"myhotelshop is an essential partner for the online presence of our hotel"
Initial situation & challenge
If we take a closer look at our customer, we quickly become enthusiastic about the charming idyll and the southern flair. The privately run 4-star Romantik Hotel am Brühl is located between Quedlinburg's medieval town center and the breathtaking Brühlpark.
Romance resides here since 1992 and allows its guests a relaxing getaway from everyday life with the lovingly restored buildings and a modern style of furnishing. The individually decorated 47 hotel rooms, including suites and apartments, invite guests to relax next to the fairytale old town, the wine tavern and the fireplace in the lounge.
In line with the hotel's expectations, the first priority was to design a new, attractive hotel website that reflects these values and conveys a welcoming vacation atmosphere even before guests arrive. In addition, the aim was to expand direct sales and improve the hotel's overall profitability.
Based on these goals, our cooperation in full management support started in May 2017.
Measures
The first step was the setup of a new website developed for the hotel. With a design that matches the hotel, high-quality images and short but interesting texts, a user-friendly hotel website was created in close coordination with the hotel.
With regard to website analysis, at the same time a tool was installed to make visitor behavior visible (and to draw appropriate conclusions from it) as well as to provide key figures for measuring success.
After the relaunch of the hotel website, the first direct sales campaigns started via the relevant meta searches Trivago & Tripadvisor as well as brand campaigns on Google to drive more traffic to the website.
In addition to the existing campaigns on meta searches, marketing placements were placed on Google Hotel Ads and generic Adwords campaigns. Later, a test run with Tripadvisor Sponsored Ads also followed.
Overall, through permanent monitoring and management as well as regular review meetings, the visibility on the marketing channels could be continuously and strategically improved. These improvements were also reflected in the results: the website's revenue increased by 24% within the first year.
In 2017, a voucher store was also implemented on the hotel website, which developed into an important pillar of liquidity. Both value vouchers, vouchers for partial services related to the hotel stay, and accommodation vouchers generated direct revenue without any service having to be provided immediately.
The results are impressive: an average increase of €650 in monthly sales revenue.
In addition to the measures that directly affected the website and direct sales campaigns, further projects were also implemented in 2018. Besides the technical relocation of the channel manager and the yield management system, we also supported necessary organizational measures, such as the legally compliant adaptation of the General Data Protection Regulation and the Flat-Rate Travel Guideline.
The upgrade of the booking engine to the latest version in mid-2019, which promised a conversion boost, was also accompanied by a voucher shop change. Since the tool changed, revenue has actually increased to an average of €1,700 per month, while December 2019 alone generated an astonishing €7,800 in additional revenue exclusively from the voucher shop.
During the constant check for completeness of the hotel website's content, marketing-specific optimization recommendations were also made. Therefore, we revised the presentation of the social media area on the website, as well as implemented a table reservation system for the hotel's own restaurant and a conference tool to create an even better user experience.
Special challenges in 2020
Because of the Covid-19 crisis and the related closure of many hotels in Germany, we had to switch into crisis mode together in order to guide the hotel through this situation as well as possible. On the one hand, there was the idea of showing the hotel different ways to continue offering extra value to its guests. Therefore, the content was updated and adapted in order to provide the (potential) guests with all necessary information in an optimal way. In this context, we worked with different pop-ups and evaluated them. The hotel also established a pick-up meal offer and made it available on the website with our support.
During this challenging time, it is obvious that we have focused on a very close collaboration between the hotelier and our hotel e-Commerce specialist regarding the performance of existing marketing campaigns and necessary updates on the hotel website.
We are extremely proud of our personal cooperation during the difficult period, which our contact person also appreciates very much:
"It is a pleasure to have you by our side, even beyond the work processes. It's simply a pleasure to work together, even nicer to be successful in the process. Even in these turbulent times, humanity does not fall by the wayside and helps us to persist."
Results
Since the start of the collaboration more than three years ago, the results have been very impressive. In particular, the continued growth in website revenue is worth mentioning:
With an excellent cost ratio of 12-13% over all three years, the marketing campaigns placed on Google, Trivago and Tripadvisor have also contributed to the hotel's success.
Compared to 2018, revenue from these campaigns increased by 52% in 2019. It is also particularly remarkable that even in the Corona year 2020 there is an increasing growth in revenue.
The campaigns therefore took a decisive share of hotel website revenue:
These positive results also impress Hartmut Wiese, owner of the Romantik Hotel am Brühl and our first contact person:
"Our personal full manager and myhotelshop as a partner are essential for the online presence of our hotel. We appreciate the good cooperation and are looking forward to the coming time!"
In general, the monthly phone calls to analyze and coordinate the ongoing marketing campaigns and projects have a significant impact on the common further development. Family Wiese & their team contribute significantly to the success of the hotel through the active use of a revenue management system, the lovingly maintained product itself and an open exchange with myhotelshop.
Outlook
The first projects for 2021 have already been implemented. Among other things, a systemic update of the website and further tools to be tested are under discussion. With regard to the current marketing campaigns, there will be a focus on the expansion of Google Ads.
