How to attract more clients to a hotel

Any owner of a hotel business is interested in the ways how to cope with getting the client number upandit is not surprising, because the occupation of hotel rooms and the basic income depend on the number of the clients.

How to increase the number of clients? Not to lose them!

Every guest is important for a hotel not only because of non-recurring income from the sale of a hotel room or additional services he pays for, but to what extent he is satisfied with the hotel services has a direct impact on the hotel popularity and, as a result, there is an increase in a number of hotel guests. Pristine state of hotel rooms, comfort and quietness, kindness and politeness of the staff, comfortable furniture and serviceable appliances, an easy access for booking and even the ability to meet special needs of the guests are important for people to become loyal clients.

Firstly, the guests will be ready to visit your hotel again and again, generating income, and you do not spend money on advertising. Sometimes it goes well, consequently, you do not need to think how it is better to attract clients to your hotel.

Secondly, word of mouth goes off: your satisfied guests tell their relatives, friends, acquaintances and publish their commentaries on social media or forums. That, in turn, attracts new interested clients.

How to improve hotel services will be considered further in details in a separate article. Wait for announcement.

How to attract new clients to a hotel: 9 best ways

But it is not enough for a hotel to have only loyal clients. Some of them change their mode of life, others move to another place or simply get lost for various reasons and it is not easy for a new accommodation to get loyalty of the clients. So, there is always the most important task to attract new clients to a hotel in order to have a required occupancy rate of hotel rooms.

A detailed description of the most effective ways to attract potential clients to a hotel is given below.

Official hotel website with a booking module

At the present time, hotel website is the best and the most effective way to attract guests to a hotel. Moreover, it is an obligatory component of any hotel business. If the potential clients of a hotel can find necessary information, choose and book a hotel room or order additional services on a hotel website, it adds convenience and ease to their life, so a hotel will attract more visitors.

You can say that there are many online booking services such as Booking.com, Trivago, Agoda, Airbnb and others where the information about available rooms of your hotel can be placed and they will do the work instead of you. Of course, you have to do it, but we will tell you about it below. But there are a lot ofreasons why a hotel has to have its own website:

• availability of the official site adds credibility to a hotel;
• having found suitable hotel on one of the websites, many guests prefer to book a hotel room without any mediators;
• if you have a promoted website, you can get more direct website visitors, it helps to increase the percentage of new clients and reduce the competition;
• you do not have to pay any commission to mediators if a client reserves a room on a hotel website;
• any information that you need can be available on your hotel website and the effective attraction of the clients can be done in any way you wish without the restrictions that you can have on the external booking services;
• you can give discounts, action offers for limited time, loyalty programs, special proposals which are not always possible to do on the aggregators’ websites;
• direct contacts (telephone, e-mail, skype, telegram, online chat, social network links) are also available on your website and it makes easier to communicate with the clients and offer the individual possible options according to the situation;
• it is the source of raw data that helps to analyze the rise and drop in attendance, seasonality, the most demanded hotel rooms and services, and much more.

The development of a hotel website will be discussed more detailed later in a special article, wait for announcement.

Using different booking channels

The introduction of the online booking channels greatly facilitated travelling. It is possible to choose and book a hotel room in any hotel on our planet. These aggregators have become popular and many people prefer to choose and book the best option in a great variety of accommodations in advance. Consequently, if the owner wants to attract more clients to the hotel, the booking modules must not be forgotten. Even if we take into account the fact that the mediators demand to pay fees for using their booking channels, it does not diminish the benefit you will get cooperating with them. While launching strong advertising campaign for the clients, they also give directly or indirectly greater publicity to your hotel.

There are hundreds of aggregators today, but the most popular are: Booking.com, Trivago, Agoda, Airbnb, TripAdvisor, Ostrovok, Expedia, HRS. Some of them are international, the others are targeted only to the audience of one or some countries. However, it is better to be available on different channels not only on popular ones. Experience shows that a number of booking made by new clients increases considerably.

For more information, read the section entitled Work with booking channels.

It takes a lot of time and energy to manage tens and hundreds of channels, to monitor free and reserved rooms, or even change prices for them. Special service Channel manager for hotels can do it automatically without the help of the staff. You have to configure it only once when connected.

To get more information about OtelMS Channel manager

Social networks and booking module

It cannot be overlooked that social network is one of the greatest sources of new clients. Many people communicate via the internet, exchange information, share their opinions, ask about or recommend something. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, VK, if they are popular in this or that country, can attract clients to a hotel like other social media.

You have to update your social media page regularly with interesting and useful information to attract more visitors. It is a good idea to tell not only about your hotel but the place where it is situated, its sights, historic monuments, the climate of the country and how to get there. Use bright photos, they attract the attention of the public. ”Befriending” with the audience you will get the benefit of the doubt and many of the visitors of your website can become real guests. Likes and reposts do not hurt anybody.

Applying OtelMS hotel booking engine you can get new clients on social media

A special article about the details of a hotel promotion will be published later, follow the announcement.

Websites for comments

The distrustful clients will go through the websites for comments to be sure they have made the right choice. They can find the information about a good hotel on that site and choose it. So it is important to enhance the reputation of a hotel on these sites, it will attract more clients to a hotel.

Respond to reviews and comments politely as soon as possible. Thank them for highly positive review, but it is more important to know the right way to respond to negative commentary. It is impossible to get rid of negative opinion, but the way you respond to it will influence the future choice of the client.

Special offers

The best options to attract clients to a hotel are special offers, discounts for services especially during the low season. There are websites that gather information of this kind and if you place the information about special offers of your hotel it will help you to get new orders. That’s because people like to get presents and discounts.

Moreover, if wisely manage your business, it is possible to attract your guests to the promotion of your hotel, giving them different bonuses.

PR-actions

A hotel is not only ”bed and breakfast”, it is a whole system of service provision inside the building. So you can organize any PR-actions such as seminars, conferences, presentations, exhibitions, shows, theme nights, concerts and New Year or Halloween celebrations, especially during the low season by popularizing your hotel through PR-campaign for these events. Taking part in a group fun run, trips, excursions the participants are given a chance to have a rest and the opportunity to interact with each other along the route.

Local advertising

We are accustomed to use the internet or another traditional way to cope with the problem online, so we lose the sight of local options. A hotel, first and foremost, is a local business. Confused lonely tourist in a strange city would appreciate any signs to help him to get to a hotel. Of course, it is a random client who has not planned to stay there, but who cares? A bill-board or a ticker on the side of a bus stop, a railway station, an airport or a roundabout and also near the tourist facilities will help ”lost tourists” to find the way to a hotel.

Guidelines and handbooks

A line in a thematic handbook, guide-reference book will increase the flow of tourists. Because unlike general catalogues these publications attract the attention of independent tourists and travelers.

Cooperation with tourist companies and partners

Big travel agency can provide high hotel-occupancy rate for the whole season. Use this opportunity!

You can also cooperate with the nearest restaurant, sauna, entertainment center or even with a car rental business, it depends on the kind of your hotel.

Peculiarities of various accommodations

How can you attract clients to mini-hotel?

It is difficult for mini-hotels to compete with large hotel complexes because of a number of hotel rooms and the limited choice of services. Use your marketing skills to attract clients. Firstly, the emphasis should be placed on local advertising, action offers when you attract clients with prices and rapid service. You should have your own website and use aggregators.

Do you know how to bring clients to a country hotel?

Campers or vacationers are the main target audience for a country hotel. You should advertise your hotel everywhere using not only social media but forums for parents, tourist blogs and other extra channels that are rarely used by the standard hotels – in that case, they can do an excellent job.

The expanded range of services in a country hotel will also help to involve and make clients stay there because they want to have a complex of services during their vacations and holidays.

How to involve corporate clients to a hotel?

Hotel reservation for groups of business-clients is beneficial to a hotel. They are people on a business trip or somebody who is planning to arrange a corporate event – in any case, special servicing for b2b sphere is always appreciated. Other forms of payment, discounts for wholesale orders and small know-how can be found to engage new business clients to a hotel.

Read more about this in our article Hotel guest service

It is important toget a better reputation in business community to make them give preference to your hotel. Different PR-actions contribute to the promotion of your business.

Take the difference into account

People who stay in a hotel have different interests, purposes, habits. You cannot attract clients of different age groups and status applying the universal advertising campaign. Consider the way, your target audience can be categorized into some groups and create special advertisement for each group. Make a unique offer for a family with children or without them, for a single person, tourists or businessmen, for those who want to have a place to sleep. If you focus the efforts more precisely, you will attract more guests to a hotel.