A hotel can be visible without giving guests enough reasons to choose it

I have been asked to write copy for a hotel website while its commercial logic was still being worked out.

The request seemed simple: write. Yet it led back to decisions about the product, target guests, presentation and sales. What was supposed to convince the guest was not yet clear enough to be shown, compared and booked.

That situation sums up how I approach the topline: the hotel’s revenue. I start with the choice we want the guest to make, then work back through what needs to happen to make it possible.

Guests choose from what they can see and understand

Owners know their projects from the inside. They know why they chose the location, the style or a particular room category. Guests encounter images, prices, terms and reviews. Much of the original intention may be lost on them.

They may discover the property on social media, compare it on an online travel agency (OTA), visit its website, read reviews or ask an AI tool. These points of contact can overlap. I do not try to reduce that journey to a fixed number of websites or a sequence of steps that everyone follows.

I look at what guests can understand at each point, and what they still have to look for elsewhere.

Price, location, breakfast, guest ratings, atmosphere and value for money are very concrete reasons to choose. Several can work together. A distinctive feature has commercial value only if it matters to a particular audience and that audience can recognise it.

For a new hotel, this means making an experience credible before many guests have had the chance to describe it. For an established property, it means keeping the reasons people already choose it visible. The work changes with the circumstances of the project.

A website involves decisions that go beyond copywriting

Guests can already find availability and a rate on an OTA. When they also visit the hotel’s website, we have an opportunity to give them a clearer understanding of their stay.

A room category may offer more space, but do its images and description explain how that space can be enjoyed? A service may be valuable, but are its terms and availability clear enough to influence the choice? A setting may look appealing while the offer itself remains difficult to understand.

These are commercial decisions. Photography, the order of information, differences between offers, the booking engine and replies to enquiries should help guests move forward.

I want marketing, sales, digital and operations to work through these points together before asking a copywriter to resolve everything in a paragraph. Sometimes the presentation needs work. Sometimes the offer itself needs clarifying.

Buying more traffic before resolving these points may simply bring more visitors who hesitate.

Preference also has an economic dimension

OTAs provide distribution, an audience and bookings. Their commissions form part of the economics of those sales. Direct bookings have costs too: acquisition, tools, content production, sales time and guest relations.

I want to assess those costs alongside the bookings secured, their contribution and the demand the hotel wants to develop. The channel that appears cheapest is not necessarily the one that will bring the desired guests at the relevant time.

Preference can help a hotel enter consideration earlier, sell particular room categories more effectively or sustain a rate. It does not remove seasonality, competition or the need to check what guests are actually willing to pay.

The aim is to give guests reasons to choose us that can then translate into sales. An attractive difference that remains invisible cannot do that work.

A product can take on a different role

At Sofitel, a bed was initially just a bed. Then it became a reason to choose the hotel.

That shift in perspective stayed with me. Our hotels were very different, each with its own history and ways of working. We needed to build an experience guests could recognise across that diversity.

With MyBed, the sleep experience took on a different role. Guests could feel the difference, remember it and talk about it. It was a collective effort, extending to the standards and their execution.

I think back to that experience when we discuss hotel investment. We can describe what we are buying and what it costs. I also want to understand what guests will gain from it, how they will discover it and what teams will need to do to deliver on that promise over time.

What a hotel says about itself opens the conversation. What guests say after their stay gives it a different kind of credibility.

Resources are part of the commercial ambition

On repositioning assignments, I have also been struck by marketing investments that had little connection with the resources teams had to make the change happen.

A new promise may be ready in the communications while still requiring work inside the hotel. This can involve sales, the product, opening hours, skills, available information and the decisions each person is authorised to make.

Hiring one or two experienced professionals can add a great deal. Their presence does not resolve everything missing around them. They need an offer to develop, support and a remit within which their expertise can make a difference.

I see the general manager as the person who brings these skills together, listens to how they inform a decision and takes responsibility for the final call. One person may hold several roles. That does not give them unlimited time or every specialist skill.

When marketing and sales are viewed solely as expenses, the budget can end up expecting revenue without describing clearly enough the work needed to produce it.

AI speeds up part of the work. It needs the substance of the project.

I see the value of AI in preparing alternatives, adapting copy, producing a first translation or identifying inconsistencies across content. These uses can give teams time back.

The prompt must still reflect an understanding of the place, the market, the owner’s intention and what can actually be sold today. A proposed promise and a confirmed service should not be presented in the same way.

Fluent content can look finished before those decisions have been made. This is where professional judgement matters: choosing the argument, checking the facts, asking for a better image or reopening a question about the offer.

The time saved can be used to understand the project better and express it more clearly. We need to retain the skills required to judge the result. Easier editing software does not automatically provide a video editor’s eye; faster production does not, by itself, create marketing leadership.

What I want to see in performance

A full hotel is reassuring. I also want to know the rates at which rooms were sold, to which guests and at what acquisition cost. I look at the experience delivered and the resources needed to maintain it. Then comes the return for the owner, taking operations and investment into account.

A RevPAR index above the market benchmark is not enough to establish the return on the asset. A good guest rating alone does not prove that the hotel is booked first. These perspectives need to complement one another.

This is the continuity that interests me: an owner’s intention translated into an offer, visible reasons to choose, teams able to deliver on the promise and a business that justifies the resources committed.

The topline is built through these decisions. My role is to connect them, with the people who will have to make them work.

Stéphane-Jean Lacroix — Trouverlecap