Luxury Hotel Marketing: Copywriting Clichés and Smarter Alternatives

By Cvent Guest

When it comes to hospitality marketing online, words carry a lot of weight. Your choice of words has the power to impact how travelers see your brand, your hotel’s search rankings, and if your site or luxury hotel marketing campaigns attract or repel bookings. With language holding so much clout when marketing hotels online, it’s vital you’re using the right language to appeal to your target market.

Particularly in the luxury travel space, there's a multitude of boring and tired clichés that are so overused that they no longer mean anything. (How many mid-market hotels have you seen marketing themselves as "luxury" accommodations?) But what if your property is a bona fide luxury experience? How can you make sure to convey the lushness and grandeur of your hotel so that it cuts through all the clutter of the other "luxury" hotels? Here are my hotel copywriting tips when showcasing the true experience of luxury hotel brands:

What to stay away from for luxury hotel marketing

This is easy. Just think of the well-worn luxury travel clichés that have been used for decades, over and over again.

1. Exclude value property terms: These include phrases such as “hidden gem” or “paradise.” By now, these terms have become so commonplace that they can actually make your property sounds pretty average.

2. Exclude common catering words: Other words have been recently introduced and since then have become rapidly popular such as ‘artisanal’ or ‘farm-to-table.’

3. Exclude blank luxury statements: And unfortunately, many mid-market hotels and travel brands have been using the word "luxury" and "luxurious" to describe amenities and their properties – even when what they’re describing is actually far from it. Because of this, "luxury" has become meaningless, and may unwittingly turn travelers off.

What to say instead, for luxury hotel marketing

So, if you can't describe your property as a beautiful paradise, a hidden gem, or as luxurious, what can you say?

1. Use specific adjectives: Start with vividly describing the sense of place. Remember that your words need to transport travelers to your hotel so that they feel like they’re actually there.

2. Find the right balance: Don’t spew out factual statements that sound like a Wikipedia page, nor oversell with flowery prose. The goal is to be both descriptive and accurate. Instead of telling guests that you are luxurious, convey why and how your hotel is luxurious.

3. Highlight what is unique: What is special and rare about staying with you? For example, describe the “glamorous brown velvet walls and the glowing candlelight” in your fine dining restaurant such as Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa does. Or, your “sumptuous beds topped with silky duvets and goose-down pillows and spacious, marble-tiled baths" as Millennium Hilton Bangkok does.

Don’t completely eliminate "luxury" from your hotel marketing

Of course, it’s near impossible to delete the word "luxury" from your marketing. After all, it’s an important keyword. So continue to use it, but sparingly and judiciously. Be creative in showcasing your hotel’s luxury with evocative descriptions instead. Accompany your descriptions with well-shot photography and your content is on its way to not only creating wanderlust but to converting as well.

Written by Junvi Ola.

Cvent Guest

Cvent is a market-leading meetings, events, and hospitality technology provider with more than 4,000 employees, ~21,000 customers, and 200,000 users worldwide.