Five ways to boost your direct booking website – and get found by AI search

Former hotel general manager turned short-term rental web specialist Craig Webb breaks down the five website mistakes costing hosts direct bookings – and exactly how to fix them.

If you're a short-term rental host with a direct booking website, chances are you're leaving money on the table – not because your property isn't good enough, but because your website isn't working hard enough.

Craig Webb knows this better than most. A former hotel general manager who retrained as an SEO and web specialist during lockdown, Craig now manages around 60 STR clients, hosts 250 websites, and has a front-row seat to the mistakes hosts make again and again.

During a recent Host Planet Bitesize episode, he shared five practical tips you can act on today. Catch the full episode on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple.

Tip 1: Treat your website like a sales funnel, not a brochure

The most common mistake hosts make is trying to put everything on their homepage. Craig's number one tip is to stop thinking about your website as a brochure and start thinking about it as a sales funnel.

Here's how the funnel works in practice:

• Homepage (top of funnel): Broad keywords. What you offer and where. Nothing more.

• Property pages (mid funnel): Specific keywords – property type, target audience, key features.

• Checkout / enquiry page (bottom of funnel): Answer objections. Parking, Wi-Fi, cancellation policy. This is where questions get answered.

Think of it as a domino effect. Each page needs to topple into the next. Visitors don't need your cancellation policy before they've decided they like your property. Let the funnel do the work.

Craig's test? Ask your granny. If she can land on your homepage and figure out what you do and where within three seconds, you're on the right track. If she's confused, so is Google – and so are your potential guests.

Tip 2: Build dedicated pages for each target audience

If you're targeting multiple types of guests – contractors, leisure travellers, romantic couples, families – don't try to speak to all of them on the same page. Build a dedicated page for each.

Craig uses his own business as an example. He ranks strongly for "contractor accommodation in Milton Keynes" because he built an entire page around that single search intent. The page title, URL, and H1 all include the keyword. And every word on the page speaks directly to contractors – vans, parking, Wi-Fi, proximity to infrastructure projects. There's no mention of family attractions, because contractors don't care.

What about AI search and GEO?

Craig also raised how people search differently when using AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Google's AI Overview. Instead of typing "contractor accommodation Milton Keynes," they might say: "I'm travelling to Milton Keynes on 21st August with four men, two vans, one person with a disability, and a dog – what are my options?"

That level of specificity means your content needs to answer real, detailed questions. The best format is FAQ sections structured as questions and answers — a heading that is the question, and a paragraph below that is the answer. This is what AI assistants extract and surface. In the world of GEO (Generative Engine Optimisation) and AEO (Ask Engine Optimisation), questions and answers are the new keywords.

Example FAQs for a contractor accommodation page:

Is there parking for vans at this property? Yes, the property has off-road parking suitable for two large work vans, with 24-hour access and security lighting.

Is the property suitable for guests with limited mobility? We have a ground-floor bedroom with level access and a wet room shower available on request. Please contact us to arrange.

Do you allow pets at your contractor accommodation? Well-behaved dogs are welcome at no additional charge. We ask that dogs are not left unattended in the property.

Tip 3: Build local SEO authority by going deeper than anyone else

Google uses an algorithm called EEAT – Experience, Expertise, Authority, and Trust. To rank well for local searches, you need to demonstrate that you are the expert on your area and your ideal guest's needs.

Craig's advice: don't just write a vague "things to do in [location]" post. Go deep. Really deep.

If you're targeting dog walkers in Wales, you should have content covering which pubs allow dogs, which beaches permit dogs at different times of year, the best dog-friendly walks, nearby vets, and dog wash facilities. Your target guest should find your website more useful than any tourist board.

James shared a great example from a previous Host Planet interview: a villa host in Belize who had written blog posts about everything visitors searched for – car hire, surfboard hire, where to eat, where to walk. He became the local authority, and Google ranked him accordingly.

Don't forget to audit your existing content

A bloated blog full of outdated posts actively hurts you. Go back through everything you've published and delete or update anything that's stale. Blog posts about lockdown restrictions, outdated festival listings, or old event guides should be refreshed or removed. Review the accuracy of your top-performing posts at least once a year.

Tip 4: Optimise your site for mobile – most guests browse on their phones

Around 70% of web traffic to STR sites comes from mobile. The problem? Most holiday let websites are designed on a desktop and never properly tested on a phone. The result is misaligned text, images that don't scale, buttons too small to tap accurately, and – most critically – slow load times.

What to check:

• Test every page on a real phone, not just a browser emulator

• Ensure buttons are large enough to tap without hitting adjacent elements

• Compress all images – a 5MB photo on a homepage is one of the most common speed killers

• Reduce logo file sizes – a logo rarely needs to be more than 100KB

• Test your speed using Google's free tool: pagespeed.web.dev

PageSpeed Insights gives you separate scores for mobile and desktop, and tells you exactly what's slowing your site down. A poor mobile score affects your Google ranking as well as your guest experience. You have approximately three seconds before a visitor leaves. Make them count.

Tip 5: Use free Google tools to stop flying blind

Craig's final tip is the foundation everything else rests on: connect Google Analytics and Google Search Console to your website. Both are free. Both are essential. And yet many hosts have neither.

Google Analytics tells you who is visiting your site – their demographics, device, location, and broad interests. It also shows you when they visit: peak days, peak times, seasonal patterns. Craig recalled using this data as a hotel general manager to ensure extra phone cover on Friday evenings, when data showed guests were most actively browsing.

Google Search Console tells you what people typed into Google before finding your site. That's a goldmine of content ideas. If guests are finding you through searches you haven't specifically targeted, that's a signal to build more content in that direction. Search Console also flags broken links, indexing issues, and missing sitemaps.

WordPress users can connect both tools using the free Google Site Kit plugin. For other platforms, your web developer can add a short snippet of code to your site's header.

James also pointed out that AI tools like ChatGPT can supplement this research. Ask: "What are visitors to [your location] searching for?" – and use the answers to identify content gaps on your site.

Your five-point direct booking website checklist

1. Sales funnel structure – Homepage = broad. Property pages = specific. Checkout = reassurance.

2. Audience-specific pages – One page per target guest type. Nail the keywords, URL, H1, and content.

3. Local SEO depth – Become the expert on your area for your ideal guest. Keep content fresh.

4. Mobile optimisation – Test on a real phone. Compress images. Use PageSpeed Insights.

5. Free Google tools – Connect Analytics and Search Console. Data first, then decisions.

About Craig Webb

Craig is a former hotel general manager who now specialises in SEO and direct booking websites for the short-term rental industry. His agency – Webb Marketing – manages around 60 STR clients and hosts 250 websites.