We have compiled 10 need-to-know tips for hotel website design and developing; and planning an online marketing strategy in the Tourism Industry.
1. Have a blogging platform with dynamic information that is topical and relevant to your lodge or hotel. Your target audience are no longer satisfied with a static brochure website, they require an interactive website layout. By having new content on your website also helps with your SEO. WordPress is a recommended platform for a website/blog.
2. Have a CMS website so that you can update your own content and blog. This puts control in your hands and saves costs.
3. Integrate your site with social networks so that potential clients can easily share your content with friends and contacts. This can be done by adding a “Share” button, which enables them to post your content on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Digg, etc.
4. Open up and link Social Networks like Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, etc, with your website. It is essential to learn to use these channels so that they benefit your online marketing strategy .
5. Design a digital newsletter and create a “Subscribe” button, so people can subscribe to your newsfeed. Integrate this list to form a database to send information to.
6. Make sure that the platform you use to build the site has the potential to do well in the various search engines and has SEO (Search Engine Optimization) capability. Also add Google Analytics to your site in order to monitor your site’s performance.
7. Make sure that your web design navigation is easy to get around, so that your target audience knows how your site works, where to see your rates, check availability, read about your services and ultimately enquire and make bookings.
8. List your establishment on Google Places. This helps with local SEO.
9. Make sure you use quality images that showcase your hotel or lodge, and put more emphasis on a good image, rather than a lot of text, to give the client a feel for your place. Remember, a picture paints a thousand words.
10. Use multimedia, such as video, image galleries and 360 degree panoramic images, to showcase your property. Make sure that this loads quickly and works seamlessly.
