- In hospitality and tourism, the website is the first contact with the customer: it has to make people want to come, make booking easy and set realistic expectations.
- Real photos, direct booking, clear prices and well-managed reviews carry the most weight in the decision.
- Your website has seasons too: rates, opening hours and messages should change with them.
The trip starts on your website
In tourism, the website isn’t an add-on to the business: to a large extent, it is the business. It’s where a future guest or diner decides whether to visit you, whether to book with you directly or go to an OTA (Booking, Airbnb, Expedia), and what to expect from their stay.
A well-built hospitality and tourism website generates direct bookings (which are more profitable), reduces your dependence on third-party platforms and attracts customers who arrive knowing what they’ll find. That applies to a hotel, a rural guesthouse, a restaurant or an activity company.
Why direct bookings matter so much
OTAs serve a purpose: they give you visibility with people who don’t know you yet. But they charge a commission on every booking which, for accommodation, is usually around 15% or more, and they keep the relationship with the customer.
This isn’t about leaving Booking, but about making your own website pull its weight. If a returning guest or someone who finds you on Google Maps can’t book with you easily, they’ll do it on Booking, and you’ll pay commission on a customer who was already yours.
What tourists are looking for
- Is what I see in the photos real?
- How much does it really cost, with no surprises?
- Is it available on my dates?
- What do other customers say?
- Can I book directly without any hassle?
If your website doesn’t answer these questions in 2 minutes, the tourist goes to Booking.
The essentials of a tourism website
1. Real, professional and plentiful photos
In tourism, photos weigh heavily in the decision, often more than any text. Stock photos destroy credibility. You need professional, up-to-date photos that show reality in an attractive way: the rooms as they actually are, the dining room with people in it, the surroundings, breakfast.
2. Direct booking that works
Tourists want to book now. If your website only offers “check availability”, you lose to Booking. You need a booking engine connected to your property management system (and to the OTAs through a channel manager, to avoid double bookings), with instant confirmation and card payment or guarantee. Restaurants face the same issue with tables: an online booking system with confirmation works far better than “give us a call”.
3. Integrated, well-managed reviews
Tourists decide based on reviews. If you don’t show yours, they’ll look for them on Google or Booking. It’s better to integrate them into your website and manage them actively: reply to all of them, including the bad ones, politely and with specifics. A calm reply to an unfair review builds more trust than 10 reviews with 5 stars.
4. Complete practical information
Exact location with a map, how to get there, parking, check-in and check-out times, cancellation policy, whether pets are allowed, accessibility, what’s included and what costs extra. Every question your website doesn’t answer becomes an email, a phone call or a customer who leaves.
And a legal detail: in regions such as Galicia, tourist accommodation must display its tourism register number in its advertising, and your website counts as advertising.
5. Transparent prices
“Ask for rates” puts people off. Tourists want to know how much their stay will cost before getting in touch. If your prices change with the season, show it: a rate calendar or a “from X € per night” is far better than silence. For restaurants, put the menu with prices on the website itself, not in a PDF that’s impossible to read on a phone.
6. Several languages, done properly
If you get visitors from abroad, your website has to speak their language. In Galicia you’ll usually need at least Spanish, Galician and English and, depending on the area, Portuguese or French. Have translations reviewed by a person: a badly translated menu looks worse than an untranslated one.
7. Built for mobile
A large share of searches for accommodation and, above all, for restaurants and activities happen on mobile, often once people are already at their destination. Your website has to load quickly even with a weak signal, without heavy videos or pop-ups, and let people book or call with a single tap. If you want to check yours quickly, Express audit: what to check on your website in 15 minutes gives you a practical checklist.
Your website has seasons too
A tourism business doesn’t sell the same thing in August as in November, and the website should reflect that.
- Rates and availability: your booking engine should have each season’s rates loaded well in advance. Many people book their summer in spring; if your July calendar is empty in March, or still shows last year’s prices, you lose those bookings.
- Messages and photos: in the low season, show what makes it worth coming then: the peace and quiet, the fireplace, seasonal food, trails without the crowds.
- Opening hours and closures: if you close in winter or change your hours, make sure your website (and your Google listing) say so clearly. Few things generate worse reviews than arriving to find the door shut.
- Low-season offers: long stays, weekend breaks, packages with activities. Your own website is the ideal place to offer them, because there you’re not competing on price with the rest of the listing.
Put it in a calendar with someone in charge: if every change depends on calling someone, it won’t get done.
Common mistakes on tourism websites
Stock or outdated photos: the customer arrives and reality doesn’t match the website. The result: disappointment and negative reviews.
No online booking: just a contact form. Today’s travelers expect instant confirmation.
Outdated information: prices from 2 seasons ago, the old menu, opening hours that are no longer right. Confusion and frustration.
Old-fashioned design: in tourism, design conveys the experience. A website that looks 15 years old suggests the facilities are too.
How to tell whether your website is working
Just 3 indicators give you a fairly clear picture:
- Share of direct bookings versus those coming through OTAs, month by month and season by season.
- Booking engine conversion: how many people start a booking and how many finish it. If many drop out at payment, there’s a problem there.
- Repeated questions by phone or email: if people always ask the same thing, your website isn’t explaining it.
The bottom line
A tourism website is your receptionist 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It has to make people want to come, make the decision easy, set realistic expectations and adapt to each season. Every direct booking it brings in is margin that doesn’t go to a middleman.
If you run a hospitality or tourism business and want to know whether your website is generating the direct bookings it should, we can carry out an audit designed for your sector. Tell us what you have today and we’ll tell you, straight, what we would change first.