Slowing Economy Got You Down? Use the Internet Dummy!

While many have already come to the conclusion, the economists aren't ready to admit it. We are in a recession. It may not be a "full blown" recession as economists define it, but to the average Joe it feels like things are getting worse not better. To that end, with gas prices going up and the cost of everyday necessities such as food increasing as well - the money left over for travel is way down.

The travel industry and hotels in specific are feeling the pinch. If you haven't been a part of the internet revolution in the travel space - you need to check into the 21st century and get a clue. If you have been, it's now time to reexamine your online strategy and make sure that you are covering the essentials. Lodging Interactive has a good starting point for that internet marketing reevaluation in this blog post.

They claim that. . .

Eighty-three percent of travel planning is booked online. This means that the internet has emerged as the premier distributor of hospitality. Since this is the case, it only makes sense that we work through the internet for the best possible ROI.

The keys to your success can be found in the following areas of your online strategy - website optimization, strategic linking, email and search marketing and web analytics and performance tracking. If you don't have plans in each of these areas, you should reevaluate your strategy. Much of what is covered in these areas are long term strategies for success, but supplemented by the email and search marketing you have powerful tools for filling in need times and building occupancy for terms you can't organically optimize for.

How do you move forward?

1. Take a look at what has been successful thus far. Keep it or expand on it. If it isn't working and it is costing you ROI - then eliminate it.
2. Use your hotel web site as an extra person selling 24 hours a day. Is the message consistent with how you sell your hotel in person? What can you learn from your site and change the process on property?
3. What makes your hotel unique? Location? Facilities? Staffing? Make sure that the message is lound and clear.
4. Goals are important for everything. Measure. Assess. Change. Constantly be looking for improvement.
5. Get involved in online conversation. Word of mouth marketing is out there whether you are a part of it or not. Make sure that you know what is being said about your hotels on review sites. Search for your hotel on the search engines and see how you are being sold. Are the images correct? How about the information - when was the last time it was updated?

You may be surprised at what you find. You'll definitely be surprised at the impact that internet marketing can have to your bottom line.

Technorati Tags: economy, internet marketing, SEO, search marketing,

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Travel Suppliers At Odds With Google

Google may be the 600 pound gorilla of the internet, but right now they have big trouble on their hands from travel suppliers like Marriott and American Airlines. These suppliers are asking Google to get tougher with advertisers who utilize a tactic called piggybacking.

Piggybacking in the process of advertisers using trademarks and service marks of other companies in their advertising copy. The hope is that the consumer will get confused and click on the offender's ad instead of going to the site of the real deal. The major search engines, including Google, have policies prohibiting this currently. However, they aren't very good at enforcing these policies, unless violations are brought to their attention. In fact, one of Google's own systems for generating advertising copy can create and publish ads that violate this policy. Ouch!!

It is important that as hotel suppliers we look out for this type of activity. While we alone may not be able to stop it with the help of our brand partners, we can help put pressure on Google to solve the problem. The volume of travel related search traffic is big enough that given enough pressure, Google will surely see the light and fix the problem.

Technorati Tags: Google, SEM, PPC, trademark

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How Do You Keep Up - The AdAge Power 150 Media and Marketing Blogs

There could not be a better place to start your online marketing education than the blogs listed in the Power 150. Thanks to Jacob Morgan for sending this out via Twitter.

Not every blog is going to work for you, but the goal is to find the one or two that you regularly get information from. I was amazed to see how many of the top 150 I am already looking at regularly.

Technorati Tags: marketing, advertising, resources, blogging

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Gaining Consumer Trust - Search Engines Making Ground

In this post from m-Travel's blog, Porter Gale, from Virgin America, says that the work done by search engines to reduce spam and improve the quality of pay-per-click landing pages has gone a long way to improve consumer trust in paid search engine listings.

I have to agree here. Search engines are all about providing the correct relevant content to their users whether it be from the organic or paid listings. Obviously they have made big improvements reducing the search engine spam from organic listings. They constantly refine their "secret sauce" - algorithms - to eliminate elements for manipulation whether you are talking about metatags, cloaking, keyword stuffing or paid linking. They took on paid advertising spam, when they started giving ads quality scores and requiring relevant landing pages. All of this done to improve their search results and hopefully their share of those results and the money it brings in.

Technorati Tags: search engine, ppc, landing pages, SEO, SEM

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Do We Really Need Paid Search?

This is a question I am asked frequently.  Logically to most hoteliers, when they are listed in the organic rankings on search engines and they can add content to their site for events and attractions they are targeting they don't need to pay for advertising.

This is not entirely true.  While you will generally show up high in the rankings for your brand or generic hotel terms, it is much more difficult to optimize for events and attractions.  Why because the amount of content on your site isn't going to be enough most of the time.  Additionally, you are competing against other sites which focus on local events.

Alex Vlasto on iMedia Connection gives a great explanation about why there needs to be a mix between paid and organic search.

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Is Your Hotel Backed Into a Corner?

It may be if you do not have an active distribution strategy. This article from Travolution confirms the latest trends on just how important search is to people trying to locate hotels for their travel.  3 in 5 people in the UK use search to determine which hotel they are going to stay at.

Besides having a prominent hotel site, it is important that you have search engine marketing campaigns as well as distribution on online travel agencies like Expedia, Travelocity, etc.  And don't forget the travel metasearch engines like Kayak and Mobissimo.  If you don't you may be left out of the purchase decision altogether.

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