As we look the end of November in the eye and move into December, it's time to take care of some of those tasks that keep the websites running smooth and easy to use for potential guests.
One of the first items is to make sure your availability checker has 2016 as an option. It's not good for your customers to think you stopped updating your site this year. Here is an example of the kind of date checker to which I am referring:
To check, just try to find a date in 2016- if that's not an option, let your webmaster know to fix that for you.
Another task is to make sure your seasonal rates are updated if you plan to raise them in the coming year. Don't let anyone walk away with a bad taste in their mouths if they decide to book, only to find the rates have gone up since the last time they looked at the site. Some innkeepers have made the decision to remove rate information from their sites altogether, and leave it all on the booking engine, to avoid such a scenario. This sometimes needs to be done on the site as well as with the booking engine.
If you've added social media platforms over the last year, get those connect buttons up on your site.
Check your policies and amenities page to make sure nothing needs to be changed, deleted or updated. One of our customers filled in her swimming pool but forgot to take that amenity off the site- that makes for unhappy customers! If you've added packages or decided to stop some of the specials, get those updates done.
Lastly, check your directions page to make sure you've still got the right information there. Sometimes roads change or exits move, make sure your guests can find you easily.
Did I miss anything? Let me know in the comments below!
Updating your prices on every directory listing is a good idea at this time too.
Great tip, Tammy, thank you!