Is Your Bed & Breakfast Targeting The Wrong Audience? *

What is your marketing strategies target when promoting your Bed & Breakfast to prospective guests?  The first thing you need to determine is who is your target audience.

Your digital marketing strategy should be designed to attract the most motivated travelers across the globe.  Especially those that are most interested in staying at a Bed & Breakfast at your destination.

Here’s how you can be sure that you are targeting the correct geographic markets:

Create Effective Distribution Partnerships

Do you know what a travel manager is?  Without a robust channel manager, you are forced to try to create connections with powerful Online Travel Agents on your own.  Then you would have to manually input any bookings generated through those channels.

It’s impossible to do effectively unless you automate the process with an effective channel manager.  Using the right channel manager, you will be able to connect with as many OTAs and other travel agents as you want.  Your bookings will be automatically entered into your property management system, eliminating the risk of overbooking.

Reach Your Target Geographic Markets

Whether your Bed & Breakfast attracts domestic guests or international travelers, it’s important to connect with the OTAs that focus on those specific geographic markets. While there are many generic OTAs available that reach a global audience, it’s the OTAs that are widely used by a specific geographic market that will generate the most bookings for you.

Lets look at a good geographic example.  China is one of the most powerful inbound tourism markets in the world, so any Bed & Breakfast owner who hopes to increase their bookings among Chinese travelers should connect to the OTA Ctrip using their channel manager.

Monitor Your Distribution Strategy Results

Getting bookings across your different channels, you will want to use your property management systems reporting features to evaluate your progress.  This enables you to generate reports using live data to give you accurate results.  This allows you to filter your reports and create documents that highlight which geographic markets are booking rooms at your property.  This will help you identify which geographic markets to pursue.

Use Relevant Data To Target Travelers

Your generated data in your reports as well as your website analytics should be used to create your marketing strategies. If you are launching a social media campaign or an online advertising campaign, you need to invest your resources for the maximum results.  Fully understanding the guests who book with you and knowing where they come from will help you create marketing campaigns that drive direct bookings.

If you want more tips on how you can create an engaging online presence for your business, follow the IAA Bed and Breakfast Blog and our Facebook Page.  

The IAA Bed & Breakfast Association helps new customers find your business.  You can start enjoying the benefits today for free by either claiming your business listing on our site or you can create your new business listing.