Marketing strategies are too similar for hotels and hostels. Yes, it is true because both businesses have to speak to the same target audience and share the same marketplace to get people to their sweets. They must make a website and social media presence to engage with their customers in this digital age. Still, there are some points where you will consider hostels completely different from hotels which are user experience. If you are running a hostel and want to market it, you need to make more efforts to expose your services and user experience to get more potential clients.

Remember that your hostel is a brand or product you sell in your target market, so you must make it captivating. It would help if you made a good decision in choosing the marketing efforts which will work and increase the visibility of your brand, company, and product, i.e. hostel.

It might be challenging to run a hostel, but it can be exciting and fun at the same time if you adopt the right marketing strategies. You might be trying these strategies from the launch of your hostels but need satisfactory results. That's why you need to make an innovative marketing plan. This article will provide enough information to expose your hostel to potential clients and do more business. So let's get started.

Focus on Customer Experience - Offer VIP Service

As you know, you are in the hospitality industry and must encourage your target audience to come to you. The ultimate thing that can lead to the success or failure of a hostel business is the experience you offer your guests while they stay in your hostel. It is the fundamental element that can boost sales of a hospitality business. You should value your guests and offer them VIP services so they can understand you give value to their investments. A perfect and delightful customer experience comes from teamwork and professional staff.

You should train your team to deal with the guest politely, use words carefully to communicate with them, address their problems at your place and ensure they improve quickly. You should provide them with quality services if you want them to feel comfortable at home at your hostel. It would help if you organized a dinner at your hostel or some exciting event for them so they can engage with your hostel. You have to be always present for your guest and use technologies that can offer guest management. In this way, you can make your guests loyal to your company, and they will consider you when they come again.

Register on Google business

Google has endless resources to promote a business, and Google My Business (GMB) is one of the Google services which can enable a trade to a large audience, especially in the hospitality industry. It allows companies to make a free profile of their brand using a computer, a tablet or a smartphone and start communication with the target audience by sharing updates about the company. It can also improve your hostel ranking in top Google search results when customers with a similar keyword.

With Google business registration, you can connect with your audience directly, help people book rooms at your hostels quickly, and increase customer engagement. You will improve the online presence of your business and promote a strong relationship with clients, vendors and other stakeholders. More importantly, you can manage different locations (if you have more than one branch of your hostel) on GMB simultaneously.

You can also seek the assistance of SEO experts to build organic SEO and improve your listing. Be sure to add all the essential details while creating your profile on GMB, like exact location information, contact numbers and email, so a buyer can quickly contact you in case of any inquiries. Upload pictures and videos on your business profile to know people what quality services you offer at your hostel. It will help you boost your sales and conversions.

Build mobile-friendly website

You must build a robust website to interact with your target clients when running a small or big business. With a captivating website, you will make your hostel perform better. It is considered as your first and utmost important tool that you own initially. As it belongs to you, you can use it according to your way because all the other networking forums change frequently. You have to make a website which works as a flagship through your entire marketing plan. You can use your website as the most effective tool to get a higher conversion rate.

Now that you have understood the importance of a website, you should run it with something other than classical marketing tactics. You might have had a website before but need to learn how to deploy it to attract your target clients. So you should alter your website according to modern marketing techniques. Build organic SEO around your website to make it visible in search results.

Furthermore, it would help if you made your website mobile-friendly because most of your prospects check for a website or search for hostel services using their mobile phones. When a customer clicks on your website, it will not show that mobile operating systems do not support it. It is necessary because only some have laptops and personal computers, but everyone now has smartphones to search and compare different businesses. With an adequately designed mobile, friendly, and easy-to-navigate website, you can attract your potential and make it easy for them to book a room at your hostel quickly.

Invest in Hostel photography/videography

Now you can only imagine the growth of a business with solid video marketing. People love to watch visuals. It has the power to drive traffic towards your hostel venue. Most youngsters love to travel and need a place to live, so you must know how important videos are for them. It can capture their attention towards your hostel. These youngsters spend hours on social media searching for the most suitable services, and video content wins the race as it sees more viewers.

You should invest in visuals and make creative content to target more potential. Make short videos, and be sure the first 30 to 60 seconds are most vital for you as it will decide whether the user will continue watching. So choose content carefully which draws the interest of your potential. You should choose the right visuals that your target audience loves to watch. Instagram is the best place to find out what kind of content your potential. Check their likes and follow their activity on this platform, and then you can make content according to their interests. Furthermore, it would help if you remembered to show the featured part of your hostel, encouraging people to come to you.

If you have enough budget, hire a professional photographer or content creator to show your hostel facilities to your customers.

Share everything on Social media

Your hostel marketing strategy is complete with having social media engagement with your prospects. It is an essential part of the promotion of any business. Social media has billions of users, and here get the plot to tell people about your hostel services. If you are a beginner in hostel marketing, you should first make profiles of your hostel on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Connect with your prospects by telling the story about your hostel, informing people about your services and engaging them. You should regularly post updates about your hostel and introduce your team to the guests so they can get familiar with your hostel team and services.

Social media marketing is initially a free-of-cost solution to make a connection with your target audience. You can also take advantage of user-generated content like those uploading pictures from your hostel lobby. You can also run social media contest where you can ask your guest to post creative images of theirs from your hostel by tagging you. In return, offer them a complimentary one-night stay at your hostel or a member card that will get loyalty points. Furthermore, engage with the customers who love to watch videos, shoot different events you organize at your hostel and get more exposure. All in all, make all the possible efforts to manage your audience on social media.

Collect customer video testimonials

Customers are great influencers for a business, and people always check for ratings and reviews before buying a service. You have to use your customers to promote your hostel services and make more loyal customers. In the video testimonial approach, you can take permission from your happy clients to make their videos to capture their experience with your hostel. In their video, they tell what services they love at your place. It is considered more authentic than writing a review because, in this way, people see another customer talking about the benefits.

Great video testimonials can help a business rank higher in search results, spread brand awareness and a sense of trust among clients, and show the positive side of your hostels and unique features that increase conversion rates. You should ask your loyal customers to make a testimonial video to promote your hostel services. You can also encourage more people to create testimonial videos by offering them giveaways or loyalty points. It will be beneficial for your hostel promotion as well as your loyal customers.

Partner with Influencers

The hospitality industry sees a revolution with influencers and bloggers. Hostel management needs to use blogging effectively to reach target consumers. Ask the influencers of your community to come and stay at your hostel without paying; believe me, it will return higher on your investments. These influencers are celebs and personalities with incredible followers on social media. Their fans follow them and what they do and want to become like them; that's why their fans always do what they are doing.

You can choose a traveller or a writer who can influence your target clients and promote your hostel after staying in it. You can ask them to leave reviews on their website, your website, social media pages, or any other forum they use to interact with target clients. They have the skills to promote services or a brand. It does not mean they should post plenty of reviews about your hostel; it is about posting quality content that makes a brand trustworthy. When you join with influencers, you should make clear guidelines to benefit both.

If you don't have a budget to provide free services or pay these influencers, you can start writing influential blogs on your website and post links to these blogs on your social media pages to promote you as a content creator and hostel side by side. It will produce magical results once you start getting like on your blogs.

Try Google PPC search ads

Google search ads will always prove very powerful in improving a brand's ranking. PPC is a technique where you do not need to spend a fixed amount monthly, and you will only pay for the number of clicks on your ad. In this approach, returns on your investments are for sure.

Google hotels ads are suitable too

Google provide various features to business to make a business grow, and Google advertisement is the best return on your investments. Spend some money and increase your brand exposure to a broader market. Use the relevant keywords in your ad to gain higher click-throughs on it.

Register on Airbnb

Partnership always pays off and will never let a business down. It is advantageous for both parties involved in the league. You can register your hostel on Airbnb, and there are more chances for travellers to book a room and stay at your restaurant. The company will refer you when a passenger lands at your location. It would help if you gave some percentage of each booking, but it is not a loss. You can also guide your guests to use Airbnb to travel. It is a cross-reference for both businesses and will increase the sale of both partners.

Wrapping Up

The hospitality industry is seeing significant advancement even with the pandemic's effects. The credit goes to the ever-changing marketing strategies that make people think about hostel services in entirely new ways. With the proper implementation approach, you will get high conversion rates and take your hostel to the height of success in terms of customer experience and engagement.

Hostel owners need to show their customers how their efforts are tremendous and why customers should consider their brand. With the advancement in digital technology, the means to promote a business also evolved. You should constantly take action to survive in this competition and keep going to stay successful. Follow the tips and suggestions mentioned in this article to do more business. If you have any issues in adopting these tactics, then it is preferred to hire a consultant to make an effective marketing plan.

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