Venues, stays and experiences

Direct bookings from guests
planning months ahead.

 

We help WA venues, accommodation and tour operators win direct bookings months ahead, from Perth couples planning a wedding to families booking school holidays.

 

A white homestead among trees and vines at dusk, at Ampersand Estates

Tourism Marketing for WA Venues

Schedule a Free Strategy Consultation for Your Venue or Stay


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Bookings start months before anyone arrives

Nobody books a wedding venue or a week down south on a whim. Couples shortlist venues well ahead, families plan around school holidays, and groups spend weeks in a chat thread before anyone pays a deposit. Good tourism marketing is there for the whole planning window, from the first idle search to the day someone locks in a date.

Most of those people live in Perth, hours from where you are. They compare you with three or four others across Google, Instagram and booking sites, and they read reviews closely. Some now ask ChatGPT or Google’s AI answers where to stay or where to get married, and get a shortlist back.

Every booking through your own site keeps the guest relationship with you. Third-party booking sites still have a place, especially for first-time visitors. We build the plan to grow the bookings you own.

Direct bookings on your own website

A slow site with a booking button that dumps people onto a third-party page loses them at the last step. We build accommodation and venue websites that load fast on a phone and show real availability. They hand off cleanly to your booking engine or enquiry form. Rooms, packages and event spaces each get their own page.

If you rely on third-party booking sites, keep your listings but give people a reason to book direct, like late checkout or a welcome hamper. Some booking-site agreements limit how you can promote direct rates, and terms vary, so check yours before you advertise a lower price.

Wedding venue marketing that fills the right dates

Couples choose a venue on fit: guest numbers, the feel of the place and whether everyone can stay. We position your venue around the wedding you do best, then run Meta lead campaigns aimed at newly engaged couples. In-platform forms deliver your brochure without sending anyone off to a website.

If your venue suits small weddings, own that. When we worked with Ampersand Estates in Pemberton, it chose not to compete with the 150-guest barn weddings. It went after micro weddings of 10–30 guests instead.

Reaching Perth before the long weekend

Regional venues sell to people who live somewhere else. Most of your guests plan from Perth, so that’s where your ads, search campaigns and social need to land. We time them to the planning windows: long weekends, school holidays, wedding season and Christmas functions.

Visitors also need a reason to make the drive before they’ve committed. A discounted stay for venue tours gives couples a reason to come down, stay the night and see the place for themselves.

Photos and video that sell the stay

Guests book on photos, and plenty of properties still lead with one sunny afternoon from years ago. We plan photos and video with our partner photographers and videographers, Perth freelancers who each specialise in different areas. The aim is the seasons you want to sell: fire in July, green paddocks in spring, the lawn late in the day. Then we cut it for your website, ads, Google listing and booking site profiles, so every channel shows the same place.

If you’re selling winter stays, show winter. People booking a cold-month escape want the fireplace and the fog. A summer pool shot won’t sell them a July weekend.

Shoulder seasons and quieter months

Every property has months that sell themselves and months that don’t. We plan the quiet months first: midweek packages, winter escapes and small group retreats, with campaigns that start well before those dates. Starting when the rooms are already empty is too late.

If your peak season books out without help, don’t spend there. Put the budget into the shoulder months and weekdays, and use your email list of past guests before anything else. They already know the drive is worth it.

Showing up when guests ask where to stay

A couple might ask ChatGPT, Gemini or Google’s AI Overviews: “Should we get guest houses or a hotel for our guests at our wedding?” From what we’ve seen, the answers tend to favour places with a clear, specific position and pages that answer the question directly. Our generative engine optimisation work writes and structures that content, and builds the local search signals that tie you to your region.

Events, functions and group bookings

Corporate retreats, milestone birthdays and long-table lunches come through a different door to overnight stays. Planners want capacity, menus, rooms and a price range on one page, plus a fast reply. We build function pages and enquiry forms that ask the right questions up front. Then we run search and LinkedIn ads aimed at the people who organise them.

How we helped Ampersand Estates book seven weddings in three weeks.

  • A 56-hectare Pemberton estate with a restored 1940s barn and accommodation for 24 guests, positioned as a micro-wedding venue for 10–30 guests.
  • A Meta lead generation campaign used in-platform forms to deliver the wedding brochure to newly engaged couples, featuring the estate’s LGBTQIA+ friendly hosts.
  • Over 30 leads a week, with 7 weddings booked in the first 3 weeks.
  • A 100% tour-to-booking conversion rate.
  • SEO and GEO work that made Ampersand the first linked result in Google’s AI Overview for searches like “hotel vs venue guest house perth”.
  • A 30% increase in organic traffic (YoY).

Read full case study

A couple walking down an outdoor aisle between seated guests at Ampersand Estates

7 weddings bookedin the first 3 weeks
30+ leadsper week
100 % tour-to-bookingconversion rate
30 % increaseorganic traffic (YoY)

Got a season that needs filling?

Tell us which months are soft and how far ahead your guests usually book. We’ll show you when to start and where the budget should go.

Claim a Free Strategy Consultation

Common questions about tourism marketing

How far ahead should we start marketing a season?

Work back from when your guests start planning. Weddings book well ahead, school holiday stays a few months out, and weekend getaways closer in. Your own booking data tells you the rest: the gap between booking date and arrival date shows when each campaign should start. Most venues start too late, so the first thing we do is pull that report.

Should we stop paying commission to booking sites?

Not all at once. Booking sites bring first-time guests who’ve never heard of you, and that’s worth something. The aim is to win the second booking direct. Capture the guest’s details, follow up after the stay and give them a reason to come back through your own site. Over time, more of your calendar comes from guests you own. The booking sites go back to what they do best, which is finding new ones.

What makes a wedding venue stand out online?

A clear answer to who it’s for. Searches like “wedding venues south west WA” bring back dozens of similar listings, all promising a beautiful day. Couples remember the venue that says exactly what it does best: the guest count, the style of wedding and whether everyone can stay on site. Lead with that in your ads, photos and website copy, and the wrong-fit enquiries drop away.

Does hotel marketing work differently for a small regional stay?

Yes. A city hotel competes on location and price for nights booked close in, while a regional stay has to sell the whole trip. If you’re a small stay with a handful of rooms, start with your Google Business Profile photos, reviews and direct booking link. Pay for ads later. That costs little, and it’s where most guests check you out first.

Can you help us show up when people ask ChatGPT where to stay?

We can improve your chances, and being specific helps most. AI tools tend to pick up places that answer a real question clearly: how many guests, what’s nearby, whether you’re dog-friendly, how far from Perth. We write those answers into your site, tidy your listings and build the local signals that link you to your region. There are no guarantees in this space, and results shift as the tools change, but it’s where Ampersand Estates won its top spot.

We're hours from Perth. How do you get to know the property?

Usually we start on a video call. Walk us through the rooms, the views and the road in on your phone, and send the photos guests keep commenting on. That tells us a lot more than a brief. Whether a visit makes sense for a shoot or a strategy day depends on the project, and we’ll talk it through with you. Between calls, your account manager is a phone call away, and you’ll deal with the same people each time. If you’re in Perth for a trade show or a supplier run, drop into our Jolimont studio.

How do you measure tourism marketing results?

In bookings and revenue, then everything else. We track enquiries, tours booked, tour-to-booking rate, direct bookings versus third-party bookings and revenue by month. Traffic, reach and rankings get reported too, so you can see what’s feeding the bookings. Each quarter we look at which campaigns filled which dates, which ones only brought browsers, and plan the next season from that. You’ll always know what the money did.

building your marketing strategy

How it feels to work with Distl

We get to know the property first

First, we get to know the place. On a video call you can walk us through the rooms, the ceremony spots and the function space, and introduce whoever runs the tours. That conversation shapes everything: the photos you need, the questions guests keep asking, and why your stay is worth a few hours in the car. Whether we visit in person is something we’ll talk through with you.

Planned a season ahead

We start by plotting the calendar together: peak dates, soft months, school holidays and the weekends that always sell out. Each quarter we sit down with you and plan the next season’s campaigns, well before the dates you need filled. That way a winter push is signed off long before June. When a big booking lands or a date falls through, we adjust the campaigns with you.

Enquiries that reach a person fast

A wedding or function lead goes cold quickly. We set up forms and lead campaigns so enquiries land with whoever does your tours, with the details they need to call back that day. Your account manager keeps an eye on the lead flow and tells you if something looks off. Every form and ad is tested by a person on our team before launch.

Reporting in booked dates

Your monthly report shows what you care about: booked nights, weddings and functions, tour bookings, and how many came direct. We put the marketing numbers underneath so you can see how each date was won. Each quarter we sit down together and agree what to change for the next season. That can happen at our Jolimont studio or on a video call.

Let’s fill the dates you’re worried about

Send us your booking calendar for the past year, and we’ll show you where the gaps are and how we’d start closing them this season.

Claim a Free Strategy Consultation

08 9381 4441

Get directions

3/73 Troy Terrace
Jolimont WA 6014