Google Hotel Ads is a faster and easier way to find and book the hotel that best suits your needs. It's also a tool designed specifically for the travel industry, allowing you to advertise directly on Google services.
Google Hotel Ads will be visible in organic results, on Google maps and business cards, and on mobile devices.
What is Google Hotel Ads?
This Google product, previously known as Hotel Price Ads or Hotel Finder, is a tool integrated with the Google search engine. The first page of Google search is increasingly becoming a space for displaying ads—primarily AdWords, of course.
In the case of the hotel industry, something else will appear in addition to AdWords ads. Typing a phrase like "hotel Poznań" into the search engine will bring up a box linked to a Google map. It's no coincidence that our screenshot doesn't include organic search results – you have to scroll quite a bit to finally find them (and we already have four Google AdWords ads).
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This box contains the most important hotel information, supplemented by a photo: its location and position on the map, class, booking price, and guest ratings. Clicking on this hotel listing takes you to a more comprehensive presentation of the selected hotel, including more photos, a Google Street View, reviews, and the ability to choose a booking channel along with price information.
Google Hotel Ads therefore becomes a combination of advertising, a website with customer reviews and ratings, a map with navigation, and a booking portal. In addition to hotel guest reviews and the aggregate rating, there's also a summary of reviews highlighting the strengths of a given property in the categories of "rooms," "location," "service and amenities," and individual ratings for each.
Google Hotel Ads only displays the top three ads, unlike Google AdWords, which displays up to four ads at the top of the results and a few more below the organic search results. Therefore, the bidding is more intense.
Mobile version of Google Hotel Ads
In line with Google's policy of emphasizing mobile responsiveness, Google Hotel Ads also works in a mobile version. All the functionalities known from the desktop version are retained.
We have photos, reviews, a map, information about the hotel's star rating, and the price. Clicking the "website" button takes us to the hotel's mobile website (if the hotel has one, of course; otherwise, we'll end up on a page that may not be mobile-friendly). When we want to make a reservation, we'll also be taken to a mobile-friendly panel on the booking portal.
The mobile version of Google Hotel Ads is equipped with typical mobile functionalities, such as the ability to plan directions or make a direct phone call, well known from mobile versions of websites.
Who is Google Hotel Ads for?
Google Hotel Ads is aimed at hotels, not booking portals. It's a tool that showcases a specific hotel, not, for example, a brand chain. It allows users to navigate to a specific hotel's website, rather than its presentation on a booking portal. Contact information also facilitates direct phone bookings.
However, if we want to make a quick online booking, we will come across prices and offers from booking portals (could this be a nod to booking portals that use Google Ads advertising on a large scale?).
As with Google My Business, you can showcase your best photos, for example, and thus shape the hotel's image. You can also find online booking options through the hotel's official website, but this option appears below the booking portal.
The second target audience for Google Hotel Ads is internet users. Google wants to deliver search results to them in a new, attractive, and transparent format – a glance at the stars, ratings, map, and photos is enough to know which property you're dealing with.
How does Google Hotel Ads work?
Google Hotel Ads is based on the well-known CPC pricing model for Google AdWords advertising, meaning you pay only per click, not per ad exposure. Similar to Google AdWords, hotel advertising is optimized for quality score. Ad position is a combination of the cost per click and the quality score of the ad itself.
This means ensuring valuable and unique website content, supplementing meta tags, ensuring proper page and link structure, and optimizing the listing itself (this is a new feature compared to Google AdWords). It's safe to say, however, that Google AdWords users will feel like they're at their favorite hotel when using Google Hotel Ads. However, there are two interesting differences compared to Google Hotel Ads.
A noteworthy difference from Google AdWords is that the Google Hotel Ads panel only supports (for now) US currency. This doesn't mean, of course, that a hotel guest will pay in dollars for a reservation made through Google Hotel Ads. However, it's worth keeping this in mind when planning an advertising campaign using Google Hotel Ads and estimating its costs – exchange rate fluctuations can impact the budget.
The second major difference between Google AdWords and Google Hotel Ads is that Google doesn't allow individual clients to use Hotel Ads. They are required to use an agency that manages this type of campaign. With Google AdWords, there are no such restrictions, and you can freely run an advertising campaign on your own and with your own resources, making direct payments to Google.
Cost per click – the only available billing model?
At this time, the answer to the above question is "yes." There's no option to charge for impressions, as is the case with Google AdWords, for example, under the cost-per-view model. A commission model is being tested in the United States—a commission for bookings made through Google Hotel Ads. Its widespread adoption is currently uncertain, and the commission model itself is not being tested in Poland.
Google Hotel Ads in Verseo
Verseo runs Google Hotel Ads campaigns for hotels. For hotels seeking comprehensive online promotion, we've developed the Verseo Hotels service . We can also run Google Hotel Ads campaigns alone.
Summary
The above article covers the following topics:
- Google Hotel Ads is an advertising tool integrated with search and maps that allows you to quickly find, compare, and book hotels directly on Google services.
- Google Hotel Ads is a competitive advertising system fully optimized for mobile devices, offering users quick access to reservations, navigation, and direct telephone contact with the hotel.
- Google Hotel Ads is a tool that connects hotels with users through attractive presentation of the offer, facilitating the building of the property's image and enabling bookings both directly and through external portals.
- Google Hotel Ads operates on a CPC model based on bidding and quality score, requiring the use of an authorized agency and budget settlement in US dollars.
- Google Hotel Ads is currently billed exclusively on a CPC basis, with professional campaigns in this system being implemented by specialized agencies such as Verseo.
