2006 advertising

[Wilko]

Hi There,

This has been our first year, well 4 months, as a chambre d'hotes, the resultant bookings have been better than hoped for. When do would be clients tend to book for the 2006 season ie when should we run our advertising. Be grateful for any info on this from you experienced B&Bers. Thank you.

Wilko

www.maspomona.com

 

[Coco]

B&B is a little different to the likes of Gites or package holidays, ie there isn't a preferred booking time, which judging by TV advertising, seems to be post-Christmas!  As others will tell you, a lot of it is only 1-4 weeks in advance of the proposed stay.  Having said that, last night I took a booking for July 2006!  However, I would say that you are better off being somewhere that you will be seen all year round, like a website or guide book than to "run an advertising campaign" for a short period of time at a specific time of the year.

We, for example, have got 3 weeks worth of bookings for September and two weeks worth for October.  One week of the September bookings was booked in March, the rest have been over the last month or so and the October bookings have been within the last week.  At the beginning of July I was very worried that I only had a 25% take up for August (all of which had been booked pre Easter) but by the last week of July I had filled all but a couple of days of August.

So, in answer to your question, I would say that it is impossible to give a "best possible" period to advertise in, if it is going to be for a limited period.

[mascamps.com]

It's really hard to know these days. We rarely get any bookings for the summer before Easter and, so far, have only had one person book in October for the following July. The bulk of the bookings are about two weeks ahead for us but we've been getting a growing number just 2 or 3 days ahead which can be quite disconcerting. For example, in mid-July last year we had virtually nothing for August yet when I look at the book now, August was fairly full for us.

As a consequence of this, I asked a question here about February re occupancy so that we could get a bit of a feel for what to expect. Even though we had an almost completely empty book for August at that time, it made me a whole lot more content to have a projection of about 50% more than what we'd had for last August and in practice we ended up with about twice the occupancy of last August (which is our average increase for corresponding months from last year). One thing that did surprise me was how close our forecasts (based on the occupancy from last October) were to the reality: generally a few percent out on a like for like basis (the "extra" 50% for August was from new advertising).

I think that Coco's experience is pretty typical ie you will get some people who'll book months in advance whereas a lot (most these days) book just a few weeks ahead.

What is worthwhile is to use the winter months to hunt out places to list. Go for all the free and/or commission based ones that you find but keep a list of the paid-for ones for future reference. The optimum time for the paid-for ones varies a bit but, for those with an annual fee, is probably about mid/late June so that you get almost two years advertising out of one payment (ie the coming summer plus part of the next one).

 

Arnold