In Brief: Stephanie Smith advises hospitality professionals to prioritize core digital fundamentals, such as website optimization and data hygiene, before pursuing artificial intelligence initiatives to ensure effective technology integration and maximize operational benefits.
Stephanie Smith recently joined The AI Reality Check Series with Revenue Hub to discuss how AI is influencing hotel digital marketing and how hotels can leverage it effectively, especially if they’re not already performing well digitally.
Key Insights
Hotels want to know if they appear in AI tools like ChatGPT, but it’s important to remember that evaluating AI presence involves testing prompts and understanding the conversational, nuanced nature of LLM (Large Language Model) search, which differs from traditional keyword Google searches. AI results vary greatly with the same queries, making measurement complex, but queries are rarely the same.
Foundational Hotel Digital Marketing is Key
Good website content, proper schema, and authoritative, accurate information are essential before any AI-specific efforts. That’s why we always emphasize that Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) builds on traditional SEO but also aligns with how AI interprets content. LLMs prioritize social content and citations differently than Google, which focuses on backlinks.
4 Common Hotel Gaps
Many hotels lack foundational digital elements, which include:
- High-quality website content: But, be careful not to create content for the sake of content. Ensure the content is still relevant to targeted buyers and segments as well as LLMs.
- Recent and positive reviews: Reviews impact AI’s “memory” of the hotel, with older negative reviews still affecting perception.
- Active social media engagement: LLMs definitely learn and index social media, including influencers.
- Accurate 3rd party presence: AI amplifies inaccuracies from outdated information spread across multiple platforms.
Persona-Focused Content
Hotels must create content targeting specific traveler personas (business traveler, family, pet owner) rather than broad segments, as persona-driven content aligns with AI’s specialized recommendations. Additionally, evergreen content like targeted press releases can help train AI tools on hotel offerings.
Backlinks and Citations
Creating content on your website alone won’t cut it. Just because you put more content on your site, doesn’t necessarily mean the LLMs will cite that content. You still need backlinks and citations to validate your site as a trusted source.
AI Visibility vs. Distribution
Hotel discoverability is more critical than real-time distribution integration at this time. Connecting your ARI via apps in platforms like ChatGPT is currently nuanced and limited in impact on distribution, so strong brand presence and foundational marketing remain crucial.
Changing Customer Journey
AI tools now handle much of discovery and shortlisting, shifting search dynamics, since travelers widely research via AI but often still return to Google for booking, increasing branded searches. There are still a lot of zero clicks in LLMs (as with Google), so GA4 doesn’t capture all the data.
The GA4 Tracking Changes
Google Analytics has recently changed how LLM traffic gets measured, but we are seeing revenue attributed. Check out our full GA4 blog for hotels.
Advice for Hotel Marketers
- Don’t expect immediate, measurable ROI from AI marketing efforts.
- Avoid overreliance on MetaSearch ads due to false ROAS perceptions, consider testing ChatGPT ads.
- Don’t assume AI connection tools via MCP improve visibility or discoverability.
Stephanie Smith, CEO and Digital Matriarch, Cogwheel Marketing & Analytics, HSMAI Marketing Advisory Board Member. Connect with Stephanie on LinkedIn.
Source: View the original article at Cogwheel Marketing.