Every marketing channel has a job. Great hotel marketing happens when every channel does its job well. Social has a unique and different role to play than other channels, including paid search and your website.
By Kathleen Kubota
Senior Director of Integrated Marketing, Screenfire
One of the biggest misconceptions in hotel marketing is that every marketing channel should generate bookings. In reality, each serves a different purpose, guiding travelers from awareness to reservations. Hotels that consistently grow direct bookings understand how these channels work together.
What’s the role of your social media channels? Inspiration, authenticity, and assurance.
All travelers, even business travelers, are looking for these three somewhat undefinable qualities to nudge them into a decision. Unless we’re talking roadside inn or airport hotel, it’s not all about location, convenience, and price.
Websites can offer beautiful photos, lists of amenities, and the like, but a website inevitably has a static, brochure-like feel. It’s “staged” and the potential guest always wonders, consciously or subconsciously, “what’s it really like?”
Authenticity, inspiration, and assurance are what social media has the potential to bring to the potential guest: Candid photos, genuine guest moments, a sense of engagement, and thoughtful management responses build confidence and reduce uncertainty in a way that other channels just cannot. Posts, comments, and reviews don’t necessarily create demand, but they support demand, and help convert it.
Your Website Converts Interest into Bookings
Crucially, all social media must inevitably lead to your website–don’t forget those links! Now guests are looking for answers. They want to know what the rooms look like, what is included, where you’re located, and why they should choose your hotel. A great website removes friction, answers questions, and makes booking easy. Its job is to turn interest (and assurance!) into reservations.
Email and Social Builds Loyalty Long Term
Every channel must play its role, and the guest journey doesn’t end at checkout. Email and social followers keep your hotel connected with past guests through special offers, seasonal promotions, and reminders to return. Drip, drip, drip.
Great Hotel Marketing Works Together
The bottom line? No single marketing channel does everything, and it shouldn’t have to. Search helps guests discover you. Social media inspires and assures. Reviews build trust. Your website informs and converts. Email builds loyalty.
When every channel does its job well, the entire guest journey becomes stronger, leading to more direct bookings and loyal guests. Need help? Contact the Screenfire hospitality group today.
All the best, Kathleen
About the author: Kathleen Kubota is a strategic leader with deep expertise in directing integrated marketing and digital ecosystems. Prior to joining Screenfire, Kathleen spent more than a decade with the San Diego Tourism Authority. She has also held senior marketing leadership roles at Town and Country Resort, the historic Hotel del Coronado in San Diego, and Miramonte Resort and Spa. She is a graduate of the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business.
