necessary update and information. For example, their ongoing promotions, announcement, and any upcoming events.
2) Brand Awareness
Creating a strong brand identity is one of the important things in the hotel industry as it can help with booking sales and revenue. We know that people will recognize the hotel's brand immediately after hearing about that brand more than 3 times.
Make sure your official hotel website is the first result that will come out when someone searches for it especially on Google to protect your hotel's brand. By having your own hotel website, it is good that the hotel has their own space to build the brand image of the hotel.
3) Increase Direct Booking & Sales
Increase direct sales is one of the challenging parts for hotels nowadays. Hence, having your own hotel website could be another reason why a hotel website is so much important.
A good hotel website should allow people to create and confirm bookings online. It is not simply a contact form, but rather an online reservation system installed on the website. By having a proper online reservation system, people can easily check for room availability, price rate, and secure the booking with payment.
The hotel also should emphasize the benefits of booking through the website such as:- Enjoy exclusive promotion code
- Free breakfast
- Free welcome drinks
Read more about what should a good hotel website have
4) To Better Showcase Your Hotel
We know that OTA does not allow creative content writing. The hotel was limited to share the content based on the list of amenities. The hotel also can't share more about the nearby attractions, foods or restaurants to recommend, events, promotions, etc.
With the hotel website, the hotel able to upsell potential guests with attractive packages including tickets, tours, and activities.
5) To Serve Group Travelers
The hotel has the opportunity to serve the group travelers because group travelers (e.g. school teacher planning for the school holiday for her 40 students) normally reach out on the official website.
MICE inquiries like Wedding arrangement and hall usage inquiries also normally come in through the website
6) Stay Competitive
We know that OTA might bid on brand keywords. Before they take up all the spaces on the first page of Google via the ads, by having their own hotel website will give a chance for the hotel to stay on the first page.
Through a hotel website, the hotel can provide more attractive offers and benefits, show the audience the uniqueness of your hotel. A good hotel website has to be competitive in terms of content, look, design and offer.
7) Online Marketing Tools
Did you know that with the hotel website and with the power of Google Analytics, you can better understand your customer?
When it comes to booking directly from the website, Google Analytics is a powerful tool. It can tell you where your visitors' location, which sites that your visitors come from, or even how long they view your hotel website. With such information, you will know your buyers' persona and make use of it for Google Advertisement to better target your audience so that the ads that you paid for are worth it.
Time flies and now technology is rapidly evolving. It is something that is incomprehensible if there is a hotel that thinks they can operate without having a hotel website. Surely they can, but with a hotel website, they can do so much more in getting more sales and revenue.
Softinn has a professional team that will help you to develop your own hotel website complete with Content Management System. Click here to get more information.
