You may have the most wonderful hotel in the world, with gorgeous landscaping, comfortable rooms, and impeccable service, but if guests don't know about it, your occupancy rates will be a continual disappointment. In this day and age, the most critical component of hotel marketing is great hotel website design.
Why Hotel Website Design?
The numbers say it all. During 2007, almost a third of all hotel revenues will be generated by online channels. Moreover, over half of your target audience's decision-making is influenced by the Internet. Over a third of hotel guests choose their hotel based on online research, but book through another channel. The remainder researched their choices through an Internet portal, but then tried to book directly with the travel provider.

Just about every month, I hear from independent hotel owners and managers with questions about marketing their properties on the Internet. Their questions cover many aspects of Internet marketing; web site design, how to improve traffic to their site, pay-per-click and other forms of electronic advertising, online booking engines, developing a link strategy, or simply, how to work with third-party aggregators and the GDS. 

Most of these owners and managers are less concerned with the technical aspects of what needs to be done to improve their site; they are more interested in getting it fixed and how much will it cost. Take heed, it shouldn’t cost a fortune and is almost always very cost-effective; with a return-on-your-investment measured in weeks to just a few months.