SEM – A Hotel Perspective

Internet Landscape in India

Travelers1 rely on the internet as the #1 source of information while researching a trip

1 Google, The Travelers Road to Decision 2009

Others

Brand Websites

Online Travel Agents

Search Engines

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%

1%

10%

15%

74%

And where do these travelers search while planning a trip?

78%

The Power of Search: Global Trends

Online Travel: USA Trends

Online Travel: USA Trends

Online Travel: Trends in India

Hospitality: Dominant on Search

New client?

How well known is your brand?

How can your hotel be categorized?

Where are your hotels located?

Based on the type of hotels, let’s ask a few more questions…

Who stays in your hotels?

Family

Business Traveller

Couple

Where is your target audience based?

Now that we have covered…

• The type of hotel

• The target audience

• Your key source markets

• Goal of your SEM campaign

Let’s move on…

Seasonality

Skiing in Summer?

Sunbathing in Winter?

Recognize your competition

Online Presence

Special Offers & Deals

So where do you begin?

Hotel Industry Metrics

• Booking

• Revenue

• Inventory = Available room nights/month

• Average Number of Room Nights

• Average Room Rate (ARR)

• Occupancy Rate

Other Hotel Jargon

• MICE

• Rack Rate

• BAR Rate

• Early Bird Offer

• Weekend Offer

• Business Offer

Hotel Booking Cycle

Awareness & Interest

Hotel Booking Cycle

Awareness & Interest

Research

Hotel Booking Cycle

Awareness & Interest

Research

Comparison

Hotel Booking Cycle

Awareness & Interest

Research

Comparison

Hotel Booking Cycle

Booking

Campaign Structure

Split your account into campaigns based on properties and key source markets

Budget

Core Themes

• Include core themes in one campaigno Hotels in <city>o Budget/luxury/business hotels in <city>o 3/4/5 star hotels in <city>o Affordable/top/premium/best hotels in <city>

Additional Themes

• Create new campaign for additional themeso Hotel tariffs in <city>o Holidays in <city>o Locality based termso Offer based termso Beach/spa/palace hotels in <city>o Hotels near <city> airport

Events

Now that you have covered so many themes, let’s take another

look at the Booking cycle…

Hotel Booking Cycle

Awareness & Interest

(e.g. hotels in <city>, top hotels in

<city>)

Hotel Booking Cycle

Awareness & Interest

(e.g. hotels in <city>, top hotels in

<city>)

Research(e.g. 5 star hotels in <city>, luxury hotels in <city>, business hotels in <city>, budget hotels in <city>)

Hotel Booking Cycle

Awareness & Interest

(e.g. hotels in <city>, top hotels in

<city>)

Comparison(e.g. <city> hotel tariffs, Best rates <city> hotels)

Research(e.g. 5 star hotels in <city>, luxury hotels in <city>, business hotels in <city>, budget hotels in <city>)

Hotel Booking Cycle

Awareness & Interest

(e.g. hotels in <city>, top hotels in

<city>)

Comparison(e.g. <city> hotel tariffs, Best rates <city> hotels)

Research(e.g. 5 star hotels in <city>, luxury hotels in <city>, business hotels in <city>, budget hotels in <city>)

Hotel Booking Cycle

Booking(e.g. <your hotel>)

Leverage Your Brand

• Unknown or well-known, ensure that you show up for your brand

Should you bid on your competition?

Want to focus only on branding?

Probability of Booking

Put your price in the ad copy

Now that your campaign is ready and set up, what is the next step?

Measuring Success

Conversion Tracking

To measure success, track

bookings or ‘Request a

Quote’ form fills on the

website

Modify the conversion

code to track revenue &

measure ROAS

Restaurants

• Target your campaign to that city and include terms like:o Restaurantso Restaurants in <city>o <cuisine> restaurantso <cuisine> in <city>o 5 star/affordable

restaurants

Restaurants

• Use call extensions and

location extensions

• Get a unique phone

number to measure the

bookings made through

your campaign

Key Performance Indicators

• Bookings

• Revenue

• Cost

• Conversion Rates

• ROAS

Some advanced techniques…

Remarketing

Dynamic Remarketing

• User comes to your website

and checks out a particular

hotel

• He leaves your website

without booking

• Remarket to that user with

customised messages and

offers regarding the hotel he

showed an interest in

Separating Devices

Business travelers make

last minute bookings

from Smartphones or

Tablets. For business

hotels or city hotels, run

separate campaigns on

these devices

New Launches

Create display network campaigns with image ads

about a month before the actual launch to generate

awareness about the property

Thank You