How guests choose where to stay
- In two steps. First where and when: a destination, a date, an event, a school holiday. Then which property, usually by comparing on a booking site and sometimes checking your website.
- So your ads have two jobs: be the place they already have in mind before they open the booking site, and give them a reason to book with you directly.
- Lead times vary by type. City stays: days to a few weeks. Getaways and drive holidays: weeks to months. Holiday parks and peak coastal stays: many months.
- Know who’s booking: couples, families in the school holidays, business travellers midweek, event-goers, contractors on weekly stays, grey nomads heading north for winter.
What Meta does well for accommodation, and what it does badly
Meta is good at making people want the trip: a few seconds of your view beats a rate table. It reaches your feeder cities, brings back people who checked your dates, gets past guests to rebook without a booking site’s commission, and sells packages well.
It’s bad at “need a bed tonight”, which belongs to Google and the booking sites, and it can’t prove bookings your engine doesn’t report. So your plan reads two numbers every week: what Meta counts, and what your channel manager shows.
Offers that work for hotels and accommodation
Every campaign carries a book-direct reason first: a perk such as breakfast, late checkout, parking or an upgrade when available; a kinder cancellation policy; a member rate sent by email; or a real person who’ll sort it. Then one offer:
- Packages: stay and dinner, stay and breakfast, stay and event tickets. They can’t be compared line by line.
- Midweek or shoulder deals that fill nights that would otherwise sit empty.
- School-holiday family packs for your drive markets.
- Early-birds for peak periods, promoted months ahead.
- Event stays: the concert, game or festival is the reason; you’re the base.
- Stay vouchers before Mother’s Day and Christmas.
Your plan works out what each booking you move to direct is worth to you, then picks the perk and the offer for every ad.
Rules your accommodation ads must follow
- Rate claims must be true on every date. “Best rate”, “lowest price” or “cheaper than the booking sites” is misleading under the Australian Consumer Law if it isn’t. Check sample dates every week.
- Lead with perks, not a lower public price, until you’ve checked what your booking-site contracts allow.
- Advertised prices are the total, including every compulsory fee.
- Show the cancellation policy before payment, and keep deposit and cancellation terms fair.
- Photos show the rooms, views and facilities as they are now. Only real reviews, with their source, and written parental consent for any child in an ad.
- Alcohol in a package means 18+ on that ad set. The ABAC code applies, and drinks stay part of the package, never the headline. Ads around schoolies season reach under-18 crowds, so keep alcohol out of them.
Your plan covers these rules in full for your type of property. It’s general information, not legal advice.