| The internet is a very effective way to market | | | | the website it could be a coincidence, but if you |
| your vacation rentals. By like most rental house | | | | use the word vacation rental 5 times or more on |
| owners you don't have the knowledge needed to | | | | the page it easy for the search engine to |
| create both an attractive website as well as a | | | | determine that the site is in fact related to |
| search engine friendly website. The following are | | | | vacation rentals. By putting the keywords you are |
| some ideas we have put into action to promote | | | | trying to attract in the H1, H2 or H3 tags can also |
| our vacation rental property. | | | | increase the chances for that phrase to properly |
| Probably the most important to your marketing | | | | categorize the website. |
| plan is the creation of an effective vacation rental | | | | It is very important to keep into mind that your |
| site. Effective is defined in this context as a site | | | | website remain readable and interesting otherwise |
| that search engines will find and index as well as | | | | what good will traffic be when no one stays to |
| be interesting to your prospective renters. | | | | peruse the site. This requires a balancing act |
| First, lets cover the front page. The front page of | | | | required to develop great keywords with a home |
| your personal vacation house rental site should be | | | | page that is interesting. |
| very simple and not too busy. It is the starting | | | | Its important to have access to your availability |
| point of the site so it must be pleasing to the | | | | calendar in multiple locations including the home |
| eye. Your goal is to bring the potential renters to | | | | page. If the renter can't find the availability easily |
| this page so they can discover the rest of your | | | | they'll go to the next opportunity. Never give |
| site. | | | | them a reason to go to another site when what |
| You should have a limited number of pictures of | | | | they want it right here. |
| your house to capture the attention with a link to | | | | There should be a brief summary of the primary |
| a photo album on the menu or in the text of | | | | features of your house. How many bedrooms, |
| your introduction. | | | | how many bathrooms, does it have an ocean |
| Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the act of | | | | view, and of course how much can it be rented |
| optimizing your content to be "attractive" to | | | | for? |
| search engines. Specifically by categorizing your | | | | The person acting as webmaster must create an |
| website. | | | | META tag description that not only is catchy and |
| How does a search engine know what your site is | | | | simple, but also must restate your keywords. |
| about? Most search engines no longer consider | | | | That about covers the creation of the front page. |
| the keywords embedded in your site's META tags | | | | How can you make your page rank increase on |
| as an accurate list of keywords because of the | | | | your front page? Once you have the front page |
| high number of webmasters who have "cheated" | | | | optimized the hard work begins. First you must |
| by putting words that were popular, but not | | | | find like minded owners of vacation rentals who |
| related to the website. A good example are the | | | | would be willing to trade links with you. You will |
| large number of adult content sites that used | | | | want a special links page that links to all of your |
| unassociated words like "vacation rental" in their | | | | linking buddies. In addition, you want to find as |
| key words. A person searching for vacation rental | | | | many directories with a vacation rental category |
| would end up on a site they had no intention of | | | | to post your website on. There are literally |
| going to. | | | | thousands of directories that allow URL |
| Now the search engines catalog all of the words | | | | submissions for free. |
| and phrases in a website and "grades" them by | | | | This is just step one, so I will be writing many |
| there distribution and formatting to determine the | | | | more articles about this subject. Stay tuned! |
| probable category to put the website into. In | | | | For more information please don't hesitate to |
| other words if you have vacation rental once in | | | | contact me. |