Public Relations a ‘must’ for small hotels

Proper PR should shape perceptions. Ideally it should incorporate innovative and ongoing efforts to engage and entertain the media. Many hotels make a dreadful mistake of neglecting PR.

Small hotels should consider making public relations a cornerstone of the company’s growth strategy. When a consumer sees third party exposure of a service, it is perceived much differently than a traditional advertisement. When we see an advertisement, we know the company is trying to sell us something. On the other hand, when a third party, such as the media, approves a product or service, the company gains much more credibility. Obviously, customers are much more likely to make a purchase based on third party approval than an advertisement.

A consistent public relations program will help build general awareness of your service and will supplement any direct marketing and advertising efforts. This visibility also tends to make your business appear larger and more established than it may be, which may help you secure customers and funding.

PR is much less expensive than advertising and the benefits of PR can be much more significant than the benefits of advertising. A fine media placement can show the way to a substantial increase in sales, and because many small hotels have a unique story to tell or a unique service to offer, they are interesting to the media.

Small hotels have different audiences than large hotels. Guests of smaller hotels have different behavior patterns when it comes to searching and booking accommodation. The small hotel audience may rely more on offers via TripAdvisor or Lastminute.com etc., while the large hotel audience tends to be loyal to hotel brand. Small hotels often have advantages in their ability to give a more personalized service or a more family-friendly experience and memories to their customers. If they do feel they have a service edge, they should have a blog talking about their unique hospitality. Small hotels must find out what their competitive advantage is, then strongly support and promote it. They should create different marketing and PR campaigns in order to promote their strengths.

It is a fact that small hotels rarely have the same marketing budget large hotels do. However, small hotels must take every opportunity to promote the property, starting from digital marketing. If the budget is small, take advantage of the social media channels which are fast growing and take advice from other successful small hotels.

A better practice that simply offering a “great discount for the weekend” is sharing and offering something that genuinely interests your fans and followers. Yet having hundreds of Facebook friends does not mean all of them are reading your posts. Actual guests are extremely valuable and must be nurtured. A small hotel needs to attract guests who appreciate it for what it has to offer – for its “soul” – and not for a “discounted offer”.

A small property has to have focused PR to make its budget effective. A consistent public relations strategy can have long term benefits for the property and can be less costly that other promotional options. Do not underestimate its effectiveness. PR is often not a main concern for small hotels simply because most owners do not think they have the time or money to develop and execute an effective PR strategy…but it doesn’t have to be that way. Effective PR can be undertaken on a small or even non-existent marketing budget as long as you can dedicated some time to it and will do some of the work yourself.