How To Market Your Hospitality Business - Practical Tips from a 32 Year Veteran

Okay, so thank you for tuning in to the Boostly podcast. You're listening to the Boostly Podcast that helps gives hosts the tools, the tactics, the trainings and most importantly, the confidence to go out there and so you can go out and get more direct bookings. I'm Liam Carolan. I'm Mark Simpson's co host and this is the Spotlight miniseries on the Boosty podcast where we shine the light on services and businesses that you need to know about as a hospitality host or as an owner to. Today we've got the amazing Craig Webb. He's been a Boostly member for a number of years. He's had 32 years in hospitality, which is amazing. So lots and lots of experience and 17 of those was as a general manager for a hotel. He's now started up his own venture called web marketing where he focuses on helping people with digital marketing and search engine optimization. And today's episode we're going to be diving into both his journey in hospitality and so you can pick up tips and tricks from his 32 years worth of experience. But then also we're going to be talking about what you need to be considering in your hospitality business regarding digital marketing and SEO. So let's dive into it. Welcome along.

Craig Last. Liam. Yeah, thank you for the introduction. Well, I think you've covered everything, really. Yeah, 32 years in hospitality. Started out just washing up and then just grew from there. I carried on while I was at college, didn't know what else to do. When I left college, I was always going to be a police officer. That never happened because I just kept getting promoted in hospitality. People kept leaving, you know, to do other things and I kept getting promoted. So never, never look back really. And before I know it, I was a, I was a general manager with Bespoke Hotels. I've got about 100 hotels around the country and I've managed about six or seven hotels for them. I can't even remember now, all around the sort of Cotswolds, Oxfordshire area, Heathrow sort of, and different, different markets, some leisure, some tourism and some sort of commercial corporate type hotels as well. So I've sort of seen everything in the industry from weddings, conferences, events, waits, you know, you name it, I've, I've pretty much done it. But my love of digital marketing came when I was lumbered into a hotel that was in administration. It was, it must have been about 2008 when there was a crash and the property was managed by Bespoke but owned by the bank, was given to, spoke to Manage and you know, it's kind of like there's the keys, we'll pay you to manage it and look after the place and it's your job to get it sold. So we need to turn those red figures black and, you know, make it look like a good business proposition for someone to buy. So if I, if I did a good job, I was going to be out of work if the hotel would be sold. But actually I, I just thought, well, how can I do this? I don't have anything to spend, how can I improve the hotel? How can I change its fortunes? And digital marketing was really just becoming a thing. Facebook people didn't have Facebook pages for businesses and I think I was one of the first people in the, in the UK to actually have my hotel to have a Facebook page. And people were commenting on it going, well, you can't do that. And I said, well, why not? There's no rules to say why not. So, you know, I had like three or four thousand followers on Facebook before anyone even had a Facebook page. And I was doing competitions on a Friday, giving rooms away. I was really leading the way on this stuff. And yeah, it just grew and grew. Instagram wasn't even a thing then. Twitter wasn't a thing. And I think most of them I've kind of ignored as they've come along, but then when I. Because some of them, they never become something, do they? All these different things that come along, these, these new websites, most of them are just a flash in the pan. So I tend to wait to see if it's going to become of anything and, and then learn and do a deep dive into it, such as Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn is a very good one. So I do a deep dive into them, learn them and apply the trade and, and apply, put that into use for the hotel to get free business. So that, that's what I did. I just thought, how do I get customers? So I just started doing Facebook, reaching out to the community and try and do everything that I could do that was free to bring business to the hotel. And it just grew and grew from there. I just kept doing it and became an expert, I suppose.

Is there any perceptions that have changed generally about hospitality during the time that you've been a, in hospitality?

Oh, well, I think most of your audience are str kind of hosts and I'm speaking from a hotelier background, which is slightly different. I've always worked in full service hotels, you know, carry the bags, afternoon tea, spa service, all the rest of it. I Think we're going to see a divide in hospitality, certainly the service level side of hospitality. I think we're going to see more of the, the, I want to say the weather spoon type, the low service, you know, go in order on your app, the food comes from a microwave in the kitchen off a conveyor belt and you know, it's as cheap as it can be and there's no staff because we all know the cost is staff. At the other end of the scale. I think we're going to miss a lot of that middle market stuff. The pubs and the rural pubs and the community pubs are really going to struggle. But then the high end hotels, the traditional hotels that give the full service will be charging way, way, way, way more because their staff want paying properly and people appreciate having the knowledge of a sommelier, the knowledge of a doorman, you know, a porter and that sort of thing that can help them with their stay in the local knowledge and all that sort of stuff. So like I said, I think we're going to see that divide and more and more people are going to want, have that human connection and be willing to pay for it. So I think people need to start deciding now what they are. Are they full automation key is on their phone, they just check in by Bluetooth, it's all automation. They don't touch a human being and that's it. Or they get full service, they're met at the door, they're given a welcome pack, they talked about the local things to do in the area, you know, given a, a welcome basket of eggs and bacon for their, for their self catering accommodation. Yet they've got to decide because we, we go, I think we're going to see a split and you've got to be, you can't be one foot in each camp now.

No, I love that and I love the, the insight into that as well because I certainly, if I'm traveling for work, I'm that first category. I'm like, yeah, let's just, I'm happy to just get you know, into a place, um, the, the kind of like say wooden spoons, McDonald's type model. But certainly if I'm taking my other half away I, you know, I want it to feel, feel great, you know, you know I want the entire experience to be sort of concierge services and things like that to really, and, and I don't mind paying for that. So I can definitely see that camp where one is one, one is the other. So yeah, it's an interesting insight. So, so Craig, let's talk about the, what you're doing now. So you've moved from two years and only as we record this only a week ago you, you finished your, your hospitality sort of journey and you started your own digital marketing agency. So talk me through how that came about and what, what the plan is now.

Well, I've already said I sort of started doing digital marketing for hotels quite a lot of years ago. And so Mark came into my life through a, I think it must have been a Facebook message. I can't remember how he got me in his funnel, but I was sucked into his sales funnel about five or six years ago and it really resonated with me because I was already on that journey but I was self taught. I felt I needed a little bit more guidance and Boothly came along and it helped me accelerate that. So that was about five or six years ago and I implemented that at work and then went further still. I've then been doing my own, you know, Facebook do things, Google do their own, you know, free courses. I've been absorbing all of those and learning, learning more. I think during lockdown that was about when we're now two years ago or so I set up my company in lockdown because I had a fear of not going back to work. I thought is the hotel even going to open? And where our hotel was based, I managed three hotels, sorry, two hotels, there's a third hotel next door that didn't reopen, it went into administration and it's still not a hotel now and I could foresee that could be an issue. So I set up my marketing company, got some clients. My kind of my target audience at the time was digital marketing for hospitality. Now hospitality was closed, so I probably wasn't very clever there. But actually I did get some clients and some were pivoting, doing different things like food production and that while they were closed. So, so I did get some clients in lockdown but I then had to kind of let some of them go when I went back to work which always gnawed away at me because I was wondering what could have been and how could I have succeeded. So yeah, back end of last year, quarter four, I thought let's have a, let's have a real effort to get some clients again with a view to having the clients in quarter 1, 20, 23 and if it works because I can manage the hotels and the clients at the same time, if I've got enough business, I'll let my, I'll let my salary go and go full time work for Myself. So you know, I just put myself out there and lo and behold, it happened very quickly. I was hoping perhaps to be by the end of March, but yeah, I finished at the end of January and here we are. So.

Well, congratulations.

Thank you.

That's amazing. And do you know what? I'm pleased about this couple of points which I want to pick up first of all that, you know, with Boostly's help as well, that has given you more confidence to, to dive further into digital marketing, which is amazing. It certainly did the same for me in, in my sort of journey. Then you also mentioned that, you know, during lockdown you pivoted which there's a lot of businesses, a lot of people listening will remember that time very freshly. I certain and how I was, I was like, do I need to go and get a job at Morrisons? You know, what do I need to go and do? Because that was pretty much the supermarkets was the only thing still, still running at the time. The great thing is that the side effect from that period of time where everyone had stopped for a while is, is they were able to do exactly what you've done there, which is pivot into awesome businesses and carve out journeys for themselves, which is amazing. So congratulations on, on the switch over to digital marketing SEO. So let's dive further into that. What should most of the people listening to this like say are going to be hospitality owners of some description? What should people be considering when it comes down to particularly search engine optimization? Because it's something which for me as a host I always think of just going, oh, it's a lot of, you know, what's the, what's the benefit? How long is this going to take? How much money is this going to take? What would you say are some of the things that a host can start to do an action fairly fast, you know, after listening to this podcast.

Okay. The first thing I would say is that everyone wants a quick win. They, they want immediate gratification, they want some bit, they want to post something on Facebook and for the phone to ring within 10 minutes, well, let's face it, it's not going to happen. You know, Facebook and social media, it's great. It gives your message out there. So you've got to think of the social media as your kind of message that's going out regularly. It might bring you a short term booking. That's the same with Facebook ads and Google Ads. That will bring you your short term win. SEO is your long term win. That's your planting your trees for next Year, the year after. That's really establishing your business. You're building a really good base and looking after your future. Yeah. So you, I kind of say to people, you've got to do both. So you've got to look after tomorrow to get a booking. That's your social media and you've got to look after your next year bookings. That's your SEO. And if you always think like that, I think you can build your business quite nicely. Now, the second part of your question was about what people can do. There are plenty of free tools out there. Ahrefs is one of them. Neilpatel.com They've all got introductory free offers where you can use it for three months or a basic freemium service. And it will tell you what's wrong with your website, even if just some of the things that are wrong with your website. Well, I can tell you now that most people are not doing it. I do SEO audits quite a lot. And on audit People websites Now, nine out of 10 people's audits, the score comes back of about 75%. Or just by fixing some really basic things, you'll be at 85 or 90%. So I know you're going to be ahead of nine out of 10 of your competitors just by fixing some broken links, adding some more content to your, to your page, you know, getting your keywords right and that will look after your future business. You'll then outrank the BNB down the road or your local competitor.

Thank you. If you're listening in on the Boostly podcast or if you're watching on the YouTube channel, we know there's a lot of places that you can put your attention and I really appreciate you putting it with Boostly. That's it for this episode and we look forward to seeing you on the next one. Craig, was there any last moment questions or anything I missed or comments?

No, I don't think so. Just thank you to you and Mark for everything you do. Thank you. Having a blast. Gonna get it on the Bruce Lee podcast. Bruce Lee like Bruce Lee because it's so hard and the tea is loose leaf Making up those rhymes. Don't write it, just do it loose.