Increasing your web traffic; the missing link…

How to build your hotel website’s online authority and thereby rankings through targeted link-building strategies.

Link building is an important hotel internet marketing strategy to increase your Search Engine visibility. There are three essential elements in hotel Web SEO; a Search Engine-friendly technical infrastructure, keyword-rich, fresh, original and engaging content and a natural link profile. Here are ten ways to improve your hotel ‘linkability’, help you climb the Google ladder and increase your hotel revenue.

Why is link building important?
Search Engine see a link to your web site like a vote of confidence in your web site, thus the more links, the higher your site’s authority. Search Engines believe that if other websites are linking to your Web pages, you must have something good to link to and will rate the page very positively. Search Engines’ algorithms today take into consideration several additional factors when rating the quality of inbound links to your site:

• the reputation, authority or trust value of sites linking to your hotel Web site
• the theme or relevance of sites linking to you
• the “anchor text” (the words that the link is embedded within) in links to your site
• the number of inbound links to your site is an essential ingredient in your Search Engine marketing success.

Link building is a heavily weighted factor in the algorithm Google uses to determine which site appears first in the results. All things being equal, when two hotel websites have similar structure and content, the site with the best links will be considered to have superior authority and will be served up first.

Launching a link building campaign
Hotels are in a fairly rare position among all the businesses on the Web, with opportunities for link building that many other industries may not have. However, you should start with the ten basic strategies first.

Hotel blogging – link baiting: On the Web, content has knocked Elvis off his post as king. Create a blog for your hotel that publishes intelligent, useful and updated content that isn’t widely available elsewhere (for instance on the hotel destination), and you’ll naturally encourage other sites to link to you. You can also syndicate your content as articles, if you prefer.

Blogging on related websites: Get in touch with the owners of blogs related to your hotel business, and arrange to write a guest post on their blog with a do follow link (preferably) back to your site in the ‘Author information’ section. You can also do link building by placing links to your site within the blog’s text, if appropriate.

Commenting on related websites: You can proactively create your own backlinks by leaving thoughtful comments on blogs related to your industry, and mentioning your website in the comment or in your signature (if possible). Some may not be followed links (and as such won’t count towards your rankings), but all have the potential to bring visitors to your hotel website.

Build a ‘community’ of links: There are plenty of ways you can build partnerships with local businesses that make website linking a natural part of the relationship. Ask your local suppliers, industry and local business organisations such as your Chamber of Commerce and local hotel associations or any other relevant organisations to link back to your website.

Media releases: The nature of the hotel industry lends itself nicely to distributing newsworthy media releases for link building purposes. Whenever any of the following happens, you have the opportunity for a newsworthy media release:

• special offers, promotions or competitions
• announcements of awards won or new employees
• refurbishments, developments and facilities
• seasonal menus or accommodation deals
• an important event held at your hotel, or sponsored by your hotel

Directory listings: As well as general directory listings such as the Yellow Pages, the hotel industry has industry-specific directories. Look for link building opportunities on local and global travel websites and tourism websites. Travel directories for hotel link building include Directory of Hotels, Mr and Mrs Smith and Wotif.

Clients, suppliers and partners: Hotels are often strongly interconnected in the business community, with a strong network of corporate clients, suppliers and other business partners. Many of these will be happy to provide links on their website back to you – naturally as long as your service is excellent!

Create a Google Places page: Google Places has become a much more comprehensive way to connect with your customers online and reach the local market. You can update your hotel’s Places page with a full photo gallery, menus, special offers and post real-time updates. It is important to constantly update and refresh your site with new content.

Video marketing: Create videos that showcase the unique features of the hotel like the accommodation, facilities and location and post them to your YouTube channel. Pay attention to details like including keywords in your tag, description text and filename URLs, and include a link in your description text. Although the YouTube links are not followed, your video can encourage people to click through to the site.

Social media sites for hotels: Social Media sites like Twitter and Facebook offer plenty of ways to interact with your customers, link back to your website, and encourage others to link to you. As well, there are numerous travel-specific Social Media sites on the Web you can ‘like’ to build up your fan base and post comments on to encourage links back to your website.

Ongoing Link Building

Link building is an ongoing activity but it is important to build a natural link profile. What this means is that links need to be from quality websites and related to your industry. Moreover, link building is a long term and ongoing strategy and good, quality links should be obtained over time in a natural way.

If a Search Engine sees that a website has accrued a large number of links in a very short time, they may see this as an attempt to manipulate the Search Engine rankings. As a consequence, your website may be banned or your Search Engine ranking may drop significantly. Many of the activities above, such as providing high quality content, writing press releases, guest blogging and writing blog articles should be done on a continual and ongoing basis and become part of your usual marketing activities..

The hotel industry is a very saturated and competitive industry. If you don’t make time to keep building your link profile, there are plenty of your competitors around that will and may overtake you in Search Engine rankings. Setting aside half an hour three times a week to focus on your link building activities should see a boost in your Search Engine rankings in as little as a few weeks.

Start today and put into practice the simple methods we have outlined above to build relevant, theme-based links with the right anchor text … and watch as your Web site starts increasing its Search Engine ranking in a few weeks and months. Contact us to find out how we can partner with you in your hotel internet marketing strategy and create a link building strategy to start building a natural link profile and increase your Search Engine visibility.

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Here at Hotel Internet Marketing, we specialise in hotel online marketing for clients around the world through the development and implementation of effective internet marketing strategies such as hotel web design, hotel SEO – Search Engine Optimisation and hotel email marketing. Contact us today for a preliminary discussion about your hotel internet marketing strategy.