How to boost hotel revenue and occupancy with digital signage
Are you looking for a better way to increase your hotel revenue and occupancy?
If you’re struggling to keep up with, and see the value in your marketing activities and one-off initiatives, then you might like to consider investing in digital signage.
It’s not as monumental a decision – or investment as it sounds. While digital signage will digitally transform your hotel or hotel chain, it doesn’t necessarily involve any drastic changes to your infrastructure, or your operations.
With the rise of cloud-based digital signage, you can now manage and boost engagement for guest information, and promotions, as well as third-party advertising from single easy-to-use, cloud based, content management systems.
What are the benefits of digital signage for hotels?
Digital signage offers a time-saving and revenue-boosting solution for every area of your hotel, from the lobby, and front desk to the conference suites, on-premise restaurants, and hotel guest rooms.
Whether you’ve already invested in some digital signage monitors, or are looking to build up a network from scratch, you’re likely to be surprised about what you can now achieve.
Next-generation digital signage solutions instantly update your hotel, improve the guest experience, and maximise the potential for success of any promotions and add-on services.
Through the display of relevant third-party advertisements from local attractions, bars and restaurants, digital signage also helps you immediately off-set the initial, upfront cost of investment.
Hotel lobby entrance
From the moment hotel guests walk into the lobby, you can use your digital signage to create a memorable first impression. Videowalls – that is, several individual digital signage displays that are joined seamlessly together, are capable of immersing guests in the viewing experience.
Create playlists highlighting your logo and “Welcome” message. For an extra “wow” factor, you can also feature some artistic graphics, or videos that fit the design and feel of your branding.
Front desk
Your front desk area is another optimal location to install digital signage displays. An instant update for any space, they can offer, at a glance, additional support, displaying helpful information, such as check-in and check-out times, and any important hotel policies, as well as hotel loyalty scheme offers.
Using multi-zone digital signage template designs, this information can be featured on-screen alongside weather updates, the local time and local currency exchange rates.
With such digital signage, you’ll be able to provide faster and more convenient help, while also alleviating the pressure on your front desk staff.
Check-in kiosk
Having to queue up at the front desk, just to check-in is simply not necessary anymore. Through the installation of kiosks, you can streamline the process, and allow guests to check-in with a few taps of the touch screens.
The latest screen solutions also come with RFID readers, so that guests can even swipe their RFID-tagged hotel loyalty cards. No fuss, no stress and no time wasted for your guests upon arrival.
What’s more, the home screens of self-check-in kiosks offer a non-invasive way to advertise special offers for add-on services, as well as upcoming discounted room rates for off-peak seasons.
Whatever you’re promoting, you can do so even more successfully with the help of data analytics.
The integration of machine learning and vision AI solutions, such as MeldCX Viana with digital signage platforms like Signagelive can give you a real competitive advantage. They enable you to use anonymous data insights to trigger the most effective content at the best time and for the right customer persona.
Local attraction and tour desks
Your hotel offers prime real estate for contextual advertising, enabling those running local attractions and amenities to reach exactly the right audience, and at exactly the right time.
Forming commercial partnerships with such businesses can be extremely profitable, but only if you’re able to advertise their services effectively.
With digital signage, you can truly engage guests, using multiple promotional assets from third-party advertisers, including videos, imagery and special offers. Digital signage playlists enable you to cycle through several assets and/or broadcast advertisements alongside YouTube reviews, and weather forecasts to help guests plan for the advertised outdoor activities.
Integrated Proof of Play functionality for your digital signage ensures that you’re able to create and download reports that prove to partners what advertising was featured, when and for which screens. When checked against the ticket sales of advertisers, such reports are a great tool to show the impact of your advertising.
Find more advertising partners with digital signage
If you’re a new hotel business and still don’t know what advertising partners you could work with in the area, or you’re simply looking for new opportunities, then it’s worth considering using programmatic advertising platforms, such as Hivestack and VistarMedia.
Making it easier to sell advertising space, these solutions actually bring relevant and interested media buyers to you, while also automating the reporting and billing process.
Thanks to the integration of these platforms with CMS solutions, like Signagelive, you can schedule programmatic ads to appear either alongside your other non-programmatic content, or as full-screen placements in a playlist.
Lobby seating areas
Digital signage displays can also be installed around the lobby to help guests with their travel arrangements.
Content management solutions offer subscription-based apps, like Screenfeed and Seenspire, so that you’re able to display everything from local traffic information to flight times.
In any lobby seating areas, these same apps can be used to entertain guests waiting for excursion tour guides, or taxis. You can broadcast streams of entertainment and news. And publish travel blogs about the area alongside your hotel social media feeds.
Even if you don’t initially have much budget to spend on content, with the latest content management platforms, you’ll be able to draw on a whole host of free content creation applications.
While tools, such as the Webpage app may be used to display pretty much any URL, including a page from your own hotel website, the Noticeboard app is ideal for creating professional-looking promotions for your hotel services.
F&B displays
You might have great on-site cafes, restaurants and bars, but the reality is that it can be tough to incentivise guests to spend much time – and money in them. Food and Beverage (F&B) displays are designed to help tackle this challenge.
To help you get started creating content for them, free-to-use tools, such as the Menuboard app offer a whole host of enticing menu board template designs for cafes, bars and restaurants to which you just need to add text.
You can also create and publish promotional offers and happy hour deals, while also using your screens to display Insta-ready pictures of your cocktails and dishes, as well as picture galleries of happy customers.
Hotel business facilities and conference rooms
Digital signage networks are also a great way to advertise hotel business facilities and conference rooms.
Helping to make much more of an impact with rich and varied content, they enable you to, for example, broadcast special offers for conference rooms and package deals, together with video tours of the facilities and delegate reviews.
In terms of support, they also allow you to make the job of actually finding and joining conferences much easier. By using digital signage for wayfinding, you can map out on-screen exactly where each room is located.
Conference room booking displays
Tablet size conference room booking displays not only clearly signpost room numbers/names for delegates, but also ensure that there’s no confusion as to whether or not the rooms are free.
Content management solutions integrated with Outlook or Google calendars, and free-to-use room booking applications make it easy for anyone on your team to book rooms, automatically updating the information on the relevant room displays.
Health and safety signage on hotel floors
Hotels spend money and time updating barely read noticeboards with legally required health and safety notifications. What’s worse, such notices don’t even cover every kind of emergency.
By adding screens to your hotel floors, you can create – and update your health and safety notifications in minutes.
If you would like to discuss how Signagelive could support your hotel digital signage plans, then please reach out to us here.
