In recent years, and especially since the beginning of the pandemic, Google has offered a variety of free tools for the tourism and hospitality sectors to help tourism professionals.
Various articles have shown them from the classic version of Google Trends to one of the most recent, such as Hotel Insights. Here we have selected the most interesting Google tools, which form a unique set of travel tools to easily view trends, search interests, usability and visibility optimization in Google. And although there are many more, the following are probably the most useful for the travel and hospitality industry.
COVID-19 Community Mobility Reports
Link: https://www.google.com/covid19/mobility/
COVID-19 mobility reports allow you to view local mobility reports on COVID-19. These reports provide information on recent developments in human mobility due to restrictions on the fight against COVID-19.
The reports show trends over time, sorted by geographical area and classified by different categories of places: retail and leisure, food and pharmacies, parks, transit stations, jobs and housing.
According to the data, in some countries the situation has improved in all segments, although it is still far from the data before the pandemic.
Google for Hotels Directory
Link: https://ads.google.com/hotels/resources/
One of Google’s most exciting and up-to-date tools is the Google for Hotels GuideBook. This is not a tool, but rather a guide for hoteliers on best management practices. It consists of 4 sections with resources to help you build a hotel on Google.
The first section, “101: Starting an Online Business,” covers Google My Business and Google Maps, as well as how to list a hotel for free on Google using its most basic tools, which hoteliers often do not fully use.
The second section, “201: Advertise your hotel with Google Ads,” highlights Google’s high-end advertising tools. This is an extensive guide that explains very well and in simple words how Google Ads works and how to get the most out of this tool.
The third, “301: Get direct bookings from Google,” refers to Google Hotel Ads and helps you understand how this tool works, what you need to display prices, and how to get more visibility.
The latest, “401: Advanced Hotel Advertising Features,” is a more in-depth section of Google Hotel Ads that covers advanced bidding methods and the benefits and risks of using each.
Without a doubt, Google for Hotels GuideBook is a very good initiative for travel and hospitality professionals, which explains in great detail the 4 basics for achieving visibility in Google search results.
Hotel Insights from Google
Link: https://hotelinsights.withgoogle.com/intl/en/
Hotel Insights is one of Google’s latest tools, as the name implies, dedicated exclusively to the hotel industry. The tool allows you to analyze hotel search queries for Google by region, comparing in real time with the previous year, to help hoteliers choose the right marketing strategies for this future and expected recovery process.
It is a simple and intuitive tool with digital marketing guides and tips that is highly recommended for small and medium-sized hotels.
Currently, Hotel Insights is currently only available in English and Italian, but search in all regions and countries of the world is possible.
Hotel Insights offers a very interesting section on digital marketing resources that explains and reviews concepts to get the most out of Google My Business and Google Maps, best practices for hotel reviews, tips on online usability, and how to optimize your Google Ads performance. and Google Hotel Ads.
Destination Insights
Link: https://destinationinsights.withgoogle.com/
This tool provides data on the popularity of the destination and gives us an idea of which regions, countries or cities are of greater interest to travelers. It also provides information on how demand is changing in different countries of origin.
Destination Insights can identify potential increases in demand, which can help shape and determine the best digital marketing strategy for your travel business.
Market Finder
Link: https://marketfinder.thinkwithgoogle.com/
This search engine allows you to identify potential customers for your hotel, looking at new promising markets, classified by the behavior of countries and consumers.
With Market Finder, you can track demand trends and optimize your investment and strategy in new potential markets.
How to use Market’s Finder from Google – First go to Market Finder and enter your hotel website. Market Finder will offer categories automatically to classify your site. Confirm categories or add others you think are appropriate. Confirm the recommended international markets for you and complete the process by adding your domestic market. Choose up to 3 potential markets that interest you. Start viewing data from these markets: economic and socio-demographic profile of selected countries (updated every 35 days), monthly search in selected categories, recommended Google Ads bids, active users, net household income, customer behavior, and more.
Today, there is a clear upward trend, which emphasizes the importance of the domestic market compared to the international, at least while the pandemic continues.
These latest Google tools prove that the company is trying to get closer to small and medium-sized hotels to help them improve their presence in the most popular search engine with free or paid tools.