As a bed and breakfast owner your website efforts are going to be a vital part of your overall success. What you’re looking for is the magic combination of an attractive, informative and persuasive website that ranks highly in the search engines.

Your website must paint a picture of your bed and breakfast and satisfy all of the questions a potential guest will require answering before they can feel confident about making a booking.

Start by clearly defining the ‘guest experience’

Make it very clear what kind of experience your guests will have at your B & B. Do you leave guests alone to get on with things, or do you have a lot of interaction with your guests? How obliging are you with your guests? Do you do airport pickups? Do you help them plan their activities and onward journey? If you are very hands on with your guests then add your photo and biography to the website.

How private are the guest’s rooms? Do they have an external door to their room? Is there a guest lounge for the sole use of the guests? What about your pets? Many of your guests will be love the cute pictures of Fluffy and Fido on your website, but remember that not everyone is an animal lover.

Be very specific about the in-room facilities without stating the obvious, and make sure to emphasise any competitive advantage you may have over other B & B’s in your area.

Location, Location, Location!

Help your guests to understand the location of your bed and breakfast and the unique features of the surrounding area. Start with your immediate location and then broaden it to your city and region. Are you right in the heart of your city and within walking distance to most attractions or are you in an out-lying leafy suburb? Are you five minutes from the airport? Is there a bus stop nearby? What restaurants, bars and eateries are in the area? What special qualities does your immediate area have? Are you close to parks and nature walks? Highlight the major attractions in your region, including scenic spots and must-do activities.

A picture really does paint a thousand words online

First impressions are everything online, so don’t try and do your own photos unless you are very good at it. We strongly advise you get in a professional or at least an extremely good amateur photographer. Photographing the inside of any room is tricky and the lighting has to be just right. It’s also very easy to get small distracting items into a shot that detract from the overall effect. Get images of all of your rooms, as people really need to know exactly what their room is going to look like.  And do get photos of Fido and Fluffy – people love this on websites.

Give them an easy way to book online

One of the most frustrating things for people researching accommodation options online is having no obvious booking options offered. With the number of online reservations systems that are available today there’s really no excuse not to have a real time booking system. Many of these booking systems are free to sign up with, and just take a commission for each booking. With some of the systems, your listing will also be syndicated on other travel websites giving your site even greater exposure.

The pages on your website

Most bed and breakfasts are small operations, so you can probably do with just 6 pages for your website. These could be homepage, ‘about’ page, ‘facilities’ page, ‘rooms’ page, ‘local attractions’ page, ‘contact’ & ‘location’ page. We highly recommend you add your contact details to the bottom of every page, as travellers frequently print out the pages from your site, so make it easy for them to contact you when they are on the move.

If you’d like help promoting your website or if you’d like to re-develop your website, please give us a call on 03 366 3340 or email info@tmlwebdesign.co.nz. We are happy to discuss your requirements with you.