Schema Markup for Hotels, B&B and Resorts – A Complete Guide

If you work in the travel sector and manage a lodging business, regardless of its size, you know how important it is to be found by your users. 

There are many advantages you can get by investing in your website rather than being present on OTAs, comparators, review aggregators:

– you can receive reservations or be contacted for information directly, without intermediaries and at no additional cost;

– you can present your structure, your services and your offers uniquely, establishing a direct relationship with potential customers;

– you can integrate your website into a broader marketing strategy to promote your resort, hotel or B&B. 

Especially in the light of a market that is becoming increasingly broad and varied, having an effective and well-positioned website becomes essential to stand out from the competition. 

Structured data can help you do this, and we will show you how to do it step by step. Using schema markup, you can immediately start to speak Google’s language. Not only you will provide users all the information they need to find you and your resort, hotel or B&B, increasing the number of requests and guests who will come to your website and come to your hotel.

1. Why do lodging businesses need structured data?
2. How can I improve my business with structured data?
3. How do lodging businesses use structured data?
4. What is schema markup for lodging business?
5. How can I start using schema for my lodging businesses? 

Why do lodging businesses need structured data? 

Structured data is crucial for your lodging business because it will make it easier for Google and Bing to understand the content of your pages and your website. Google needs to find out what information is contained on a page to display it in the search results. Using structured data, you will advise Google about your resort, hotel or B&B, its services and facilities. This will help with your rankings, and in turn, with your sales.

On top of that, structured data will change the look of your snippet (that is how you appear in Google research). It will show more specific information to your customer. Furthermore, this will increase the possibility of a customer clicking on your results. More clicks will eventually lead to even higher rankings and even more chances of attracting new customers. 

Why do hotel chains and resorts need structured data?

A resort schema is the more relevant structured data to add to your resort website. It allows you to tell Google and other search engines details about your business and show the rich results: rating, review, if there is a restaurant or a bar, if there is a spa or a fitness centre, what type of rooms you have and how much your accommodation costs per night. Studies show that adding rich snippet content to your listing can boost click-through rates by 30%.

With Rich Results 

Without Rich Results

At the same time, it allows you to have a better ranking: your website appears among the first results obtaining more visibility than your competitors. 

In addition, for multiple locations, the LocalBusiness schema markup style helps consumers find your different places of business and other information such as the address, opening hours, contact info, etc. It reinforces the geo-local signals that the website can transmit to Google so that potential guests can find you easily. 

LocalBusiness markup schema changes depending on whether you have a dedicated landing page for each location or a single landing page for all.

Why do hotels need structured data?

Structured data is beneficial for hotels because it lets the search engine know more about your hotel, rooms, and amenities. 

This is possible, in particular, using markup for local businesses. To show its effectiveness, we experimented with +500 local businesses improving their existing markup. We could see a positive increase of +5.09% of clicks coming from Google Search in a week. 

This proves that you can immediately get results with schema markup and make sure that your site is present at the right time.

Not only that, implementing structured data allows hotels to be less dependent on OTAs and price comparison platforms. By investing in their website, you do not need the visibility of the big portals to be found by potential customers. Thanks to schema markup, users will easily find the hotel website and all relevant information required for their purchase journey.

Why do B&B’s need structured data?

The travel industry is one of the most competitive verticals in the search space. Doing SEO for small to medium B&B websites is becoming more challenging day by day.

Using structured data, you do SEO, getting better ranking and appearing on the first pages of Google search results. At the same time, you also free yourself from the intermediation and promotion platforms that you have used to get visibility until now have represented an extra cost for your business.

Users who land on your website will find clear, complete and well-connected information that will make them trust you and book their stay at your accommodation. This means that thanks to structured data, the number of guests will soon increase, and you will have a successful business.

In addition, using LocalBusiness schema markup style, you can reinforce the geo-local signals that your website transmits to Google, and potential guests can find you easily. 

How can I improve my business with structured data?

By using the markup schema, you are already evolving your business. You are optimizing your website, providing more information to your customers and increasing their engagement. 

Moreover, you create data that voice assistants like Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant can use. You are opening up to an entirely new marketing and discovery channel that makes your content accessible to everyone. As a result, you will take a huge step forward, which will have even more positive effects when integrated with a matching promotion and marketing strategy.

How can I get more guests with schema markup?

Using schema has multiple advantages: you speak the language of search engines. Because of this, you get a better ranking and a better SEO position on search engines. At the same time, you provide users with more detailed information. It makes them quickly understand the characteristics of your resort, hotel or B&B and the services you offer (restaurant, bar, spa, parking, etc.). As a result of your data snippets being displayed in this manner, you’ll likely see more qualified clicks to your page.

Increasing organic traffic to your website and its quality will positively affect your business: a growing number of guests will book your accommodation. Indeed, satisfied with the ease of finding information and content, they can understand if your accommodation is the right one for them and will be more inclined to book a reservation. This will mean an increase in guests and the turnover of your resort, hotel or B&B.

How can I display star ratings and reviews on Google results? 

Have you ever wondered how some websites get the beautiful yellow stars and review count next to their web link in the Google search result? You need structured data. 

By using schema markup, you add your ratings to the search results so that potential customers will get a good idea of the quality of your business right on the search engine. In addition, you can collect your reviews, so potential customers can have an idea of what people think about your lodging business and their experience. It will make their decision easier. 

How can I get rich snippets for my hotel, B&B or resort?

An essential aspect for the hotel industry is Rich Snippets that show the user the most significant information and services at a glance and ultimately generate more bookings.

The search engine needs structured data to get Google to extract the most relevant content from your website and show it. You can use the Resort – Hotel – B&B Schema markup for adding structured data regarding your accommodation. In the next section, you will find all the indications of using structured data to show users the most important information and examples.

So you can have a rich snippet like this: 

Rich results are even more prevalent on mobile. 

How can I use structured data to show relevant information to users?

With Lodging Business Schema markup, you specify the type of accommodation you offer (e.g., hotel, bed & breakfast, motel, resort, etc.), how many rooms you have, check-in and check-out times, and details of the number of stars, and what currencies you accept.

How can I use structured data to show relevant room information to users? 

With Accommodation Schema markup, you give more detailed information about the rooms (floor, size, special equipment) and the type of rooms (suites, apartments, conference rooms).

How can I use schema to show pricing and offers?

With Offer Schema markup, you can specify special offers and their conditions (e.g. booking, minimum nights).

How do lodging businesses use structured data?

Lodging businesses can use structured data to:

• Clarify your offer to Google and search engines, but also customers, providing detailed and relevant information.
• Expand its direct booking service, free from intermediaries and extra expenses.
• Gain relevance on the search pages from mobile devices that are the most used by travellers.
• Prepare for voice assistants, and more generally of online assistants, making your website accessible to everyone.

All this will positively affect sales and turnover of resorts, hotels and B&Bs.

What is schema markup for lodging business?

Schema markup, also called structured data, is a code that you add to your website. It allows you to make Google and search engines better understand your content and provide users with the answers they are looking for about your resort, hotel or B&B.  

In particular, you can use schema markup to improve your website:

• Lodging Business Schema: here you specify what type of lodging businesses you have (hotel, bed & breakfast, motel, resort, etc.), how many rooms you have, what check-in and check-out times there are, give details of the number of stars, and what currencies you accept.
• Accommodation Schema: with this, you give more detailed information about the rooms (floor, size, special equipment) and the type of rooms (suites, apartments, conference rooms).
• Offer Schema: with the offer markup, you can specify special offers and their conditions (e.g. booking, minimum nights).

How can I start using schema for my lodging businesses? 

We’ve already learned the meaning and value of structured data. Now, we will explore the main approaches for adding schema markup to your website.

To start using schema markup to your website, you can decide to go one of these ways:

1. you can add the code manually to the pages of your site;
2. you can use a dedicated plugin, but it still requires manual choices;
3. you can choose WordLift and fully automate the process.

In the first case, you know how to work with code, and then you know how to create and add structured data to your website manually.

Here is the code.

In the second case, the plugins that allow you to add schema markup to your website do not require technical knowledge in terms of code but still need an understanding of SEO and semantic markup. While this makes your work easier, on the other hand, it excludes you from using structured data if you do not have the proper knowledge.

In many cases, you have to check the content and complete the required fields. While fast, this solution continues to ask for extra work.

WordLift solves this limitation and allows you to add structured data to your website even if you are not an SEO expert. 

Artificial intelligence analyzes your content and automatically suggests that the entities mark your website, indicating the best type of property to assign to it.

The process is speedy, the interface is simple to use, and anyone can get started.

Finally, unlike other plugins, WordLift gives you access to the same technology used by enterprise customers with any subscription.

Discover how we can help your b&b, hotel or resort to grow by adding structured data with our SEO Management Service.

To find out more, make an appointment with our experts.