If you rent out and manage your own self catering apartment, holiday property or run a bed and breakfast, you’ll already know that marketing is an essential foundation of a successful business. Without marketing, how would you create interest in your property, find potential customers, or get rave user reviews which will inspire others to rent your holiday house or stay in your bed and breakfast guesthouse?
Getting those all important bookings doesn’t just happen overnight instead it takes planning, a good strategy, strong content and some patience. This is particularly true if you’re planning to promote your holiday property on social media.
User reviews to help grow an active social media community and generate enquiries for your holiday property
Social media offers many opportunities to promote, share and engage with people and can be an effective method of getting others to promote your business for you. Brands spend millions of ££s competing for your attention and to persuade you to purchase their latest products, but very often choices are made based on reviews from other consumers. It is no different for your self catering apartment or bed and breakfast property when you’re ready to take the plunge into the social media world.
Word of mouth advertising, particularly in the form of user reviews is a very powerful way to nurture and encourage enquiries. Consumers are making choices based on the reviews, experiences and ratings of their friends and of others with similar interests. If your bed & breakfast can be found on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram, your guests can simply share their positive experiences with their friends, who may be encouraged to book with you, after which they can also share their experiences.
You will probably have a guestbook at your holiday home, and almost all your guests when leaving comments and messages about their stay, will be looking at everyone elses comments. The same is true on social media. If someone is looking at your Facebook page, they will be just as interested in the comments of others as they are of your original posts.
If your holiday property has a Facebook, Twitter or Instagram page, start encouraging your guests to leave comments about their experience. The best way is to leave a card in their room with details of your social media page and invite them to follow you and write about their experience. They could share an image; talk about your property; write about the local amenities or a good local walk; but whatever they write will get shared with their friends, and be a permanent ‘guestbook’ on your social media timeline for hundreds of others to read.
Most importantly, engage with them. Thank them for their kind words and let them know they’re always very welcome to return. Encouraging guests and friends to comment, where you follow up with further engagement, will help you grow and build an active community. It doesn’t matter how large or small your business is, if you can get others to talk positively about your holiday property, other people will see them and make choices which can lead to further bookings.
If you need help defining a social media strategy for your self catering apartment, holiday property or bed and breakfast contact Oxfinder at info@oxfinder.co.uk
