Marketing for hotels & restaurants

Typical bottlenecks and solutions

1. Service, kitchen and housekeeping unfilled

Why: Hotels and restaurants are short of both skilled staff and temporary help, often right before the season. Chefs and service staff work shifts and hardly read job boards, while seasonal workers and students decide at short notice. If a position stays open, extra rest days are added or fewer reservations are accepted, and the revenue is lost immediately.

Solution (Recruiting campaigns (part of Performance Marketing)): We run recruiting campaigns on Instagram, TikTok and Facebook with insights into the kitchen, team and rota, locally and, for seasonal businesses, also nationally with accommodation. The short application asks about position, availability and experience. Suitable applications go straight to the head chef or hotel management, so the trial shift can take place the same week.

2. Portals take a cut of every booking

Why: Booking portals bring visibility, but they charge commission on every booking and own the customer relationship. Guests often search for your property specifically on Google and then land on the portal's site via the portal's ads. You only receive limited guest contact details, which makes direct contact later difficult and expensive.

Solution (Performance Marketing): We run Google campaigns on your hotel name and your region, plus Meta campaigns for occasions such as a spa weekend or a conference, that lead straight into your booking engine. Tracking through to the confirmed booking shows the ad costs per direct booking. We compare these with the commission and cut budget where the portal remains cheaper.

3. Guests come once, never again

Why: Hotels and restaurants collect guest contacts from bookings and reservations every year but rarely use them. Months pass between departure and the next holiday planning, during which the guest searches on portals again. Restaurateurs have reservation data in their table system but no way to send targeted invitations for brunch, seasonal menus or events.

Solution (Email Marketing): We build a guest CRM with email flows: a welcome email before arrival with add-on offers, a thank-you after the stay with a review request, an anniversary reminder and invitations to seasonal offers. For restaurants, we combine reservation data with event mailings. Every address is collected with consent, so you are allowed to use it long term.

Example calculation: direct booking instead of portal (method, not a case study)

• Assumption: average booking value: €300
• Assumption: portal commission 15%: €45 per booking
• Assumption: ad costs per direct booking: €30
• Assumption: bookings shifted from the portal per month: 200
• Performance Marketing fee, 1 platform: €1,500
• Savings after fee: 200 × (€45 − €30) − €1,500: €1,500/month

Method, not a case study: all values are assumptions for illustration. We only count bookings that would otherwise have come via a portal; regulars who book direct anyway are excluded. Not included is the follow-on value when these guests later book direct again via email.

Service mix

• Recruiting campaigns (part of Performance Marketing): Recruiting campaigns for service, kitchen, reception and housekeeping, also as seasonal campaigns with a fixed period and accommodation.
• Performance Marketing: Google and Meta campaigns for direct bookings and table reservations, steered on ad costs per booking compared with portal commission.
• Email Marketing: Guest emails before arrival, after departure and for seasonal offers that turn one-off guests into regulars who book direct.
• Tracking with Tracyn (partner Atmos): Tracking from the ad to the confirmed booking in your booking engine, so the cost per direct booking becomes measurable.

What we steer by (KPIs)

• Cost per direct booking: the benchmark against the portal commission you would pay for the same booking
• Direct booking share: shows how independently of booking portals your property already operates
• Cost per service hire: every filled shift is what makes tables and rooms sellable in the first place
• Rebooking rate: measures whether guest emails actually create regulars and trigger repeat bookings

Timing: We start recruiting for the summer and winter seasons eight to twelve weeks before the season begins. We plan direct booking campaigns for holidays, Christmas parties and New Year's Eve early, because many guests book these dates months in advance.

Legal (to be checked by a lawyer)

• For ads for bars, wine or cocktails, we observe youth protection rules: alcohol is only advertised to adults, without addressing minors and without linking it to performance or social success.
• We follow the advertising policies of Meta, Google and TikTok, which set age limits for alcohol depending on the country or exclude such advertising altogether.
• We ensure job ads comply with the AGG (German General Equal Treatment Act), with (m/f/d) and no age requirements, including for temporary and seasonal positions.
• We only send guest emails with verifiable consent or under the statutory exception for existing customers, always with an unsubscribe link.

FAQ

How much does this cost for a hotel or restaurant? Recruiting campaigns cost from €1,500 net per platform per month, plus ad budget from around €1,500. Direct booking campaigns from €1,500 per platform, plus €900 for each additional one, with ad budget usually from €5,000. Guest emails from €3,000 per month. Contract term one month in each case, all prices net.

Should we switch off the booking portals? No. Portals bring guests who don't yet know your property. The goal is to win guests directly who are already searching for you specifically or have stayed before. We measure what a booking costs per channel and shift budget to where the most margin remains after all costs.

Which booking engine or reservation system do we need? We work with the system you already use. What matters is that a confirmed booking or reservation can be measured as a conversion and that guest data can be exported with consent or passed on via an interface. We check this in the intro call, before any costs are incurred.

Does recruiting also work for seasonal staff? Yes, seasonal positions are easy to plan. We launch campaigns with a fixed period, state accommodation, meals and end of season directly in the ad and, if needed, also reach applicants from other regions. The pre-qualification asks for the earliest start date, so you only call candidates who are available.