Website design for accommodation in the Lake District.

Make sure photos show your accommodation rather than stock photography to build up customer confidence

To maximise your booking potential of an accommodation website you will need a great looking website with secure on-line booking.  Being in the Lake District you will also need an eye catching website design with great photographs tailored to your accommodation whether it be  self catering, bed and breakfast, guesthouse, hotel or a country inn. Accommodation websites should be strong on their visual element,  they should show the beauty and what the Lake District has to offer along with the features you accommodation offers. A tip here is to target your type of customer, are your main core of customers sightseers, active couples, families etc? Tailor the feel and the look of your web site to the customers you attract, this will also help on SEO.

Mick Kenyon website design and photography for the complete website design package tailored to your accommodation business .. tel 07738 255499 for your your Free no obligation quote.

Websites now need to be mobile friendly, this is particularly important for accommodation web sites as research and many bookings are made direct from smart phones. Since 21 April 2015 Google changed the  ranking system and so mobile friendly websites now fair a lot better in showing  up on search results if they adhere to the Google mobile friendly guidelines. There are hundreds if not thousands of accommodation websites in the Lake District so any advantage should be exploited. You can check on whether a web site is mobile friendly here

Getting your Accommodation Website Discovered

Great SEO is the next step to get your web site noticed, with so much competition in the lake district you need to box clever.  If you target just accommodation you are competing with lots of other lake district accommodation sites so you are more likely to have success by targeting specific customer groups. e.g ‘fishing holidays in the lake district’  will be easier to get higher search rankings than ‘lake district holidays’.

Once the customer has discovered your accommodation website you literally have seconds to make an impression or the customer or they will leave and look elsewhere.  Photographs sell the dream to your customers and build confidence, try to avoid stock photography as these can reduce the customer confidence. Photographs on your website are one of your biggest asset to enticing customers to book with you, make them relevant to your type of customer and accommodation. Photographs should be of your property and your local area in the Lake District. The other big ‘must’ is on-line booking, people like to see availability immediately and expect to be able to book immediately.

Include photographs of bedrooms

Photography tips for Accommodation Web Sites

Self catering accommodation should show the facilities at there best, if you have a fire or log burning stove this should be lit when photographs are taken. Beds should be made and tables set. Its always a nice touch to add flowers and a bottle of wine. Photographs should be well focused, shallow depth of field can be used on features to make them stand out. If possible avoid using flash, this can be achieved using the manual settings (try using bracketed exposures),  if flash is used diffuse it to stop flares in the picture to give natural light feeling.
Guesthouses and B&Bs should have pictures of the rooms well laid out, fresh clean towels should be present on the bed and add a splash of colour to the rooms such as flowers and vibrant art.  Avoid pictures of the loo unless it is extra special, it’s better to have a hint, maybe an ensuite sign.
Hotels should show the room and the best features from around the hotel, such as the bar area, restaurants and leisure facilities. Add to these photographs of art etc.

You should also add photos to the website aimed at your type of clientele, for the active types you may include photos of walking boots, mountain bikes etc. if it is aimed at romantic breaks photos of roses and wine bottles and for families include teddies, and kid friendly features.

For a website tailored to your requirements including photography and on-line booking contact Mick Kenyon on 07738 255499.

Here are 4 Ways on how to increase accommodation bookings at your B&B,  Guesthouse, Hotel or self catering property.  There are a number of ways to increase your presence and get more visible on the web which will lead to more interest and booking for your B&B, Guesthouse, Hotel or self catering accommodation.

4 Ways to increase your bookings

1. Make sure your B&B, Guesthouse, Hotel or Self Catering Accommodation website looks good, has easy navigation and eye catching quality photographs.
2. Secure online booking, if you don’t have a booking system people will go elsewhere finding accommodation that can be booked direct online
3. Is it a mobile friendly website? This is getting more important than ever with new changes being introduced by Google.
4. Registered it on Google+ and make sure your Google + page is complete. Ensure you include a phone number so people can call your B&B, Guesthouse, Hotel or self catering accommodation straight from their mobile.

Make sure good quality images are used on your website, avoid stock photographs.

Your website should invite people into your B&B, Guesthouse, Hotel or Self Catering Accommodation. People viewing it need to feel they can trust your business.  It is important to have original photography of your accommodation, make sure it is great quality and avoid using stock photography which people just don’t trust. Colours of your website are really important, don’t use too bold colours, blue is often seen the colour as the colour that people most trust. Make sure the font is big enough and links can easily be found to help navigation around the website.

People like to be able to see if the accommodation is available straight away for B&B, Guesthouse, Hotel or self catering accommodation. In general they don’t like to phone to check on availability, they want to see it straight away online, whats more they also want to book it straight away.  The best way to do this is to include an online booking service on your website, there are many out there, some charge commission and some don’t such as Freetobook.  Make sure you embed the booking service into your website and clearly show it on your website.

More and more people are turning to there friend in the pocket for help on finding that perfect B&B,  Guesthouse, Hotel or self catering property to stop. In fact sixty five percent of people who book a hotel room within 24 hours of their stay do so from a mobile device. From April 21st 2015 Google change the search rankings for mobile devices, if your website is not a responsive layout or has a dedicated mobile design platform you will not be as visible on Google as those that do (your competitors). You can check to see if your website is mobile friendly by clicking on the link here for the Google Mobile Friendly Test. If your not mobile friendly you can check out advice on being  mobile friendly.

The final tip is to get your business registered on Google+ (Google plus). By having a verified business your B&B,  Guesthouse, Hotel or self catering property is more likely to be shown on the first page of search results and included in the panel of 7. You can register your business on GMB (Google my Business) for free and it could be he best investment of an hours work you will make.

For further information or if you want a FREE quote for a website design including photography please call Mick on 07738 255499. Based in Ingleton, North Yorkshire I am within easy reach of The Yorkshire Dales and the Lake District National Parks. Including the towns of Skipton, Settle, Hawes, Ingleton, Sedburgh, Kirkby Lonsdale, Kendal, Windermere, Ambleside, Grange.