Monthly Archives: December 2013

Take a Break and Hire Inn-Sitters!

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Are you running your bed and breakfast or is your B&B running you?  There are moments when you cannot close your doors because your rooms are booked yet you need a break, have an innkeeping conference to attend, or a family emergency requires you to need to leave.  Hiring an inn-sitter, or interim innkeeper, may be your best solution.

You want experienced professionals who may have been innkeepers in the past themselves.  Of course you will want to check their references, rates, and services which may vary depending upon the size of your bed and breakfast and the tasks you ask them to complete.  They usually can give an approximate range of their fees before meeting in person with you.

Because every bed and breakfast is different, you will need to set aside training time so you can communicate how you run your B&B.  Good inn-sitters are willing to do things the way you ask for them to be done.  If you want them to cook your recipes, allow time to instruct them.  They will need to know the “inns” and outs of how you manage your B&B.

When you pick people that are trustworthy and have the experience and references that assure you they are capable, then you can leave your bed and breakfast knowing that it is in good hands.

One capable couple, Lynda and Howard Lerner, serve as Interim Innkeepers in their business called Inn Caring. After they do a great job filling in for you, please give them a positive testimonial for their website.  They also serve as expert bed and breakfast consultants and teach informative seminar training classes.

 

Image by Marcus Berg of Unique Angles Photography

Posted in Hiring

Hosting Group Meetings

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Have you ever thought about facilitating a local event? Depending upon the size of your bed and breakfast, you may be able to accommodate hosting a group meeting.  These could be chamber of commerce meetings, book groups, business leads groups, or some kind of club with a particular interest.

These are opportunities for local people who are not familiar with your bed and breakfast to be introduced via their group meeting.  You may decide to be available to give tours before and/or after the meeting to attendees.

This is also a way to make money because the groups will be compensating you for using your space to hold their meetings. Word of mouth will spread quickly that your facility hosts meetings and other events such as weddings or music performances.

When people come to your bed and breakfast for a local event, they may be reminded that this would be a great place to spend the night.  Your bed and breakfast could be the perfect place for them to send their out of town relatives who are visiting.

Bed and breakfast blogging can devote blog posts promoting your events on your website.  The events will draw more people to your bed and breakfast as they visit your B&B or read about your events in your blog.  It is a win-win situation!

 

Image by Marcus Berg of Unique Angles Photography

Posted in Events

Online Guest Book

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You may already have a guest book in each room of your bed and breakfast for guests to make their comments, but did you ever think of putting their written praises on your website in an “online guest book page”?  Of course, you will need to get their permission in order to use their comment and please respect their wishes if they prefer you not give their full name or specific city when you quote them in a testimonial.

Website visitors will gain insight from what previous guests have said about their experience staying at your bed and breakfast. Some bed and breakfasts already have a web page devoted entirely to feedback they have received.

Your guests may think of reasons that you did not even think of as to why they liked staying at your bed and breakfast! It does not get any better than putting unsolicited positive feedback on your website so potential guests can feel good about booking one of your rooms because they heard recommendations directly from actual guests who have stayed with you!

 

Image by Marcus Berg of Unique Angles Photography

Posted in Associations and Ratings, Guests

B&B’s That Welcome Pets

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Petswelcome.com features accommodations that allow lodging for traveler’s pets.  This website has a specific section that allows guests to locate which bed and breakfasts welcome pets.

The advantages to allowing pets include: standing out to potential guests only willing to stay at a place that allows pets, looking hospitable to animals, and enabling the B&B owners to have their own pets.

The disadvantages include: not attracting people who are afraid of or allergic to pets, the wear and tear of housing pets, and the potential negative interactions between pets and unfamiliar people or pets with each other.

There is a happy compromise that some bed and breakfast owners are able to do. For the owners that have separate cottages or rooms with private entrances, they can be pet friendly while insuring to their other guests that the pets will remain in those areas only.

Whichever you decide, you can make it an important selling point.  To the B&B’s that allow pets, you will attract pet owners.  To the B&B’s that do not allow pets, you may attract more romantic couples.  Be sure to designate whether you allow pets or not on your website and marketing materials. You can check out our Pinterest page of bed and breakfast pets!

 

Image by Marcus Berg of Unique Angles Photography

Posted in Guests

Trip Advisor Certificate of Excellence

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TripAdvisor®, one of the world’s largest travel sites, offers trusted advice from real travelers on a wide variety of travel choices (including bed and breakfasts). TripAdvisor branded sites make up the largest travel community in the world, with more than 200 million unique monthly visitors and over 100 million reviews and opinions covering more than 2.5 million accommodations, restaurants and attractions. 

Trip Advisor also awards hospitality excellence only to establishments that consistently achieve outstanding traveler reviews on TripAdvisor. Stephen Kaufer, president and CEO, TripAdvisor said, “The Certificate of Excellence award provides top performing establishments the recognition they deserve, based on feedback from those who matter most – their customers.”

Winning bed and breakfasts can showcase their success a number of ways, including displaying the Certificate of Excellence they receive, uploading the award to their own website, or by promoting the achievement to local media with a press release. Last year’s winners promoted their award to great advantage through social media, highlighted their success on Twitter and on their business’s Facebook page, as well as notified past guests and customers of their win, thereby encouraging repeat visits!

TripAdvisor provides access to promotional services and tips for successful PR campaigns through the Management Center. To qualify for the Certificate of Excellence, businesses must maintain an overall rating of four or higher, out of a possible five, as reviewed by travelers on TripAdvisor. Additional criteria include the volume of reviews received within the last 12 months.

If your bed and breakfast earns awards, Bed and Breakfast Blogging, can write about it in a blog for your website. Awards of this caliber make a great impression on potential guests and make great content for your website!

 

Image by Marcus Berg of Unique Angles Photography

Posted in Associations and Ratings

Fun With Board Games

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Why not provide board games in a common room so your bed and breakfast guests can play?  This works well when guests want to spend a quiet day inside or when the weather does not permit outdoor time. The following are some of the best selling games of all time.

Chess is a two-player strategy board game played on a chessboard, a checkered game board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world’s most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide

The object of the game Clue is for players to strategically move around the game board (representing the rooms of a mansion), in the guise of one of the game’s six characters, collecting clues from which to deduce which suspect murdered the game’s perpetual victim, Mr. Boddy (or Dr. Black for international versions), and with which weapon and in what room.

Scrabble is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, bearing a single letter, onto a game board which is divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words in crossword fashion, that flow left to right in rows or downwards in columns. The words must be defined in a standard dictionary.

In 1979, two Canadian journalists wanted to play Scrabble but had to ditch their plans because some of the pieces were missing. Being media people, both were extremely knowledgeable with general information and popular culture. So Chris Haney and Scott Abbott decided to create a game out of it. They enlisted the help of John Haney and Ed Werner to create Trivial Pursuit. Questions were divided into different categories. In 1984, the game sold over 20 million copies.

Monopoly is an American-originated board game originally published by Parker Brothers. Subtitled “The Fast-Dealing Property Trading Game,” the game is named after the economic concept of monopoly — the domination of a market by a single entity. It is produced by the United States game and toy company Hasbro. Players move around the game board buying or trading properties, developing their properties with houses and hotels, and collecting rent from their opponents, the ultimate goal being to drive them into bankruptcy.

The game Checkers, (known internationally as draughts) is for two players, in which they make diagonal moves with the aim of capturing the opponent’s pieces by jumping over them.

Guests will appreciate the break from technology to play fun board games together.  In order to keep all of the pieces together, so that many different guests will enjoy playing the games over the years, one tip is to put the pieces in various plastic baggies: keeping like pieces and cards and pawns together.

If guests give you permission, you can take a picture of them playing in a common area of your bed and breakfast to put on your website.  Let the fun begin!

 

Image by Marcus Berg of Unique Angles Photography

Posted in Guests

Why You Need to Use Pinterest

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Pinterest may be the perfect tool for letting potential guests know about your bed and breakfast.  Ben Silbermann, Evan Sharp, and Paul Sciarra co-founded this website in March 2010. Millions of people use the website to pick up new hobbies, find their style, and plan life’s important projects.

Pinterest has pins that are like handsome little bookmarks. Whenever you find something on the web that you want to keep, add it to Pinterest. Your newly minted Pin will be here whenever you need it, and will always link back to the site it came from.

Boards are where you organize your Pins, and you get to decide what your boards will be all about. This is a great way for bed and breakfast owners to get ideas about cooking, decorating, gardening, hospitality, and more! Plus this is your chance to post pictures of your bed and breakfast, including:

  • The outside of your B&B
  • Your rooms and bathrooms
  • Your delicious breakfasts and recipes
  • Your garden, pool, hot tub, or any other amenity
  • Events such as weddings and music performances
  • Your library of books, DVD collection, etc.

Really the sky is the limit as far as how many pins you want to post. The point is that potential guests will see your bed and breakfast and click to find out more about you from your website.

This is a huge and free marketing opportunity!  All it costs is the time it takes to share the pictures (your own and the millions of other pictures already on the Pinterest website)! Be sure to check out Bed and Breakfast Blogging’s very own Pinterest website!

 

Image by Marcus Berg of Unique Angles Photography

Posted in Blog and Social Media

Frequently Asked Questions

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When potential guests arrive at your website, do they have all the pertinent information they need in order to know that they want to stay at your bed and breakfast?  Your website needs to be informative and friendly enough so that guests can be assured that your bed and breakfast is the one they want to stay at.

Consider having a “FAQ” (frequently asked questions) section on your website. This can list questions and answers about your inn and the surrounding area. The following are examples:

  • What amenities do you offer? This is your opportunity to list things like their own telephone, wi-fi access, jacuzzi or hot tub, air conditioning, cable television, library, a suite, private bathroom, etc.
  • What can I do in the area?  Answering this question gives you the chance to brag about the fun things to do in your area.  This is when you can talk about shopping, area attractions, favorite restaurants, arenas to see sports and concerts, and more!
  • Can you tell me what to expect for breakfast?  You can indicate the time breakfast is normally served, if they can make arrangements to adjust the time, what is normally served, if special dietary needs can be accommodated, and if breakfast can be delivered to their room.
  • Do you allow children to be guests?  You may allow children, but require a specific minimum age or you may decide to keep it only open to adults.
  • Do you allow pets?  Do you have pets living at your bed and breakfast? You may allow pets or have separate cottages for your guests to stay in with their pets. Some B&B owners have pets that live in the B&B, but their pets may be restricted to only specific areas of the place.
  • What about the details?  This is where you can bring up how you handle early arrivals and late departures, your credit card policies, if you have a minimum number of nights they must stay, and if you have any discounts or special packages.
  • How much privacy will we have?  You can answer their questions such as if there is a common area to meet other guests and if they have to interact with the other guests at breakfast and if they will hear the other guests behind the walls.
  • Do you allow smoking?  92% of all B&B’s do not allow smoking inside. There is a trend for healthier environments.  Most states do not allow smoking in public restaurants.
  • Where do the innkeepers sleep?  Many times you live on the premises or just a few minutes away. It gives guests peace of mind to know that they will be able to reach you if and when they need to do so.

Having an FAQ section, on your website, helps answer any questions they may be too timid to ask, but truly want to know.  I also recommend giving guests, who have paid for one of your rooms, a number where they can always reach you in case of emergency.  This helps everyone feel more comfortable!

Posted in Amenities, Guests

Your Breakfast Menu

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Do your bed and breakfast guests give you feedback on your cooking?  It is important to pay attention to a comment if you have heard it many times.  If ten guests rave that you have awesome blueberry pancakes, then you must have awesome blueberry pancakes.  If there is something you make that does not normally get finished on people’s plates, that may mean that you are not preparing it in a way that most people like.

Variety is the key to “spicing” up life.  If you make the same breakfast menu over and over, you are bound to not enjoy cooking as much.  Try implementing some new recipes as well as adjusting recipes with great guest feedback.  For example, maybe you can offer strawberry pancakes next time you make pancakes.

If you would like feedback on your cooking, but do not want to make it awkward for you or your guests, then offer them an opportunity to provide you feedback on their stay by answering a short survey.  Some of the questions can focus on the food they had at your B&B.

  • What breakfast items were on your plate?
  • Which ones were your favorite?
  • Were there any items you disliked?
  • Do you have any suggestions for us?

This way guests have an opportunity to say something without feeling like they are judging you and your cooking. Most people like to give helpful feedback.  For any unkind comments, take them with a grain of salt!  You will likely receive some very useful advice for planning future breakfasts.

 

Image by Marcus Berg of Unique Angles Photography

Posted in Food

Stay Inn-spired

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Especially around the holidays, it is easy to feel like you have too much to do to actually have time to enjoy it.  Remember that, as a bed and breakfast owner, you are helping to make other people’s Christmases very special.

Even if you cannot take time off from inn-keeping, you can still be inn-spired. Think of at least 5 positives that happened this year associated with your bed and breakfast. Now think of 5 positives you would like to see happen in 2014.

When you focus on the good, you tend to get more of it.  You can make your bed and breakfast even more successful in the coming New Year.

What actionable steps can you take toward making those 5 things happen in 2014?  The secret to success is step by step. A little bit each and every day turns what seems impossible into a reality!  The solution is making progress every day toward achieving your bed and breakfast ownership goals.

 

Image by Marcus Berg of Unique Angles Photography

Posted in Success
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