After several slower years, the tourism industry is on a rebound. In fact, by 2023, the global tourism industry is expected to top more than $9.6 trillion—a return to pre-pandemic levels. This is great news for hotels, motels, resorts, and vacation rentals. But with more people hitting the road or taking to the sky for a vacation comes more competition in the industry. And if you’re making common hotel marketing mistakes, you could wind up losing business to that growing competition.

At Vibrant Management, we specialize in helping a variety of tourism-based businesses find their niche, improve their marketing, streamline their operations, and more. Keep reading as we explore some common hotel marketing mistakes—and how we can help you overcome them!

Not Knowing Your Audience

It’s easy to fall into the trap of assuming that everyone is your target audience. After all, why wouldn’t any traveler want to experience your incredible property? But the reality is that every hotel, motel, and resort has a unique audience that they should be targeting. Narrowing down your target audience can help you to better focus your hotel marketing, and help you avoid wasting time and money targeting the wrong audience.

Figuring out your target audience means considering many different factors. For instance, based on the cost per room, most of your guests likely earn above a certain income level. Your property’s amenities might be a big draw for families, or it could be better suited to couples looking for a romantic getaway. Insights from your booking engine, digital analytics from your website, and information gathered from previous guests can all be used to figure out your target audience.

Failing to Update Your Website

More than 80 percent of guests prefer to book trips online. While a portion of bookings occurs through travel sites like Hotels.com or TripAdvisor, encouraging bookings through your own website means more profit in your pocket and more chances to win over potential guests and expose them to your property’s many unique amenities, features, and benefits.

Creating a hotel website is the first step. From there, there are a number of things that you’ll need to do to get visitors on your site and keep them there long enough to book a stay. SEO, or search engine optimization, can help your website rank well on search engines. That way, when guests search for “hotels in Springdale Utah,” your property has a greater chance of appearing high up in the list of results.

The next thing you’ll need to tackle is your website’s load speed. According to Google, more than half of all mobile site visitors will leave a website after just 3 seconds if it fails to load. And it isn’t just slow load speeds driving away potential guests; research shows that you have just 10 to 20 seconds to capture the attention of your web visitors. Fail to do so, and they may just move on to a competitor’s website. Featuring stunning videos or images of your property that showcase its beauty or unique amenities on your website’s homepage can help you avoid this.

Skipping Content Marketing

More than 80 percent of professional marketers are already investing in content marketing. Are you?

Content marketing offers a number of opportunities, including:

• The chance to implement SEO strategies to improve your website’s ranking
• A way to advertise new amenities, deals, packages, etc.
• An easy way to help guests plan a customized trip (For instance, by offering guides for planning an off-season visit)
• Having a set of content that you can share on social media

Investing in content marketing by adding a blog to your site is a great way to grow your visitor count organically, while also tapping into these great benefits.

Failing to Invest in Social Media Marketing

The rise of social media has given business owners around the world a new way to take marketing into their own hands. But there’s a big difference between posting pictures of your property or sharing customer reviews, and truly utilizing social media to the full extent.

Social media can be an incredible tool for your hotel marketing—but only when it’s done right. Professional hotel social media management will help you tap into your true target audience, create posts that will shine, and help you make the most of this great marketing tool.

Investing in Better Hotel Marketing

A professional Utah hotel marketing management company can help you avoid these common hotel marketing mistakes. At Vibrant Management, we specialize in helping properties of all shapes and sizes find solutions that work. 

Our marketing experts can help you hone in on your target audience, and to learn more about what they really want in a hotel or motel. We offer professional web design and development, so you can build a website that captures the attention of web visitors and helps your property shine. Unlimited web support means that you’ll never have to worry about losing visitors to slow load speeds!

Ready to invest in professional content marketing for your site? Our SEO experts are here to craft stellar content your guests will love. With our Digital Advertising services, you can get the hotel social media management you need to shine on Facebook, Instagram, and beyond.

Hotel marketing is complicated. But with the right help, it doesn’t have to be! Check out our services to learn more about how Vibrant Management can help your hotel grow, increase bookings, and stand out from the competition!