SEO for Hotels.

SEO for Hotels.

SEO for hotels is how you take bookings back from the platforms that outrank you for your own name. We’re Sokada, a family-run web design and marketing agency in Heathfield, East Sussex, and below we cover your brand search, the searches Google’s travel results leave open, AI answers and where we’d start.

Losing Your Own Bookings.

Someone’s seen your rooms on Instagram, or a friend has recommended you. They type your hotel’s name into Google on a phone. Above your own site sits Google’s hotel panel, then a paid ad or two from the platforms, then Booking.com’s listing for your property. They tap that, because it looks official and has a Reserve button. You still get the guest. You just pay a commission on a booking that was already yours.

That’s the part that stings. You earned the guest and you’re renting the checkout, paying a cut on a decision the platform had no hand in.

Measure the Leak First.

Take your last twelve months. How many room nights came through Booking.com, Expedia or your channel manager, what was the average rate, and what percentage went out in commission? Then ask how many of those guests already knew your name before they booked. Now work out what shifting even a modest share of them onto your own site at full rate would be worth over a year. That’s the figure to plan against, not traffic. Direct guests are worth more afterwards too, since you keep the email address.

Win Your Own Name.

Brand search is the bit almost everyone leaves lying there. Your homepage needs your hotel’s name, its town and what the place actually is. Your Google Business Profile needs the same name, address and phone number as the site, with real opening hours and photographs that aren’t three years old. Reviews carry more weight here than anywhere, and they matter to the guest reading them, not just to Google. Answer the awkward ones clearly.

Then there’s the search that pays the mortgage, such as a hotel in your town, dog-friendly rooms near a coast path, or somewhere to stay for a wedding at a local venue. Each of those wants a page of its own. One page listing every room type and facility won’t rank for any of them. A page about dog-friendly stays that says where you walk them, which pubs let them in and what you charge for it will.

Target What Google Misses.

Search for seo for hotels and you’ll get ten checklists that all say optimise your meta descriptions. Fine, do that. But on a phone, for a bare “hotel in X” search, Google’s own hotel panel and the paid slots have pushed organic results a long way down. What you can still own outright are the reasons people come to your area at all. Where to walk the cliff path, what’s actually open in October, which beach has the car park. Write those and you meet the guest weeks before they’ve chosen a hotel, and yours is the site they’re already reading when they book.

Hotels in AI Answers.

Ofcom’s 2026 research found that 75% of online UK adults read AI search summaries at least sometimes, and 42% read them often or always. That is a large share of your prospective guests getting an answer before they see a single link. What earns a place in those answers is content that really answers the question. There is no file to upload and no markup to add.

Who You’d Work With.

Us. We’re a family business in Heathfield and Julian has been building websites since 1997, which means the person who looks at your booking flow is the person who’ll still be answering the phone in two years. Blackstock Country Estate is a published case study, a country estate and wedding venue rather than a hotel, where enquiries rose 188% year to date and total website users 108%. Hospitality-adjacent, and upfront about the difference.

Where We’d Start.

First, find out what your own brand search actually returns, because if an agency outranks you for your own name then every direct booking is being taxed on the way in. Second, count what the platforms took last year. That figure is usually the entire business case, and most hoteliers have never added it up.

After that it’s the rooms, the reason people come to the area, and a booking path short enough that nobody gives up and reopens Booking.com. It’s search engine optimisation with the commission line as the scoreboard.

If you also run a restaurant, our page on SEO for restaurants covers menus, Google Maps and reviews.

If you would like to talk about SEO for hotels, book a free audit and we will show you where your direct bookings are going.