Marketing for serviced apartments and holiday lets
An apartment operator lives further inside the platform than a hotel does: the listing is the product, the reviews are on somebody else’s account and the guest is not yours to write to. Building a direct channel here is slower and worth more, because the fee per stay is higher and the repeat rate is real.
A 30-minute video call. The audit document and the 90-day plan.
What changes
Platform fees on every stay, on top of cleaning and turnover cost.
Reviews and ranking that live in an account you do not control.
A brand nobody searches for because every guest came via the app.
Longer stays, the most profitable, hardest to sell on the platform.
Regulation and licence rules that vary street by street.
Off the platform, onto your own booking page.
The operator’s asset is the portfolio, not any single flat, and the direct channel has to be built on the portfolio: one brand, one site, real pages for the neighbourhoods and the stay types the platform buries. The long stay is where this pays first — a relocation, a project, a month — because it is the booking a platform is worst at selling and the one where the fee hurts most.
How it runs
A portfolio brand worth searching for
One name, one site and pages per neighbourhood and stay type, so guests can look for you rather than for a category on an app.
Own the long stay
Relocation, project work, a month in the city. High intent, poorly served by platforms, and the searches are specific enough to win.
Capture the guest you already have
Consent at check-in and on the direct booking, then a CRM that makes the second stay yours rather than the platform’s.
Trust the platform used to supply
Licence numbers, house rules, arrival instructions, real photos and clear cancellation terms on your own pages, because that is what the platform was doing for you.
Every service
Content & SEO
Answer the search that ends in a direct booking.
Newsletter & CRM
The guest already stayed. Get the second night without a commission.
Social
Four pieces a week. Measured in bookings, never in likes.
PR & Media
Authority the search engine can see and the guest can trust.
Branded & Cases
The material your sales team uses to close the group.
Strategy & Data
Cost per direct booking against the commission. The only number.
Questions
Should we leave the platforms?
No, and we would not advise it. They stay as a shop window and a filler; the goal is to move the repeat guest and the long stay onto your own channel, where the fee is zero.
We have twenty flats in one city. Is that enough to rank?
It is enough to build a portfolio brand and to own the neighbourhood and stay-type searches. The audit shows which of the two brings volume first.
Does regulation affect what you publish?
Yes. Licence numbers and local rules go on the pages as required in your city — it is also a trust signal, since guests check.
Can we reuse platform reviews on our site?
Only within what the platform’s terms allow, and always attributed to where they came from. We do not repackage other people’s reviews as our own testimonials.
Book your free audit
A 30-minute video call. The audit document and the 90-day plan.