Your Google Business Profile Is Free Marketing: Here’s the 15-Minute Audit Most Operators Skip.
If you set up your Google Business Profile when you first opened and haven’t touched it since, you’re not alone. Most accommodation operators do exactly that. Here’s why that’s costing you bookings, and what you can fix in 15 minutes.
Your Google Business Profile isn’t just a digital business card. It’s one of the first things a potential guest sees when they search for accommodation in your area. It feeds directly into Google Maps, Google Search, and increasingly, AI-powered search tools like Google’s AI Overviews. If it’s incomplete, outdated, or thin on detail, you’re handing traffic straight to the online travel agencies (OTAs).
The good news? A proper audit takes about 15 minutes, it’s free, and the improvements you make can start showing results within days. Here’s where to look.
1. Claim and Verify Your Listing (If You Haven’t Already)
Before anything else, is your listing actually claimed and verified by you?
It sounds obvious, but plenty of properties are running on auto-generated Google listings that no one has verified. That means you can’t edit the content, respond to reviews, or add photos. Google has likely created a basic listing for you based on public data. It exists. You just don’t control it.
Go to business.google.com and search for your property. If it shows as “unclaimed”, claim it. The verification process usually involves a phone call, email, or short video recording, and it’s the most important step in this whole list.
2. Check Your Business Name, Category, and Description
These three things matter more than most operators realise.
Business name: Use your actual trading name, nothing more. Don’t stuff keywords in here (e.g. “Sunny Bay Motel Best Motel in Tauranga”). Google will penalise you for it.
Primary category: This one has a big impact on which searches you appear in. “Motel” and “Holiday Park” are both valid primary categories in Google. Make sure yours matches what you actually are. You can also add secondary categories, for example if you have a restaurant, playground, or self-contained cabins.
Business description: You get 750 characters. Use them. Write naturally about what makes your property stand out, including location, family-friendliness, pet policy, and what’s nearby. This is what guests read when they’re comparing options, so make it count. If your description is blank or one sentence long, fix it today.
3. Confirm Your Contact Details and Location Are Correct
Simple, but surprisingly often wrong, especially if you’ve changed your phone number, email address, or website URL at any point. Check:
- Phone number (and that it’s your direct line, not a third-party booking service)
- Website URL (does it actually load, or does it show an error?)
- Physical address and map pin (drag the pin to the exact entrance if it’s sitting in the wrong spot)
If you’ve got a direct booking engine on your site, make sure your website URL links there, or at minimum links to a page where guests can book without hitting an OTA first.
4. Review Your Opening Hours, Including Special Hours
Incorrect hours are one of the most common Google Business Profile problems. If your front desk runs reduced hours over Christmas or Easter and you haven't updated your profile, Google may show your property as closed when a guest checks online. They don't call to confirm. They just book somewhere else.
Update your regular hours, public holiday hours, and any seasonal closures or restricted periods. Google allows you to set “special hours” for specific dates well in advance. It takes five minutes and can prevent a lot of lost bookings over Easter, Christmas, and other public holidays.
5. Add (and Regularly Update) Photos
This is where most operators underinvest, and it’s one of the highest-impact things you can do. Google recommends at least three photos per room type for accommodation properties. In reality, the more quality photos you have, the better.
At a minimum, make sure you have:
- A cover photo showing your property at its best (exterior, ideally on a nice day)
- Interior shots of your rooms, clean, well-lit, and true to life
- Photos of amenities: pool, BBQ area, playground, communal kitchen, spa, etc.
- A shot of the surrounding area or view if it’s a selling point
Update your photos at least once a year, or whenever you’ve made improvements to the property.
6. Fill In Your Attributes
Attributes are the little tick-boxes that appear in your listing, things like “pet-friendly”, “free Wi-Fi”, “on-site parking”, “accessible rooms”, “EV charging”, and so on. Most operators fill in a handful when they first set up the listing and never revisit them.
Go back and check that everything is accurate and up to date. If you have Qualmark accreditation or other environmental credentials, add them to the sustainability section too.
7. Answer the Questions in Your Q&A Section
The Questions & Answers section lets anyone ask a question about your property, and anyone can answer it, not just you. That means guests, competitors, or random strangers may have already written answers on your behalf. Some of those answers might be wrong.
Check what’s been asked and whether the answers are accurate. Then proactively add the questions guests always ask anyway:
- “Do you have a swimming pool?”
- “Is there parking for boats/trailers/campervans?”
- “Are pets allowed?”
- “What time is check-in and check-out?”
Answering these yourself means you control the information, and it saves your team from fielding the same questions over the phone ten times a week.
8. Check Your Reviews and Respond to All of Them
Your star rating and review count directly influence how high your listing appears in search results. Guests also read your reviews before booking, and they pay particular attention to how you respond to negative ones.
Have you responded to every review, positive and negative? If not, start now. Even a brief, warm response to a positive review shows you’re engaged.
For negative reviews, respond calmly and constructively. Acknowledge the issue, explain what you’ve done, and invite them to reach out directly. Never get defensive in public. And if you’re not actively asking guests to leave reviews, start. A simple follow-up message at checkout can meaningfully increase your review volume over time.
9. Post Updates Regularly
Google Posts let you share news, offers, and updates directly on your listing. Most accommodation operators either don’t know this feature exists or set it up once and forgot about it. You don’t need to post every day, but a couple of posts a month keeps your listing looking active. Ideas include:
- Seasonal promotions or packages
- Local events coming up nearby
- New amenities or upgrades you’ve made
- Reminders about school holiday availability
- Direct booking offers (“Book direct and get free late checkout”)
Posts don’t stay visible for long, so make it a regular habit rather than a one-off. Add it to your fortnightly task list.
10. Check Your Performance
Once you’ve worked through the above, take a few minutes to look at your Google Business Profile Performance (previously called Insights). You’ll find this by going to your Business Profile and clicking Performance. It shows you how many people viewed your listing, what search terms they used, how many clicked through to your website, and how many requested directions or called you. It gives you a baseline to track improvement against and a clear signal for where to focus your energy next.
Do this now
If you do nothing else today, start here:
- Confirm your listing is claimed and your contact details are correct.
- Add or replace at least five photos with fresh, high-quality images.
- Respond to any reviews that are sitting without a reply.
That alone will put you ahead of the majority of properties in your area. The rest can follow over the next few weeks.
Your Google Business Profile is either working for you or against you every single day. Fifteen minutes of attention now can mean more direct bookings, better visibility in AI search, and a stronger first impression for every guest who searches for a place to stay near you.
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What is organic website traffic and why is it the holy grail for accommodation businesses?
Organic traffic to your website is considered the gold dust of digital interactions. While the term might sound fancy, it refers to a visit to your website or app by somebody who has searched and found it by using a search engine like Google or Bing.
When it comes to accommodation businesses, people who visit your website in this way are actively seeking a place to stay, making them likely to book your accommodation if they like what they see.
After a deep dive into data for the websites we managed for accommodation businesses in 2024, we found that just over half of the visits came from organic traffic. That’s well above the travel and hospitality industry average of 31% – a result we’re proud of. Organic traffic doesn’t involve paid advertising, but it does require an investment in effort to
ensure your website’s online presence is powerful enough to pull in the traffic you’re angling for.
In this month’s article, we explain why organic traffic matters and how to boost the number of people finding your website via organic search.
What makes organic website traffic so important to the success of your business?
Our data reveals that organic traffic not only makes up the lion’s share of visits to the websites we manage, but the people arriving in this way are 23% more likely than other visitors to view photos, check room availability, make a booking or submit an enquiry.
These are the visitors you really want because they are more likely than others – including those arriving at your site by clicking a link from another website or arriving via paid advertising – to interact deeply and to make a booking to stay at your accommodation.
Out of the 290,838 total number of visits to the websites we managed in the year to November 2024, the number of new users was 224,620 – a whopping 77%. Organic traffic brought in a significant portion of these new users, helping to make potential guests aware of accommodation offerings and creating opportunities for them to book.
According to the 2024 Organic Search Traffic Benchmarks Report, organic traffic makes up 31% of website activity in the travel and hospitality sector, while organic traffic for websites Seekom manages sits at a significantly higher 50.4%.
This is a result we are thrilled with – by funnelling unpaid, high-intent traffic to client websites, we can be sure we are delivering real value to their businesses.
How do you generate more organic traffic to an accommodation website?
Our approach to improving website search results focuses on key areas that help businesses show up more often when people search online. If you manage an accommodation website, there’s no reason why you can’t use the same techniques to your advantage.
Creating great content
We write helpful, interesting content that relates to what people are searching for. This means when someone looks for information about travel, accommodation, or services, the content is easy to find and appears in the right place.
Making your website easy to use
We design websites that are simple to navigate, work well on phones and tablets, and help search engines understand how everything connects. Think of it like creating clear road signs that guide both customers and search engines smoothly through your website.
Taking care of the technical stuff
We make sure websites load quickly, have clean and professional behind-the-scenes coding, and are set up in a way that search engines like Google or Bing can easily read and understand. Slow load speeds, messy code or poor website architecture can result in a website appearing lower down in the search results – often outside of the first page – which makes finding it more difficult. There are some important online tools you can use to achieve this including schema markup, Google Business Profile and similar platforms.
What is schema markup and how can it help you?
Imagine giving search engines a cheat sheet about your business. Schema markup is like that – it helps search engines show interesting and relevant information about your property when people search online. Instead of just seeing a boring website link, potential guests can see your business name, photos, ratings, or special offers in their search results, making people more likely to click on your listing. We’ve previously written about the value of schema markup in our blog – have a read if you want to harness it for your website.
Spreading the word online about your accommodation
We use several online tools to help people find your business more easily including, Google Business Profile, Bing Places, Webmaster Tools and IndexNow. These platforms help us share your website and information across the internet, making sure you show up prominently in search results, including local ones.
The goal: Maximising your position on search engine results pages
When someone types "affordable motels near me" into Google or Bing, the page of results they see is a search engine results page (SERP). The higher your business appears on this page, the more likely people are to notice you and have a closer look at your accommodation offerings. It’s like having a well-presented shop in a prime location on the main road of a city – everyone’s going to notice you.
By focusing on the actions mentioned above for the websites we manage for accommodation providers, we help them show up more often in search results, thereby nurturing organic growth to attract more potential customers, and boost their business through online bookings.
Need help?
If you’re thinking that doing all this yourself sounds a bit too technical, why not let us handle the heavy lifting? Our team offers tailored strategies that combine content, structural, and technical expertise to drive organic traffic to your website and lift online engagement.
A growing number of accommodation businesses around the world trust us to take care of their websites with fully-managed search-engine-optimisation plans. Find out how you can too by contacting us today. We’d love to help.
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Smarts to help you operate more effectively and efficiently. From guides of our systems and integrations to tips and tricks you can use every day - we've got you covered.
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Contact Us
4/234 Wakefield Street, Te Aro, Wellington 6011
Phone (NZ) : +64 4 974 9588
Phone (UK) : +44 20 3835 5939
Support: support@seekom.com
Websites: webhelp@seekom.com
Connect With Us
Copyright 2025 © Seekom Limited (NZ owned)