The good news is that you have low-cost, usually completely free, ways of increasing your hotel’s direct bookings. They require some time and effort but they rely on one great advantage: What you do best.

One commonly-recommended best practice is to write blog posts telling people what there is to do in your area, emphasizing the reasons people come to your area and why they should stay at your hotel when they do. Business strategy analyst Ashley Verrill writes that you should write blog posts for your site and send them to your email list - you do keep one, right?

“Optimize them with keywords that have high search traffic,” she recommends, as this strategy “can drive more organic traffic to your website.” Think what search terms people would use to plan a trip to your area and use them as Google keywords in your blog post.

Small hotels have advantages over big chains in that instead of points and other institutional rewards, they can use their websites to offer better deals specials and packages and emphasize their strongest selling points.

“Find out what is your property’s USP [unique selling proposition], explore it and promote it consistently,” says Renata Parolari Fernandes, founder and director of Five Star Magazine. “If it’s the location, make sure you inform your potential guests about any and every event that could interest your guests. If it’s food and wine, organise regular events and packages. If it’s the service, have a blog in your website talking about good service in hospitality… There are endless options for every case.”

The key in all cases is to use your online presence, your site as well as social media, to emphasize what’s most attractive and compelling about your property, so guests searching for what you do best will find you.