How Hotels Can Use YouTube to Generate Bookings

Boost your bookings by up to 67 percent! If you’re looking for an easy, affordable way to boost your bookings and up your conversion rate, hotel video marketing on YouTube is the answer. Whether your hotel caters to leisure travelers who are motivated by the sights, sounds, and exciting allure of exotic places or business travelers looking for comfortable, professional surroundings, video is the ideal way to generate bookings. Videos envelop travelers in the experience of a stay at your hotel with an immediacy that gives them confidence that your hotel’s offerings will be exactly what they expect. Learning how to use YouTube to generate hotel bookings is not difficult; with a little practice, you could be seeing a significant increase in your bookings in no time!

YouTube Hotel Marketing by the Numbers
A recent article on Hotel News Resource revealed some pretty impressive statistics on the effectiveness of hotel video marketing. The author asserts that  hotel bookings are 67% more likely to happen when a video tour is available, and that watching a video of a hotel before checking in has been reported to increase conversion rates by up to 85%. With YouTube as the leading method for disseminating hotel videos, these conversion gains are poised to increase even more in coming years – according to Neilsen, YouTube reaches more U.S. adults ages 18 to 34 than any cable network. Since Millennials and Generation Y travelers will become the core customers of the hotel and travel industry over the next five to ten years, marketing your hotel with YouTube is the ideal way to extend your reach to this key demographic.

How to Generate Hotel Bookings Using YouTube

1. Create a customized YouTube channel
   You will need to go to YouTube and create a dedicated channel where visitors can view all of your hotel videos in one place. Once you are given a custom URL for your channel, you can customize it so it presents a cohesive branded look that meshes with your hotel website:
   • Create a custom background, include your logo, and choose colors to match your hotel’s branding
   • Set the playback options: Choose Player View, select your most popular video as the featured clip, and set your channel to autoplay your chosen video when users land on your channel
   • Turn your privacy setting to Public and encourage comments
   • Keep viewers up to date with your hotel’s news with the activity feed
2. Create compelling videos showcasing your hotel’s key attributes
   Video gives you the opportunity to showcase all the details that make your hotel so exceptional. Make sure your videos are optimized for mobile so they look good on every size screen, and invest the time to give a professional polish to your finished videos. Shoot footage of everything that guests are looking for, including:
   • Tours of your rooms and suites, with a focus on your special accommodations, such as your Honeymoon Suite
   • Exceptional amenities, including convention spaces and services, spa services, recreation equipment and facilities
   • Special guest services, such as weekly pop-in restaurant nights and cocktail hours
   • Planned excursions, local surroundings, and special attractions
   • Testimonials from satisfied guests
3. Apply Video SEO
   Since Google generally places videos at the top of its search results, correctly applying search engine optimization to your videos will increase your hotel’s ranking on Google search results as well as YouTube search. Gain maximum exposure by utilizing YouTube’s full list of video SEO opportunities:
   • Keywords
   • Description
   • Annotations
   • Captions and Subtitles
   • To maximize your bookingptimize your videos for mobile
4. Cross-Promote your YouTube hotel videos
   Marketing your hotel with YouTube is more effective when you take a full-channel approach. Maximize your videos’ ability to generate bookings for your hotel by posting them on your hotel’s website and sharing them through social media. You can include them in your Facebook posts and Tweets, and share them in your Google+1 posts.
5. Use YouTube Analytics to adjust your hotel marketing campaign
   Data is the key to a successful hotel marketing plan; measure the success of your hotel marketing efforts using YouTube Insights and Google Analytics and reshoot any underperforming videos.

Now that you understand how hotels can use YouTube to generate bookings, it’s time to start bringing in those guests! The experienced marketers at Travel Tech Strategies can help you create an effective YouTube marketing strategy with professional YouTube video shooting and production, expert video SEO services, and responsive hotel website design to complete your comprehensive hotel marketing strategy.

Contact Travel Tech Strategies today at 954-779-2801 for help creating an effective YouTube hotel marketing campaign to boost your bookings!