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Virtual Tours Of Hospitality: Are They Useful?
Today there are millions of ways to attract customers in the hospitality industry. But what about virtual tours? Are they useful? Or is it just another stupid investment?
That is the question of today’s article.
But let’s start from the beginning.
What are virtual tours?
Well, I already wrote an article about what is a virtual tour. So, I’ll go fast. But still for those who somehow missed it:
“A virtual tour is broadly speaking a digital opportunity how you or anyone else can explore any space in a 360° view.“
Important here is that virtual tours are created from 360° content such as 360° photos or 360° videos. This means the user can explore every detail of the space (or atmosphere) interactively.
A virtual tour is a multimedia output that can contain besides 360° content other images, sounds, videos, text, interactive elements, and much more.
The possibilities are endless.
But now let’s dive into today’s topic.
Virtual tours in the hospitality industry
So, why are virtual tours beneficial to hospitality? I would love to mention that virtual tours can be beneficial to numerous industries such as real estate, education, history, art, and much more.
In principle, a virtual tour can be beneficial to any industry that sells (rents) space or provides a certain experience in its space.
And that is why the hospitality industry can gain a lot from this technology.
Maybe now you are asking how, right?
Well, there are numerous ways how a company in hospitality can gain value from virtual tours. Unfortunately, I am not able to talk about all possible benefits or features with are beneficial specifically to hospitality, because if I did this article would have 3000+ words and nobody would read it to the end.
But I’ll try my best to highlight the most important aspects, of why virtual tours are beneficial to hospitality.
Competitive advantage
With a virtual tour, your visitors can explore your space from anywhere and anytime. Compared to static photos which are normally used, 360° images provide a more interactive and interesting experience.
By having a virtual tour in place your company can provide more information to the visitors. And with more information, better and more informed decisions can be made (such as booking a stay at your hotel).
Increase bookings and revenue
The virtual tour provides a transparent experience which can create closer relationships with customers. A 360° content showcases every detail of the space so that nothing will be hidden from the visitors. Less cancelation and complaints, because customers already know what to expect from the virtual tour (transparency effect). And they already fell in love with your space.
The selling process is easier with an effective virtual tour in place because visitors do not have to imagine how their stay will look like. After exploring everything in the virtual tour, the customer is more likely to make a reservation.
PRO TIP: We recommend creating a virtual tour with a strong CTA button to increase the effectiveness of the sales funnel. For example, a “Book a stay” button in the right-bottom corner to make a reservation.
Well, of course, I do not need to mention that virtual tours if embedded online can be watched from anywhere and anytime. So, that your sales team does not even have to be awake at the moment.
Marketing and SEO
Virtual tours are not just sales but also marketing tools.
Interactive content is popular and has a growing tendency in the future with the advent of virtual reality (VR). Virtual tours do not need to be created just as web-based virtual tours but also as virtual tours for VR headsets.
A 360° content in its interactive form can be shared on the most popular social media platforms such as Facebook, Panorra, or YouTube. Need to mention that you can create a post for any other social media platform with a link to the virtual tour.
Virtual experience also can be embedded on your website to boost your website traffic and boost your website in Google Search. Beneficial is also uploading the virtual tour and 360° photos to your Google Business Profile (aka create a Google Street View virtual tour).
What is that?
Well, this is the right box in the Google search when you are looking for a local business. And especially for bars, restaurants, and coffee shops these profiles are extremely important because they are shown in Google Maps so that customers can see them.
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Recommendation for the hospitality managers who want to create a virtual tour for their company.
If you are a manager of a hotel, restaurant, coffee shop, bistro, hostel, or other hospitality facilities you should be thinking about creating a virtual tour.
First of all, getting a virtual tour in place shows innovative and customer-focused thinking, but also if done correctly it can deliver long-lasting results for a one-time payment.
Secondly, you yourself know how big the competition is in the hospitality industry. Getting a virtual tour can be a sort of differentiation for your company among others. Also, it does offer special value to your visitors, so it is a win-win.
PRO TIP: If your competition already offers a virtual tour, you should create a virtual tour of higher quality (or at least the same). We recommend creating a branded virtual tour with a lot of interactive and cool elements such as an “open-door” effect or different variations of the same space (especially useful for showcasing B2B conference rooms).
Also great is to use all the created material from the virtual tour on other marketing platforms.
Wait. What do I mean by that?
Well, if you decide to create a virtual tour for your website you can also recycle the content on other marketing platforms.
Virtual tour is just a tool to interact with customers, if they do not know that you have a virtual tour, they will not use it.
From an investment standpoint, every time think of a return on investment. Virtual tours are a great way how you can showcase a beautiful space to your customers. But bear in mind that every virtual tour is not the same (virtual tours are not homogeneous products). So, choosing the right creator for your special case is crucial (mainly in terms of expenditure and reliability).
And the last recommendation for you, if you want to make sure the money was well spent, you can ask a virtual tour creator or your virtual tour agency to send you analytics of the virtual tour. Professional creators will give you access to analytical reports (for example we provide access to Google Analytics 4).
Okay, this will be really the last recommendation. If your company is opening now, this is a great moment to create a virtual tour, because customers do not know you and do not trust you. And virtual tour can be a great icebreaker.
