Back to BlogsTips for Marketing Your Hotel in 2022
In the agency world, we use the phrase ‘digital marketing’ a lot. But the first part of that phrase is becoming almost unnecessary. In 2022, almost all marketing is, by its very nature, digital. The vast majority of travelers will use digital means to find and book at your property and the best hotel marketing efforts should focus primarily on the digital realm.
As we take stock of the emerging trends in hotel digital marketing, here are a few tips that can help you attract and convert travelers this year.
1. Prepare for the End of Third-Party Data Collection
For the last decade, we’ve been living in a golden age of data collection, where third-party platforms like Google and Facebook furnish marketers with reams of invaluable data about how consumers behave and interact with your business online. It seems this era may now be coming to a close.
It began with Apple’s iOS 14.5 update which gave users the ability to opt-out of allowing platforms to collect data about their interactions. It was furthered by an iOS 15 update that prevented marketers from tracking when users open promotional emails.
And this is just the beginning. Many are predicting the ‘death of the third-party cookie’ as Google looks to phase this out of its Chrome browser in 2022.
The answer for hotel marketers? Focus more of your efforts on first-party data. That is, information gathered about how people are behaving on your website. This data is entirely yours and can be invaluable for everything from creating personalized web content to hyper-targeting ad campaigns.
2. Video is King
Humans are visual creatures. Humans in 2022 are especially visual creatures. With so much high-quality media available for us to scroll through infinitely on our devices, your hotel’s marketing content really needs to stand out to capture consumers’ attention.
This is where videos come in. Investing in high-quality video content is a great way to help immerse website visitors in your on-property experience. Not only will it help keep them on your site longer, leading to better SEO performance and higher conversions, but it’s also something that is increasingly expected by discerning consumers visiting your website.
In addition to video on your website, it’s worthwhile using video content to engage with users on TikTok, a social platform that is becoming increasingly important in digital marketing. Other platforms can produce results in the video realm as well. In fact, one report shows that 93% of brands sharing a video on social media attracted a new customer as a result of this action.
3. Target Digital Nomads and Bleisure Travel
A recent report by the US Travel association showed that as of Dec 2021, travel spending had recovered to 98% of what it was pre-Covid. Add to this their finding that 9 in 10 Americans plan to travel in the next six months and 8 out of 10 companies plan to conduct business travel and you have a market primed to take advantage of people looking to combine business and pleasure in their travel plans.
This unique segment of so-called ‘bleisure’ travelers should be top of mind when you’re thinking about how to target your paid search campaigns and how to tailor your web experience for potential guests. Digital nomads (people who travel for pleasure while working remotely) should also factor into these considerations.
Ultimately, 2022 looks poised to be a bounce-back year for much of the travel industry, but it will take some novel approaches to take full advantage of the unique aspects of the post-Covid travel market. For more advice on how to structure your digital marketing plan this year, give us a call here at Digital Hospitality. We’re always happy to help.
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