The key element in any Hotel SEO is reinforcing your location across your online property. A hotels physical location is one of the primary factors that underpins a customers search when looking for a Hotel, Bed & Breakfast or Guesthouse.

 

 

The hotels physical location is used to underpin other key location based characteristics that research shows could influence a customer decision:

 

Hotel Location Based Characteristics:

Location based characteristics refer to features that describe the geographic environment information of a hotel accommodation.

• Near the beach within a locality
• Near the sea, lake, river, not necessarily with a beach, near a defined locality
• Near public transportation
• Near city, town, village centre
• Close to the motorway or A road
• External amenities, restaurants, shops, attractions
• Safe location

 

Hotel Service Based Characteristics:

Service based characteristics are used for specifying the performance of a hotel accommodation, including hotel amenities, appearance and service.

• Hotel class
• Customer reviews
• Total number of rooms
• Internal amenities

 

The above list is a condensed version of research conducted into hotel characteristics that influences a customers decision. It does however highlight the importance of reinforcing a hotels location and also provides future areas where hotels can expand their informational content on site.

 

Hotel SEO 101

 

Single Location Hotels

The first steps in reinforcing a hotel, bed & breakfast, guesthouses location within their site is to add the hotels: Name and full Address in the footer of the website. The footer allows the address to become visible site wide and also allows us to add structured data into the page.

I also add contact details, however the hotels Name and Address are the most important bits of information.

 

 

Hotel Structured Data Markup

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org",
  "@type": "Hotel",
  "image": "https://your domain image file",
  "starRating" : { "@type" : "Rating",
                   "ratingValue" : "5"},
  "priceRange" : "$100 - $300",
  "address": {
    "@type": "PostalAddress",
   "streetAddress": "Street Address",
    "addressLocality": "Town or Village",
    "addressRegion": "County",
    "postalCode": "Post Code",
     "addressCountry": "Country"
  },
  
  "description": "Description of Hotel",
  "name": "Hotels Name",
  "logo": "https://your domain logo",
   "telephone": "hotel tel number",
  "email": "hotels email",
  "url": "http://hotels domain",
  "sameAs" : [ "social media url",
    "social media url"]
   
        },   
   "hasMap": "link to google map listing"
   }
  }
}
</script>

 

 

Read More on Hotel Schema

 

Multi Location Hotels

In the case of a hotel brand that has multiple hotel locations, all property pages ( Pages belonging to a specific hotel ) should have their own footer which displays their own hotels specific location and markup.

Brand pages, not specific to a hotel property, can incorporate organisation markup.

Make sure that social profiles on page should be matching to that specific hotel and “same as” structured markup applied where applicable.
 

Hotels Location in Page <Title>

The hotels location should be within the page title

 
<title>Hotel Name – Secondary Characteristic in Location</title>
 

<title>Hotel Name – 4 Star Boutique Hotel in Location</title>

 

Hotels Location in H1 or H2

If possible I would try and have the hotels location within the H1 tag, however you need to balance the aesthetics and if it does not look quite right, then H2 will do.

Remember H1, H2, H3 sizes can be changed across site in the CSS or you could individually style the size, you are not stuck with one size, speak to your developer.

 

<H1>Hotel Name   Location</H1>
 

<H2>City Center 4 Star Boutique Hotel</H2>

 

These local SEO basics should be worked into all pages across the relevant hotels property pages.

 

Points to Ponder

Hotel guests shop and book on either supplier or OTA sites, rarely both. Hotel searchers tend to conduct between five and six search sessions before they book.

There are tangibly different booking patterns on individual hotel sites and OTA sites. OTAs are an effective way to reach consumers who are more likely to consider last-minute “impulse” trips. Guests who book on hotel brand websites do so 25 days in advance, versus just 10 days on OTA sites. The different hotel booking patterns illustrate how hotel brands have a longer pre-arrival window than OTAs in which to promote various ancillary product offers.

Low brand loyalty in the travel market means nearly every hotel guest is a “free agent.” Don’t take loyalty members’ business for granted: The majority of regular hotel guests stay at multiple chains throughout the year. Loyalty can’t be demanded, it must be earned.

About half of all hotel guests let their travel budgets dictate their destination and hotel. If they need to budget, hotel guests are more likely to cut back on the type of accommodation rather than airfare or car hire. With budgets clearly an important factor for many, hotels must take steps to understand their guests to the fullest extent possible.