Here are our 10 tips for effortless marketing — how to increase revenue in hotels and receive more bookings.

How to increase our revenue? This is the question we get over the meeting table from time to time by hoteliers. While it is an easy question for us to answer, it is not an easy task for managers; it requires a lot of organization, promotion, and effort. If you are serious about increasing your revenue get your marketing and sales team aboard and put some time aside to execute these steps:

1. Focus on customer satisfaction

An unhappy guest will hurt your reputation – make sure you answer reviews or have someone do that for you. Keep a high standard of service, respond diplomatically, calmly and offer a reimbursement if needed.  Take it to the next level: don’t just answer the reviews but act on them! If a large number of your guests have similar requests or feedback, implement those changes in your hotel’s daily life.

2. Offer a better booking experience than your competitors

Nowadays almost everyone books via the internet and a growing number of people book from their phones. This means both your site and your own booking engine should be mobile-friendly. Read about device and booking trends here. Hopefully, you are already doing this, but offer a better price on your own site (direct booking.) than on the OTAs. You can even add online check-in or a digital guest experience to it.

3. Keep your staff happy!

If your staff is satisfied with their working conditions, pay and treatment then they will most definitely have more patience towards bickering guests not to mention it will be easier for them to be generally friendly. This is key to a top-class service, guests will definitely notice if your employees go above and beyond their expected duties to make their stay perfect. And abracadabra; your ratings will skyrocket!  

4. Make the guests feel at home

A warm welcome message before their arrival will do miracles. You can also inform them pre-stay about your services, parking and things to experience in the area. This will help you create a guest-hotel bond. If the guest knows which taxi service to order – so they are not scammed at the airport – or can check in earlier than usual (e.g. when their flight arrives at 4 a.m. in the morning) they will truly feel at home. You can create offers out of these, and increase your revenue easily with an upselling platform, such as GuestJoy.

5. Ask the guests if they need an upgrade

But do not say that it is an upgrade explicitly. Try to sell the experience or the memory they will have, such as: get a guaranteed view! – selling a bigger room with a better sight of the city. Especially if your suites are empty most of the time, just offer it to guests who have already paid for their general room and get increased revenue. Take it to the next level: An upgrade does not only need to be about the larger room, but it can also include a bottle of wine, room service or late checkout, whatever you think suits your guests. Of course all for a small extra fee.

6. Sell the other hotel products

If you have a spa or a restaurant make sure guests use it! If you are in a popular tourist destination there must be other restaurants that stand out and your guests might go eat elsewhere. Make sure you market your extra services properly, make them appealing to your guests, such as making the traditional, offering them seasonally and following up on the latest trends on what sells. There are so many ways you could do that, we have articles about seasonal upsell here and one about boutique hotel upsell here. You can also upsell the simplest things, such as a fluffy bathrobe, room service or a Netflix & snacks package.

7. Sell tickets

Are there concerts, events and special occasions in town that guests come for? Make sure you are prepared for that. You can sell tickets to these, team up with Hop on Hop off, and offer these experiences with the additional taxi, dinner or gift sets.  As a result, the guest will enjoy the city more while your hotel earns more revenue—a win-win for both.

8. Social media marketing

Social media trends help hotels connect more with their guests. It is very easy now to promote a hotel’s services and hotel activities on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Learn a bit about who uses which platform, for e.g. FB is mostly used by middle-aged women, and Instagram is the playground for the upper coming GenZ. Just because they are not grown up yet does not mean they do not have money, and GenZ will not purchase anything that has a bad review. Try to post new information often, the best times are morning, lunch break and evening, and remember that it’s necessary to engage with guests’ comments. You can read more about social media strategies that a hotel can use via HotelSpeak.

9. Personalise your offers

Each guest is unique. Use segments to promote offers. This increases the relevancy significantly. Business travelers behave completely differently than leisure travelers. This might apply the same to different nationalities. You understand your segments the most. Create offers with them in mind.

10. Automate your upselling

To understand customer needs while also increasing the revenue of your hotel, you need an upsell and guest communication software. If you do not have the time to search through guest behavior, assess what you’ve learned with your team and implement it then simply get an upsell software where the system analyzes data for you and sends the welcome e-mails and offers automatically. All you need to do is sit back, relax and watch your revenue skyrocket.