Seasonal content is key to any hotel’s overall online marketing strategy and should be carefully planned out ahead of time, featuring relevant keywords and visuals that reflect its location and time of year.
Dean is the Content Marketing Specialist for Little Hotelier, an all-in-one hospitality software solution tailored specifically for small accommodation businesses. He shares educational articles which offer insight, assistance and value to owners looking to enhance daily operations and expand their businesses.
Identifying the Right Audience
Your seasonal marketing efforts can best succeed by understanding the fluctuation of your target audience. Whether it’s specific traveler demographics or just engaging with more visitors in general, knowing what drives tourists during different seasons is essential to aligning marketing efforts with expectations and desires of your target demographics.
An effective way to identify the ideal seasonal audience for your accommodations is through analysis of Google searches your potential customers are conducting. Conducting SEO research will enable you to create blogs, social media posts, and email campaigns tailored directly towards their interests and needs – for instance if you own a lawn service in a snowy climate and wish to increase engagement during wintertime, creating an infographic featuring effective ways of maintaining healthy grass in cold climates is an ideal way to attract your ideal clientele.
As another way of creating interest during slower seasons, special promotions or discounts can also help your brand stand out. For example, if your hotel is near a ski resort, offering packages including accommodation, discounted lift tickets, and ski rentals can give potential guests a compelling incentive for choosing your property over competitors during peak season.
Utilizing paid advertising platforms like Facebook and Google Ads, you can also promote seasonal offerings by running paid advertisements targeting specific features of your property to capitalize on increased demand during peak seasons such as ski hotels and hotels with pools. For instance, if your audience searches for these amenities during winter months, running targeted ads highlighting them will allow your property to capitalize on any spike in demand that might exist for these offerings.
Another effective strategy for increasing visibility and engaging an off-season audience is taking advantage of local events and attractions. For example, if weddings and other major events regularly take place during winter in your region, use Google Trends to identify relevant search terms to build campaigns around for these occasions and then promote these campaigns via website, social media and emails to attract guests during a low season period. Consider offering packages including accommodations as well as activities from your area for these off-season events to further increase exposure.
Tailoring Your Messaging and Offers
As soon as you understand your audience’s seasonal preferences, you can craft targeted marketing campaigns that drive more bookings during peak season. For instance, if your target audience likes traveling during winter and is likely visiting ski resorts near them, creating seasonal promotional campaigns offering discounted lift tickets or winter activities could attract and convert targeted users while simultaneously increasing overall hotel occupancy rates during this period.
Social media and other digital channels offer another effective means of promoting seasonal offers, creating an optimal mix of paid and organic channels that will yield optimal results. A seasonal hashtag and contest asking guests to post photos/videos from their experience at your hotel could increase engagement while garnering new leads.
As with traditional promotions, seasonal offers should be promoted prominently on your website’s homepage and individual landing pages for each special offer to make it easy for visitors to find and book them. By creating a seamless user experience and communicating the terms and conditions clearly during busy seasons, conversion rates and bottom line results may increase exponentially.
Create seasonal content to meet the interests of your target audiences. For example, create a travel guide in your area offering advice and recommendations for enjoying seasonal activities – this type of useful material can inspire and inform prospective guests as they plan their vacations confidently while increasing bookings and developing loyalty among your targeted audiences.
Marketing your hotel effectively during its busiest seasons can boost occupancy rates and ensure consistent revenue all year-long. By tailoring messaging and offers to seasonal events and using digital channels to reach target demographics at specific moments in time, you can draw and keep guests for extended stays while making sure it remains profitable throughout the year.
Dependent upon your location and the types of visitors your property caters to, seasonal fluctuations in demand will differ for every property. From beach resorts to ski lodges, understanding seasonal peaks and troughs will enable you to target the right guests at the appropriate times and increase profits margins.
SEO
Marketing efforts of accommodations depend heavily on their website, which provides visitors with crucial information about the property and amenities/services provided. Search engines such as Google offer extra recognition to websites offering quality content with relevant keywords by ranking them higher in search engine results pages (SERPs).
Planning a seasonal content strategy requires taking into account how your content will be optimized for keywords you are targeting, from page titles and meta descriptions to keyword optimization. UberSuggest and Google Keyword Planner tools can be helpful in helping to identify appropriate keywords to target based on location and business type.
Your targeted keywords in page titles and meta descriptions will enable search engines to better comprehend each page on your website and match up its content with user intent when people perform searches related to these subjects.
Your website provides a wonderful opportunity for showcasing seasonal offerings through SEO-optimized blog articles that highlight seasonal activities in your area, such as “Top Winter Activities in [Your Area]” or “Best Family Summer Escapes.” Video content can also be an effective marketing tool during shoulder season – it could feature festive decorations decorating the hotel itself while guests enjoy various seasonal activities.
Promoting seasonal promotions through both your website and social media accounts can also drive visitors and bookings to your business. By creating specific landing pages for each promotional campaign, you can easily communicate what it entails as well as any necessary details such as booking procedure.
By tracking your website’s traffic and acquisition data over time, you can gain insights into which types of guests travel during different seasons – this will allow you to tailor advertising and marketing campaigns towards these audiences. For example, young couples might prefer booking during shoulder season travel while families may favor high season vacations; Google Analytics provides insight into this as well as key metrics like conversions and newsletter sign-ups in order to gain further insights into seasonality of online audiences.
Social Media
Hospitality businesses may find it challenging to keep customers interested year-round in their seasonal offerings, but with expert social media marketing strategies such as those provided by Creatives On Call accommodations can create engaging content that keeps visitors returning even during off-peak months.
Visually-appealing images and videos that highlight accommodations, amenities, and local attractions help to encourage travel planning and bookings. Utilizing hashtags or hosting seasonal challenges or contests can increase reach and engagement; TikTok and YouTube platforms in particular lend themselves well for accommodation marketers since younger audiences tend to engage with this type of content more strongly than others.
Furthermore, publishing high-value blog articles about seasonal experiences can drive organic traffic. Examples might be “Top Winter Activities in [Area]” or “Best Summer Escapes for Families.” Creating and sharing user-generated content can further establish credibility when hotels interact with guests by sharing their posts using specific hashtags – creating a sense of community and appreciation among guests who use these posts.
As part of paid search campaigns designed to generate bookings for seasonal experiences, using keywords related to hotel accommodations such as “hotels with indoor pools” or “hotels with family friendly swimming pools” can be effective ways for accommodation providers.
Accommodation companies need to be ready for fluctuating seasonal demand throughout the year in order to build brands, reach new audiences and drive direct bookings. This requires having an in-depth knowledge of their target audience as well as an advanced content strategy designed to deliver relevant messages at just the right time.
Contact TravelBoom now if you want to learn how to create an effective seasonal content strategy for your business! Our seasoned copywriters and digital marketing specialists possess all of the expertise required to set you apart from competitors.