The Owner Community blog over at HomeAway had a great article in their newsletter about 11 types of travelers that might rent vacation homes in the fall.

I’d argue that these tips aren’t ONLY for vacation rental managers; hotel and resort managers could hop on the bandwagon also.  Keep in mind, in many locations “Off-Season” is longer than “On-Season” in this economy; the lines between seasons are blurry.

Here are some tips for maximizing your fall, and the possibility of turning your “slower” season (between summer vacation and holiday getaways) to your busiest. The ideas here can be developed for nearly any location, although some do require Mother Nature’s help.  You can’t peep at leaves in Palm Springs!

1)  Leaf Peepers – This is big business in the Northeast, but some locations have great color but not a lot of recognition – get the word out if you’re a great destination for seeing the fall colors.

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Blizzard has lined up 12 webinars designed to improve your overall marketing strategy.

Each webinar is free and will run for about an hour. Sign up today, webinars fill up fast.

Join us for:

Diagnosing Page Speed Issues on Your Travel, Tourism or Hospitality Site
Thursday, May 6th, 11 AM MDT
With Google’s recent announcement that Page Speed is a ranking factor, find out how to determine how your site measures up!

Google Analytics 101 for Hotels, Resorts, Inns and Rental Managers
Tuesday, May 18th, 11 AM MDT
Learn the basics of Google Analytics setup, how to monitor, interpret and track your online ROI.

Google Analytics Advanced for Hotels, Resorts, Inns and Rental Managers
Thursday, May 27th, 11 AM MDT
You will learn how to use goals, funnel tools and advanced reports for tracking actions that improve ROI. (more…)

Local Google Map listings are essential for your web site’s local and overall visibility; make sure that your information is accurate and in accordance with the guidelines.

Here is an overview of the new guidelines:

• The business name must be the full legal business name.
• No stuffing of keywords into the business name, Google recognizes that you are trying to manipulate the search results. “Key West Vacations by Antlers Realty” is a no-no.
• No stuffing of URLs or phone numbers into the business name.
• A property for rent isn’t considered a business; use the main office for the address. This is a big one for vacation rental companies and real estate agents who have tried to list every property in their inventory separately in the past.
• If your business operates in several cities, don’t create a listing for each city, use the main office location.
• Physical business locations only, PO Boxes don’t count.
• Best practices have always been to use an email address that
  matches your business’s URL, so for www.AwesomeRentals.com use Info@AwesomeRentals.com.
• It’s also best to use an email address that is shared by people in the company. For example Info@BlizzardInternet.com is shared between the business development and marketing team.
• When choosing categories only choose those that apply to your business, and not related categories
• Use the description and custom attribute fields for additional information about your listing; don’t stuff it into other fields.

Photo by  Spencer E Holtaway

Since 1997, Blizzard Internet Marketing has teamed up with hospitality marketers to create smart online marketing strategies for lodging and travel websites.

During the last week of September, Blizzard Internet is hosting a 2-day hands-on workshop in their home town of Glenwood Springs, Colorado where their long time clients, new clients, and other hotel marketers looking to discover what is new in search marketing will gather.

The workshop titled “Google and Foundations” will cover proven search strategies and how to integrate them it to a 2010 marketing plan. Leading the workshop is Blizzard Internet’s President and Co-Founder, Trent Blizzard, who is known for bringing a fresh and proven perspective to search marketing. Trent comments that:

“Blizzard Internet clients who are committed to growing their online marketing presence are the first to sign up for our workshops. They understand that successful marketing means teamwork; work is done both by Blizzard Internet experts but also by their in-house team, and together we can take their search engine presence to the next level. Both our new clients and other hospitality companies wanting to learn attend because they are ready to outrank and out perform their competitors.”

After the 2-day workshop, attendees will leave knowing:

• How to optimize their website for search engines
• The best tools for researching keywords, tracking results, and spying on their competitors
• How to successfully build powerful links to their website
• The ins and outs of how Google works
• The latest strategies to compete for guests in today’s saturated market

Event Details:
When:  September 29th and 30th of 2009
Who:  Hotel, Resort, Vacation Rental, and Travel Related Website Marketers
Where:  Glenwood Springs, Colorado
Bring: Your Laptop
Register Here:  Google and Foundations Workshop

With the recent hurricanes in the southern US I thought it prudent to put together some tips for combating the whims of Mother Nature. By having a plan you can be prepared to cope with the challenges that may come your way due to a variety of weather-related and even man-made emergencies. Form hurricanes to blizzards, the unexpected is a given when traveling to certain parts of the world. Making sure your guests, future guests and potential bookers are taken care of – you’ll come out the other side of the storm in good shape.

The key to handling these issues with professional efficiency is a PLAN. What will you do if a hurricane hits your hotel next week? Do you have a step by step marketing checklist to make sure things are set in motion with a simple phone call? Take the time to set yourself up now – and the obstacles Mother Nature leaves behind will be less daunting.

Marketing in Spite of Mother Nature

Using your website is a great way to keep your current guests, future bookings and possible customers informed as to the status of your property or properties. Spend a few minutes with your webmaster or SEM company coming up with a plan that can be put into action with a quick phone call or email.

Keep guests/ future guests updated
Here are a few examples of hotels using their web sites keeping guests and even employees updated as to the status of reservations and closing:

(click image to enlarge)

From MoodyGardens.com

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From Wyndham Hotel Galvez

These are both excellent examples of taking the time to convey a small bit of information. I bet every guest and employee that visited the Moody Gardens site felt a bit of comfort in knowing they’ve been thought of and they know the property will open again on Sept. 21st.

Having a policy in place and published is also a good idea. Wyndam’s Hurricane Policy is really good, and lets guests know where they stand.

(click image to enlarge)

Post photos
Sometimes damage caused by Mother Nature can completely miss certain areas, or the devastation to certain areas can be exaggerated. If your area and property missed the brunt and is open and comfortable for business – then post date-stamped photos to prove it.

Transportation updates
Airport closures, bridge malfunctions – things happen and when a guest may be inconvenienced getting to your property – providing them with information on the easiest route will alleviate having an already disgruntled guest showing up at your front door. You might send them an email w/ alternate directions, send a sms/text message to their cell phone. Maybe even meet their flight with a driver to deliver them safely and without hassle. Taking advantage of small opportunities to excel in a time of adversity is a great way to earn repeat customers.

Family and Friend Messages
I had some friends that were stuck in the Cayman Islands during a tropical storm a few years back. I don’t know the exact circumstances but a change in direction along with limited flights and they were stranded. The resort they were staying in offered them immediate access to a phone and computer as soon as they found out they would be riding out the storm so they could notify loved ones that they were being taken care of and would contact them as soon as they could. The hotel’s location made this preparation necessary – and because they were treated like royalty with intense rain and winds whipping around outside – my friends have gone back to the same resort every year since.

So take the time during your off season – or right now – to formulate a plan of attack – and a plan for getting your efforts off the ground. It can be as simple as calling corporate – or your marketing firm or webmaster in a different city or state.

Now that you have successfully implemented a Web Analytics program to evaluate visits to your website, what should you be looking at? Whether you are utilizing the Blizzard ROI Tracker, Google Analytics or another type of analytics software on your website, these resources can provide valuable information about the effectiveness of both online and offline marketing efforts.

1. Bounce Rate – tells you the percentage of visitors that only viewed one page on your website. There are many possible scenarios that cause websites to have high bounce rates. If the content on your website is outdated, you will typically lose visitors looking for the newest information about your business. How often do you update the content, specials or packages, local events, etc… on your website? Are your keywords reflective of what your visitors expect from your website? If the keyword phrases you are using, both in your optimization and paid advertising don’t give visitors what they are expecting from your website, they will most likely not make it past the first page.
2. Average Time Spent on Website – It is crucial to monitor how long the average visitor spends on your website. If your content keeps the visitor engaged, they are more likely to view more pages, which often lead to conversions or a request for more information. Pay attention to pages that show an unusually high time spent on the page, as there could be an issue with the page.
3. First Time and Returning Visitors - It is important to spend your time and efforts attracting new visitors to your website. It is just as important to see an increase in returning visitors, an indication that visitors are interested in learning more about what you are offering on your website.
4. Top Referring URL’s – This will help to determine which directories and search engines are bringing the most traffic to your website.
5. Top Keywords that send visitors to your website – analyze whether the most relevant keywords for your business are really the ones that are sending the most qualified visitors. Which keywords are resulting in more conversions?
6. Top Keywords by Search Engine – Analyzing the top keywords by search engine will allow you to determine what is working best for you in the organic rankings and your pay per click advertising.
7. Paid vs. Organic search engine referrals – this will help you to analyze your organic and paid marketing efforts. Are you investing enough money for Search Engine Optimization or Pay Per Click advertising?
8. Visitor Demographics – You can analyze where the majority of your visitors are coming from by Country, State, or City and focus marketing efforts in these areas.
9. Conversion Rate – The number of visitors that complete the desired action, such as reserving a room, signing up for your newsletter or filling out a request for information form. It is important that you or your webmaster define the conversion pages.
10. Other Links – Are the other link building efforts, such as lodging directories and authority websites, sending visitors to your website, if so, are they also converting?

Don’t forget that the purpose of your website marketing efforts are saving money, increasing traffic, increasing conversions, increasing your return on investment and decreasing the bounce rate of visitors to your website. The analysis is as important as the online marketing itself.

spoon image courtesy chris runoff

When evaluating website traffic, people often look at the volume of traffic to justify if their marketing efforts are worthwhile.  While traffic volume is an important piece to consider, you cannot measure it exclusively.  You must evaluate the quality of the traffic your site is receiving.  Even if you get thousands upon thousands of visitors a month, if their visit doesn’t convert into an action on your site or a call into your reservation desk, than what was the point (not to mention the cost)?  As web marketers and business owners we must use additional metrics to define what quality traffic on a website looks like, and take the appropriate steps to improve it.

So, what other metrics can we use? 

Bounce Rate
Bounce rate is probably one of the most typical metrics used to define quality traffic.  Wikipedia defines it as “…when a website visitor leaves a page or a site without visiting any other pages before a specified session-timeout occurs.”  Typically we look at the bounce rate for individual pages, and if the bounce rate is unacceptably high, then we try to isolate what is causing people to bounce from that page.  Are you targeting the wrong keywords, is the content poor, are the photos low quality, do you have a call to action on the page to entice people to stay, etc?

There are many opinions on what is an acceptable bounce rate, and most people tend to agree that anything over 50% is a red-flag for any website.  However, it is really important to benchmark yourself against other sites in a similar industry.  Let’s look at the average bounce rates of a large sample of two different type of lodging sites – vacation rentals and hotels/resorts:

While this is merely a sample, it provides us with good information to use when looking at your vacation rental or hotel site bounce rates.  As a Vacation Rental, you should aim to have a fairly low homepage bounce rate in the 20’s, and as a hotel/resort you should aim to have a homepage bounce rate of around 30%.  When looking at all pages on your site, aim to be in the lower 30% range.  When you define pages that have red-flag bounce rates, evaluate those pages and make sure you are offering guests a reason to stay on your site (specials, valuable content, easy to use navigation, etc.)  Sometimes we see sites that are so well-optimized and that rank so well organically that they naturally have higher bounce rates.  Why?  Because people land on their page, get the info they need, and then move on without necessarily wanting to book a vacation (for instance, your site offers an entire page about a popular event in your town, people are looking for the dates and times, they find your page, get the info and bounce.) This isn’t always a bad thing (we all know content and pages are important for SEO), as long as you are meeting your reservation goals.  If this is the case, you can still take steps to try to minimize the bounce rate for those pages.

Page Views Per Session or “Depth”
While bounce rate is standard, let’s take it one step further and look at just how many pages of your site visitors are viewing. Is it 2 pages, 5 pages, 10 or more?  This is an important question, and the answers depend on the type of product or service you provide. If you are a hotel chain that often has repeat guests, they may only need to get from your homepage to your booking engine to reserve a stay, as your offerings are much more standard and require less research and buying commitment.  But if you are a vacation rental with various types of properties spanning a large geographical region, than guests are going to shop around on your site until they find the exact home they want to rent at a price that they can afford. Taking this into consideration it is again important for you to compare the number of pages visitors are viewing on your site to sites that have similar offerings.

Let’s look at how many pages visitors are viewing on average for our sample of vacation rentals and hotels/resorts sites:

For vacation rentals, we see a higher number of people viewing more than 10 pages of a site, and this should be expected.  Depending on the size of your site, you want to see guests viewing a larger number of pages simply because you have more lodging options, prices, etc.  For a hotel site, you won’t see as many visitors viewing more than 10 pages of your site because of the limited room options.  Depending on the size of your hotel site, you will probably see the majority of your site visits in the 1-3 page range, but you should aim to give guests enough information about your city that they don’t necessarily have to research it elsewhere and may view additional pages.  For all hospitality sites, you don’t want visitors to leave your site if they can get all the info they need in one place.  Create quality info on your site, entice visitors to stick around, and this can impact the number of pages people visit on your site as well as conversions.

Conversions
Conversions are what marketers and business owners pinpoint as the most important metric to determine if their website is generating quality traffic. This is extremely hard to average out and show an average across websites, as the actions vary from site to site (secure online bookings, booking requests, calls, filling out contact forms, requesting brochures, etc.)  As an owner or marketer, measure a variety of metrics like the ones identified above, in addition to conversions, to improve the quality of traffic to your site.

With these metrics (and others) in mind, dig into your analytics and take steps to improve the quality of the traffic your site receives.  Consider your content, your keywords, your photos, your navigation, your calls to action, and it may even be time to consider a new design to address a variety of these issues.