There are many different ways people can find your website but it is important to understand how, away from the search engines, you can use your website to increase your bookings, and then what you can do to improve your website’s visibility and ranking on the search engines themselves.
Through Social Media
Facebook, Instagram and Tiktok are great ways of growing a customer base and incentivising people to your website with beautiful images, late deals, great offers and discount codes.
Following a visit to your property’s Airbnb/VRBO etc listing
Make sure the name of your property is listed within your agency advert so guests know how to search for you on Google and save money by booking direct.
Google My Business Listing
Getting your holiday home listed on Google Maps gives it a prominent advert when people search for your holiday home by name on Google Searches also. It is free so make sure you list your holiday home on Google here.
Print & Guest Communications
Leave business cards in your holiday home for guests so they can book direct next time. Including a voucher code eg:’VIP10′ that they can use on your website’s booking form in order to get a fixed amount or percentage discount is a great way to make your guest feel special and want to book again.
When communicating to your guests over email, make sure you include your website address on your email – reinforce your brand!
Google Searches
A couple of weeks after being launched your holiday home should be ranking highly for its name. This is vital because you want to be there for potential guests that find your property listed with an agent but cannot justify paying expensive booking fees. These people will search for your property on Google by searching for your property name.
To get your website to rank highly for people searching for properties in your location can be more challenging. After all, why should Google rank your website above plenty of other more established holiday agencies?
Google loves websites that are full of content featuring keywords/phrases, websites that are frequently updated and contain links from other websites. Google also likes old websites, so as your website gets older and more established this will naturally start to work in your favour. All these things give websites credibility in Google’s eyes and should lead to them rising up the search rankings
Think about what you would search for on Google to find your holiday home. Would this include your town, city, resort, attraction? If so, help Google out by making sure your website contains plenty of text and photo references to these places.
Update Your Website
Google can identify when your website was last updated and will reward frequently updated sites with a higher ranking than those that may appear “dormant” This doesn’t mean your website needs to be overhauled every six weeks. A simple photo update, blog entry or featuring a local attraction will do the trick!
Reviews
Receiving a Google Review provides a positive signal to Google that your website is popular and relevant and this will contribute to your website’s search engine performance. Invite your guests to leave reviews after their stay.
SEO Review
An SEO Review will look at any competitor independent holiday homes that are ranking well on Google and determine keywords that can be used on your website to boost your own search performance.
The other thing a review will do is to identify less common key phrases. For example, if you own a villa in Marbella, many agencies will optimise their websites for “Marbella Villas”. You might find it more achievable to rank highly for less commonly used search terms such as “villas near the beach in Marbella” or “villas near Nikki Beach Bar in Marbella” for example.
A Review would look to identify at least 5 main keyphrases and dedicate a page on your website to each by including these phrases within the headings, text copy and image metadata on each page
Google Paid Advertising
Pay for your website to feature prominently on Google Searches with Google Ads.
Encourage other websites to link to your website
Last but certainly not least, this is one of the most significant things you can do to improve your website’s search engine performance. Links to your website from other websites are yet another signal to Google that your website is relevant and credible. If you know a local business that is willing to support you then suggest to them that you exchange links between your website. Also make sure you link to your website from your social media accounts.
