Vacation Rental Marketing Guide: Owner Marketing Strategy
Learn several effective digital marketing strategies for your vacation rental business and how to implement them with the help of our OwnerRez software.
The vacation rental industry is a highly competitive landscape, and effective marketing is key for owners who want to stand out from the crowd, attract more bookings, and generate higher revenue.
In this guide, we'll walk you through several effective marketing strategies, including organic and paid tactics, and teach you how to implement them with the help of our OwnerRez software to maximize your ongoing marketing efforts as you continue to grow your successful vacation rental business.
The Importance of a Vacation Rental Property Marketing Strategy
Marketing is essential for any business, and short-term rentals are no exception. With so many vacation homes on the market, a solid marketing plan can make all the difference in connecting with your target audience and attracting them to your property.
How Can I Attract More Guests to My Rental Property?
Understanding how to attract more guests requires understanding how potential guests search for properties for their upcoming vacations. Here are a few of the common places guests look to find the right property:
Online Travel Agencies (OTAs) - OTAs like Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com, and HomeToGo are common places travelers turn to to find a variety of property listings to choose from. It's important to include high-quality listings featuring professional photos, detailed descriptions, and compelling reviews from past guests to showcase clear social proof and get you in front of your ideal guests.
Search Engines
Many travelers still turn to search engines like Google to find vacation rental options. Common Google searches include keywords and phrases like "vacation rentals in (destination)," "Holiday homes in (destination)," or more specific inquiries like "bachelorette vacation rentals in (destination)." When these searches come through, you'll want to be sure that your vacation rental website pops up on the first page. Also, ensure that your Google business account is current and findable on Google Maps. We have users with a lot of traction there. Google Vacation Rentals (and Google Hotels) is a popular metasearch engine for short-term rentals that many guests use.
Referrals
While digital marketing is a great way to attract new guests to your property, never underestimate the power of word-of-mouth referrals. Be sure to provide an exceptional guest experience and follow up with past guests through email or direct message to request a review, encourage them to share with friends and family, and invite them to tag you on social media in their vacation photos.
Social Media
Speaking of social media, platforms like Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and LinkedIn can be effective channels to showcase your property, build a loyal community, and partner with influencers to promote your listing to their audiences.
Local Listings
Some potential guests also look to local listings like bulletin boards, newspapers, and magazine ads in the places they plan to visit. These listings can be particularly effective for reaching guests looking for a more local, authentic experience.
Vacation Rental Marketing Strategies
With so many potential channels for guests to discover your vacation rental, it's essential to use a variety of marketing strategies to help you stand out from the competition. Let's look at several marketing tools available to you as a property owner or property manager to improve your visibility and attract more bookings.
Social Media Marketing
Social media is a great way for vacation rental owners to promote their rental and connect with potential guests. Video content and stories go above and beyond a set of photos to help you tell your property's story and give potential guests an inside look into the experience they can expect when they stay there. When you're considering social media as a marketing strategy for your property, here are a few things to consider:
Choose the Right Social Media Platforms
Each social media platform has a unique audience and features, making them useful tools for a well-rounded marketing strategy. Instagram, for example, is a highly visual platform that is particularly effective for showcasing your rental's aesthetic and amenities to a younger, travel-savvy audience. TikTok is a great platform to reach Gen Zers with aesthetic and entertaining video content for your rental. Facebook will introduce your property to an older demographic, so this might be the platform for you if you want to target retirees or families. LinkedIn can be a great resource to help you target corporate stays, extended business travel, and corporate gatherings.
Identifying your ideal audience can help you focus your marketing efforts on the right platforms for your rental business.
Influencer Marketing
Influencer marketing has become increasingly popular and can be a highly effective way to promote your vacation rental. By partnering with social media influencers with an engaged audience of your ideal guests, you can tap into their existing network and reach a wider audience. Influencers can also provide valuable social proof for your rental.
To get started with influencer marketing, you'll need to identify influencers who have a strong following in your target market and reach out to them with a proposal. You can offer a free stay and compensation in exchange for social deliverables like feed posts, stories, reel content, and more. Be sure to choose influencers who align with your brand values and provide the most value to your rental business.
Quality Photos and Videos
When it comes to social media marketing, high-quality photos, and videos are essential. As potential guests scroll through their feeds, eye-catching content is more likely to grab their attention and stop the scroll. Consider hiring a professional photographer once a month to capture professional photos, and be sure to film your video content in 4k in portrait format so the footage is ready for publishing as a reel.
Also, consider aerial footage to show off the property and its surroundings to provide a more immersive experience for potential guests. High-quality visuals will help you stand out from the sea of travel content saturating social platforms.
Pay-per-click (PPC) Ads
Pay-Per-Click advertising is a powerful way to drive targeted traffic to your vacation rental listing. With PPC ads, you can bid on specific keywords related to your rental and display your ad at the top of search engine results pages. PPC pricing structure is set up as the name suggests - you only pay for your ad when someone clicks it. This is a great structure that only charges you when you earn some sort of traffic or conversion.
To get started with PPC advertising, create a campaign on a platform like Google Ads and determine the keywords you want to target that relate to your property and the surrounding destination.
Be sure to create an engaging ad with a clear benefit and call to action that encourages users to click through to your vacation rental listing. With the right targeting and ad copy, PPC ads can be a highly effective way to drive bookings and increase your vacation rental revenue.
Email marketing
Email marketing is a great way to stay top-of-mind and regularly communicate exciting news, updates, and potential special offers for your future and previous guests who subscribe to your email list. To implement an effective email marketing strategy, you need to start building an email list on an email platform that offers the functionality you need to drive organic traffic to your booking sites.
Gather email addresses by adding a subscribe option on your own website, in your social media bios, and during the booking process. You can also consider implementing an opt-in incentive like a discount, a free local destination guide, or something else that brings value to your audience.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Optimizing your listings and rental site for search engines can improve visibility and boost direct bookings on your listing site.
Here are a few easy ways to improve your SEO strategies today:
Keyword Research
To implement effective SEO strategies, start by identifying your rental property's most relevant keywords and phrases and adding them to your site's content, including page titles, headers, meta descriptions, and listing descriptions.
Optimize for Mobile
It's important to make sure your website is responsive to different size screens, particularly mobile screens, as more people conduct searches from their phones.
Compress Images
Page load speed plays a role in your overall SEO rankings, so be sure to compress those beautiful professional photos you add to your site so they don't slow anything down.
Create a Blog
Blogs are a great way to build a robust online presence full of valuable keywords that help search engines match you with relevant search inquiries.
OwnerRez Is Here To Help
Strategic marketing is essential for vacation rental homeowners. And by implementing a range of fee and paid marketing strategies, you can increase your property's visibility and appeal to your target audience on a wide scale. OwnerRez is a leading short-term rental software that integrates with popular OTAs (and Google Vacation Rentals) to help you streamline your marketing efforts, manage your bookings, payments, and provide your guests with seamless rental experiences. Learn more about our software's unique features and integrations today!