Midweek Matters: Determine your objectives

It's that time of the month again, when the team at FLOCC, a hotel marketing agency that specialises in maximising direct bookings, delves into finding solutions to an issue that many hoteliers face: midweek bookings. No great strategy works without a clear vision of what you’re trying to achieve, it’s an integral part of why and how your business goes about setting out a plan of action - if you don’t know what your objectives are, how do you know how you’re going to achieve them? Marketing is a big picture kind of thing, you can get trapped in going round in circles trying to be all things to all people. Sometimes the best option is to take a step back, set out a strategy and work out your key objectives - what you think success looks like and how you can work towards it. We understand that pitching your hotel everywhere in the UK is difficult and doesn’t always get you the results you're after, which is why honing in on a more targeted goal will help your hotel achieve better results. Focus your campaigns In order to achieve your marketing goals and increase your chances of midweek bookings, your hotel should aim its objectives by running highly focused campaigns. For example, rather than putting all your efforts into the whole of the UK, you can figure out where most of your guests are travelling from - let’s say within a 40-mile radius - and target your campaigns here. Think about who you’re targeting and what you can do to attract these audiences to stay with you. Do you want to focus on booking up your family suites? Do you want to focus on getting more business travellers to stay in your rooms? Defining your goals is crucial in any marketing strategy. Use the SMART goal approach So you’ve got an objective in mind, how are you going to set it out? You’ll need to consider a variety of steps in order to achieve this, so using the SMART goal approach can help your team to understand what you’re working towards and what needs to be done - and whether it’s a good idea! The SMART objectives are: Specific - Define a clear goal that you want to achieve, make it specific and focused. For example: “to increase midweek bookings by 20% by the end of the year” Measurable - When your goal is measurable, it makes it easier to be able to track how well it is doing. This often means including a numeric factor (20%) so that you can evaluate the extent to which the goal has been met. Achievable - Realistically, is your goal attainable? You want to make sure it’s something you have the capacity to do. Big goals look great, but prioritising more short-term goals that are achievable will help you get great results too. Relevant - Is the goal relevant to your responsibilities? Can it help to solve the bigger problem at hand? Time-Bound - Every goal needs a deadline. Based on your understanding of requirements, set a realistic timeline that will allow you to prioritise your task load and act as a point of motivation for your team. After you've determined whether your goal is attainable, you can take the initial steps toward achieving it. You've outlined exactly what you want to accomplish, how you'll accomplish it, and who needs to be involved; now it's time to put your plans into action. Every hotel is unique, with its own variety of rooms and services. Decreases in midweek bookings are a problem that many of us are all too familiar with, but there is a range of things your business can do to combat this. Focus your efforts on increasing sales in one area of your hotel so that you can follow up with a focus on bookings in another. What’s evident is that when you take the time to lay out the foundations of your marketing objectives, understanding the who, what, why and how, you’re going to have a much better chance of reaching the goals you put in place. Look out for our next Midweek Matters, where we’ll give you the rundown on our next set of tips for increasing midweek bookings.