Capitalizing on the Workcation Trend - Hotels

According to Kayak, more than 40% of Gen Z employees plan to take a workcation in 2022 as a result of their remote work flexibility. With this trend on the rise, it is important for hotels to find a way to capitalize on it, especially during these difficult times where occupancy may not be at its highest.

Some ways that hotels can capitalize on the workcation trend is by:

• Offering a "Workcation Package" or "Workcation Offer".

• Adapting Your Property for Remote Work

• And creating digital marketing strategies that target remote workers.

Allow me to further elaborate on these ideas that could help your hotel earn some more revenue through this trend.

Offering a "Workcation" Package or Deal

Hotels are often able to lure specific audiences through the different packages and offers they have available at their property, for example, a Valentine's day offer will lure in couples during Valentine's Day, the same way a skiing deal or package may help to lure in guests that are seeking to ski during their vacation. With this being said, creating a "Workcation" package or deal has the ability to lure in remote workers that are looking for a change in scenery.

So how would a workcation package or deal function? It's simple! It could be a package or deal that gives guests a discounted rate on a weekday stay along with wifi included. If you really want to make it unique, you can even include a reserved space for your guests to do work outside of their hotel room, this could be at a unqiue area of your hotel, such as, a poolside cabana or a workstation somewhere inside of your hotel.

Through this package or deal, you will be able to lure in more remote workers to your hotel and drive more revenue by appealing to their needs.

Adapting Your Property for Remote Work

Adapting your property to the needs of remote workers is perhaps one of the most important aspects of luring in remote workers, as the hotels who do a better job of this will enjoy better success in attracting this audience. There are a variety of ways you can have your property better appeal to remote workers, including having a strong wifi connection throughout your entire property, ensuring that you have accommodations with features that fit guests remote work needs, offering a space where guests can work remotely other than from their room or suite, and more.

I recently listened to a Hospitality.FM podcast by Wil Slickers featuring Matthijs Welle, speaking on how hotels are currently finding creative ways to take advantage of their public spaces due to low occupancies as a result of the pandemic. Matthijs, who is the CEO of Mews, a cloud-based software company within the hospitality industry, goes on to mention how hotels have used their lobby as a co-working space for guests, creating another source of revenue for their property during a time where bookings for traditional rooms and suites are low. The idea of creating co-working spaces in public areas throughout your hotel, such as the lobby, and promoting this is a fantastic way to attract remote workers to your property. With many hotels missing out on significant amounts of revenue from their events venues due to the pandemic, the idea of using perhaps your event venue as a remote working space where guests can reserve desks here for a fee can be a fantastic way to generate revenue from a space that is not currently in use. Poolside cabanas with charging outlets and other unique public spaces within your property also present a great opportunity for this.

Creating Digital Marketing Strategies that Target Remote Workers

Creating a digital marketing strategy to target remote workers may be one of the more obvious ways to attract remote workers, however, it is still important to ensure that your hotel is including remote workers in its digital marketing strategy. While this may appear to just be a trend that you can jump on and reap the benefits for the moment, the reality is, the amount of people working remotely will increase every year moving forward and this could be an audience your property can target for the long-term. According to the Future Workforce Report, 36.2 million Americans will be working remotely by 2025, which goes to show that this trend definitely presents a great opportunity for hotels in the future.

One of the first things I highly recommend doing first when offering workcation deals, offers, accommodations, and other products/services relevant to remote workers, is to get a good understanding of their trends and behaviors. Use tools like Google Analytics to understand how they interact with your site, what types of accommodations they seek, how long they stay, and more. I would also recommend creating surveys, which is a perfect way to collect what is known as "zero-party data" (which is more important than ever now that we are entering a cookie-less world) in order to get more in-depth knowledge of what type of experience remote workers are looking for when staying at your property. Perhaps, include questions such as "What are some amenities you look for when staying at a hotel for remote work?" or "How can we improve your remote work stay with us?". These are important questions to have answers to because each hotel will have different remote worker audiences, for example, one property may attract remote workers that are only looking to have a different scenery while they work and then choose to go home at the conclusion of their workday, while another property may be more popular with remote workers looking to enjoy the most out of their stay and are seeking to spend a few nights there. Once you truly understand the types of remote workers you attract through analytics, you will then be able to effectively market your property to this audience.

Creating content on your website and on social media pages dedicated to remote workers will go a long way in attracting this audience. These efforts will help raise awareness that your property offers a unique setting for them to get their work done. Digital ads targeting remote workers will also help in driving traffic to your website and securing bookings from this audience for your hotel. SEO currently presents a phenomenal opportunity for you to reach this audience as well, given that not many hotels are targeting remote workers. With this being said, many keywords will not be as competitive to rank for and it will also be easier to acquire valuable links to your website. In addition to this, your SEO efforts will be worthwhile in the long-run by possibly having your hotel rank towards the top of search engines for searches related to remote work hotels within your city. To take advantage of all of this, you will need to begin these efforts soon, as more and more hotels are beginning to look into capturing this audience.

Want to Capitalize on the Trend?

The workcation trend presents a tremendous opportunity for hotels to capture a new audience and drive more revenue during these difficult times and Selva Digital can help you capitalize on this trend.

Selva Digital helps hotels, resorts, and other travel businesses grow through effective digital marketing efforts. Our digital marketing agency offers services including SEO, paid digital media, and of course, our main area of focus, digital marketing analytics. Selva Digital uses the power of marketing analytics to uncover trends, find areas of opportunities within your travel business, give you in-depth insights on your audience, and improve return on investments for your digital marketing efforts. Through these services, we are certain we can help your hotel effectively reach remote workers. Contact Selva Digital today and begin capitalizing on the workcation trend.