Launching a great website for your hotel with unique search engine optimisation (SEO) is vital to increasing traffic from search engines. This post will walk you through the best on-page SEO techniques which will help your hotel get better visibility in organic (unpaid) searches and get more bookings.
What is on-page SEO?
On-page SEO is a component of
SEO that focuses on enhancing web pages in order to rank higher in search engines' organic results, get more relevant clicks, help run successful marketing campaigns and provide a first-rate user experience.
Google's search algorithm is continuously being updated. It's vital to keep up with the latest practices and not let your competitors get ahead and steal a larger share of the market.
1. Make sure search engines can access and index your hotel's website
● Check your meta tags
Meta tags should be built into the code of a website and are a way to categorise and describe your content. They are like hidden titles, headings, and are visible to search engines when they crawl your site. They help them to index your page and make sense of the content. With missing or duplicate meta tags, your site will not rank as highly in search results.
● Make sure your site is secure
Based on Google's announcement, having a secure site is a ranking signal. Also, internet browsers flag non-secure sites which discourages e-commerce. It is essential you have a secure ‘https’ certificate.
● Submit valid and concise URLs to search engines.
A well-structured URL -short and keyword rich- is optimal for users and search engines. Use Google Search Console to prepare simple and accurate outlines of your pages and content, and also submit XML sitemaps that contain valid URLs. This will ensure your important pages are crawled, indexed and found.
● Schema markup
Schema is a semantic vocabulary of tags which can be added to your website code. It provides the easiest way for search engines to understand your page content and match them up with relevant searches. FAQs are a good example of content which can be marked up with schema so that Google can present a list of your answers in response to a search.
2. Create a hotel website with quality, relevant content and media
Your website should be well constructed with stunning imagery and appropriate keywords in order to deliver a valuable experience for users and search engines.
• Images & Videos
o Visual content is extremely important for hotel sites. Ensure your website provides brilliant imagery which showcases your hotel and allows your visitors to find out what it will be like before they book.
o Insert Alt Text in your visual content. Alt Text is a description of an image and is a way of inserting content rich in keywords. Make sure all images on your site have unique Alt Text.
o Make sure your loading speed is fast. One of the most important components of on-page SEO is the time it takes pages to load. Ensure your attractive images are not slowing down your site's speed, otherwise your audience are likely to abandon the web page before they even see your beautiful hotel pictures.
• Well-presented SEO elements
Ensure your foundational elements of
SEO such as page titles, meta descriptions, H1..H6 tags, are optimised with valuable and relevant keywords.
• Rich content
Quality text and word count is crucial. Word count is one of the most effective factors for higher rankings. Remember to integrate well researched and relevant keywords authentically throughout your content. A professional content writer is your friend here.
• Optimise voice search
This is a fast-growing search trend and your site needs a strategy to ensure it is found for voice searches on all devices.
• Optimise your hotel website for user experience (UX)
o Deliver fast loading times for smartphones. Mobile page speed is a priority - over 60 % of hotel bookings are made on a smartphone or tablet. If you are not providing a fast, friction-free user journey across all devices, you are losing conversions and revenue.
o Provide an explicit path to book. When your target audience cannot find the information they need, they will quickly abandon your site. Make it easy for them with intuitive links, high quality content and clear call to action (CTA) buttons.