Tourism Season Report Card: Evaluate the Season's End and Prepare for the New Season

Yes, closing the season by looking at sales figures is easier, especially if the numbers are good. However, the effort put in throughout the season is not only about sales figures, which will not be the thing that brings success for the next season. It will be about how the efforts made throughout the year have been received, how guests evaluate you, and what you did right or wrong. So let's not take the easy way out by just looking at sales :)

You should conduct analyses with your hotel teams and agencies and evaluate the season based on different criteria.

Here are some important points to consider when evaluating the season:

1. Sales Focus: Is It the Only Criterion?

For hotels, season evaluation is usually based on sales figures. However, digital marketing strategies offer much more than just focusing on sales, where the best price always wins. Because in customer experience, the optimal price for sales and the comfort area while making a reservation come into play. Therefore, having sales as the sole target leads to incomplete evaluation of all the work done.

Instead of setting a KPI that focuses only on sales, understanding your customers' preferences, analyzing where they come from and how they behave on your website, and creating KPIs based on these can provide a more meaningful analysis and help shape your future marketing strategies.

2. Conversion Scenarios: Every Step Matters

Let's recall the conversion scenarios created at the beginning of the season. These scenarios should be a comprehensive evaluation process that covers all visitor behaviors on the hotel website, not just reservation-focused. Data such as how long visitors stay on the website, which pages they spend time on, which buttons they click, whether they fill out contact forms, and whether they make reservations should all be included in the conversion scenarios. At the end of the season, the budget spent should definitely be compared with these conversion rates.

Of course, at the beginning of the season, it is also necessary to create frameworks and goals for these conversions. For example, if you have a new room type, how many minutes should it be viewed for it to be considered successful, and what behaviors should users exhibit during the review? You can set goals for each of these.

3. Non-Sales Performance Indicators

Although sales are important, especially for hotels that want to avoid competing with agencies by not being able to offer discounts, non-sales performance indicators become even more important. For example, how did digital advertising campaigns conducted in countries like Germany or the UK affect agency sales? Was there an increase in website traffic? Did the obtained traffic meet the desired conversion targets? All this data should be thoroughly analyzed at the end of the season, and the hotel's future digital marketing strategies should be shaped accordingly.

4. Website Performance: Visitor Analysis

Website performance should be evaluated not only based on whether reservations were made but also based on how long visitors stay on the site, the content they are interested in, and how deeply they delve into it. For instance, if visitors stayed on the page created for a villa type for the average minutes you determined at the beginning of the season, this page can be considered successful. However, to evaluate how you can carry this interest further, you need to analyze visitors' behaviors.

For example, how did the sales of the villa type examined perform both on your website and across all agencies? The overall sales table should always be taken into account.

There is also SEO performance. At the end of the season, evaluating the increase in organic traffic, your ranking for specific keywords, and the performance of the content you created can help improve your SEO strategy. Additionally, data such as the most-read blog posts or the most-visited pages will reveal which types of content attract your customers' attention.

5. Analysis of Customer Feedback

Customer feedback received throughout the season is a crucial source that should not be overlooked when evaluating the success of your digital marketing strategy. Measuring customer satisfaction is possible through both online reviews and direct feedback. Therefore, at the end of the season, you should review and analyze all your social listening reports. This feedback shows how the digital campaigns conducted during the season affected the customer experience and where improvements can be made. All these efforts will support your preparations for the new season.

6. Competitor Analysis: Assess Your Position in the Market

When evaluating digital marketing results, it is also important to review your competitors' performance. At the end of the season, analyzing the digital world feedback of hotels in the same segment will not only provide feedback about your region if you are in the same destination but also help you better understand your target audience and their expectations. The data derived from this will provide material for your advertising in the next season.

7. Long-Term Metrics and Brand Awareness

At the end of the season, it is important to focus not only on short-term goals but also on long-term metrics such as brand awareness and customer loyalty. Understanding how your digital marketing strategy contributes to the hotel's brand awareness and whether it increases customer loyalty can influence your future marketing planning. For example, an increase in your social media followers and engagement, and whether this engagement continues off-season, will be a positive indicator for brand awareness and loyalty.

8. Impact of Multi-Channel Marketing Strategies

By evaluating the performance of the different channels (social media, email marketing, Google Ads, etc.) used in your digital marketing campaigns separately, you can determine which channels provide the highest conversion rates, which can help optimize your future campaigns. This evaluation allows you to understand which channels require more investment or which channels are not meeting expectations. Additionally, you should design a multi-channel strategy without relying solely on one channel.

Let's take the closure of Instagram in Turkey as an example. During that process, those who wondered what to do as advertisements were affected appeared, as well as agencies explaining different media. The problem started here. You cannot build a strategy based on a single medium. You should always have different plans and create strategies for all platforms if they are suitable for your target audience, even if budgets are not actively spent.

Success in digital marketing comes when you move beyond measuring success through sales. Before planning for the next season, carefully evaluate all this data to understand how effective your digital marketing campaigns have been. If necessary, seek external audit support and have the season report card created for you.

While calmness typically begins in hotels and agencies at the end of the season, activity increases even more at IQUEEM because we start audit services for our consulting clients. We create the season's report card and provide a data-driven roadmap to the teams and agencies for the new season. Being data-driven is important because everything becomes meaningful with data. This can be considered the most enjoyable part of the season's end, especially when success is involved 😊

After the season evaluations, actions continue for the tourism sector, and preparations for the new season begin.

Stay tuned for the details of the 2025 season preparations 😊