Marketing a guesthouse..any ideas?

The guesthouse is next door to a major subway and in a student / teacher area of a university campus. We need more advertising ideas. Currently rely on just the lonely planet.

Who are the target clientele? This question cannot be asnwered without more specific information.

For a successful guest house, your service is the key factor for successful running. Your existing guests are the best medium of advertisement. You can extend them referral bonus or incentive in the form of gifts or souvenirs. But this process will take a bit of time for results. But the results are going to be long term. As your guest house is near a particular university (is it possible to get the mailing address of the potential students) can sent direct mailers to the new incoming registered students. Add a bit of value added service like providing subsidized tution to the inmates- My suggestions are only a drop in the ocean. Every thing depends on your communication skills also. Always smile stands before Service. Your smile is the best advertising medium for this type of industry.

Do you have a website? If so, is it quick to download, stylish and a good showcase for your business? Have you asked your guests to refer you to their friends, colleagues and family? If so and this hasn't worked - maybe try a loyalty system for referrals. Is your pricing right - have you checked it? Is your service top notch? Do you know where your guests come from - ask them how they found out about you. These are just some ideas - if you want to contact me, I can perhaps help some more.

Did you see if the University had a newsletter or newspaper you can advertise in? Also you want to get a website and have it optimized (search engine optimization) for terms that make sense. So if you are in City B, you want to optimize it for "City B hotels", "City B inns", "CIty B guesthouses", "City B rooms" and also similar terms for the college. You should be sold out for parents weekend, big college weekends, etc.

The Internet should be a major source.

Also, try to donate a free night stay to local charities to give away at fundraisers, this will help build brand awareness. Ask for a mention in their literature, etc.

Good luck with it.

It is very important to promote one's website by first publishing one's domain named website on these major search directories. For example, to publish your website's domain name for FREE at Google's search directory, visit "http://google.com/addurl/?continue=/add... and fill-in the form. In another way, Google, Yahoo or MSN provide a Yellow Pages kind of advertisement for every website according to a set of ranking protocols. And there's where web designers and search engine optimizers play an critical role in marketing websites which in turn, display goods and services to be discovered [via search directories] by the rest of the world. The greater the appearance or presence that one's website can generate on search directories, the greater number of customers will accordingly visitor one's website.

As for the cost to market one's website via the Internet and more particularly -- search directories, will depend initially with the proper design of webpages and the proper placement of metatags which are: <Title>, <Description> and <Keywords>.

A searchable <Title> would be "[name of the goods/services - a generic domain name is okay unless you own a well-know brand], [city], [state - postal abbreviation]" -- up to 65 characters and spaces. The <Description> would be up to 20 words comprising a complete readable sentence which promotes interest in your business, i.e., "We sell quality _____ at a reasonable price, etc." And <keywords> would consist of 12-15 compound plural words separated by commas, i.e., "cars, planes, transportation, etc."

In conclusion, webpages can either be rather straightforward using only HTML text or be crafted totally as a graphic Flash configuration. Either way, care should be taken to complete the Properties entries for Title, Description and Keywords so that there is something that search robots can index. The more one is educated in crafting effective webpages along with metatag placement, the less will be spent to hire third-party consultants to assist you in this matter.

To demonstrate how search engines/directories work, go to Yahoo.com and type in the following search query: "pizza downtown los angeles." [Note: do not include the quotes (").] Again, this is a very generic query which means you want to order a "pizza" from "downtown" and in what city -- "Los Angeles." Sounds fairly simple and then hit Enter. In a moment or two, there will appear some 1.3 million search results and among the top Five rankings will be a business called "Pizza Next Door, etc." The significance of this demonstration is to illustrate that most Interest shoppers will discover "Pizza Next Door," forthright because of its high web presence and ranking within the Top Five. So these shoppers are more or less likely to patronize this pizza establishment and hopefully in the long term; validate the owner and his family as having a profitable Internet enterprise.

Good luck!

Hi, have you held an open house? Try doing a give-a-away for anyone visiting your open house. Not for nothing I have something that you might like to use, no charge honestly.

I have certificates for 2-3 night hotel stays, that Im giving away. If you like I can send 50 for now....let me know.

thanks and good luck,

Marcelo

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