GMB for Hotels Question

[Nathan_NZ]

Hi all, I have a client that is a hotel chain and I'm looking for ways to improve their GMB profiles.

I've noticed that some of the hotels have a business description under "hotel details" in the knowledge panel while others don't. I read somewhere that this info is aggregated by Google from the website and other digital listings. For one of the hotels that does have a business description, this seems to have been pulled from an obscure review website.

Since we don't have an option to customize their hotel details section...does anyone know how to get Google to populate this area?

 

[Lluc]

Hi Nathan, all hotels should have a "hotel details" (the equivalent of a business description for other businesses) section in the K.P. Could you send some examples of hotels without it? Are the hotels brand new or pending to open for the first time?

As you said, hotels cannot edit their own description and must rely on Google writing them. I have never had a case where the hotel had no description (unless it is a brand new hotel and there are no citations from reputable sources such as Booking, Tripadvisor, etc), what I often have to do is request Google to change the description because it is incorrect.

Both hotel experts Tim Capper and Craig Harkins confirm that the best way to modify the "hotel details" text is to contact your Google Hotels Ads account manager and request that it is modified. Contacting GMB support has never worked for me. In this particular case, where there is no description to modify you might want to leave your case in the GMB forum so that a P.E. can help you.

I would also recommend that you identify the sources from where Google is pulling the info to write the "hotel details" and you modify the incorrect information. You will want to clean up your citations, especially in industry-specific business listings and directories. Both Bright Local and White Spark are very helpful for this. This will also reduce the number of suggestions/edits Google will suggest to your listings with regards to hotel amenities and services. During the last weeks, there has been a large increase of Google suggesting amenities and services.

If it is possible, it would be interesting to test how many sources/citations Google needs in order to write the hotel description (if this is the case and it is not a bug of some sort). Do these hotels have already a profile in TripAdvisor, HolidayCheck, Booking, other OTA's, etc?

 

[Nathan_NZ]

Hi Nathan, all hotels should have a "hotel details" (the equivalent of a business description for other businesses) section in the K.P. Could you send some examples of hotels without it? Are the hotels brand new or pending to open for the first time?

As you said, hotels cannot edit their own description and must rely on Google writing them. I have never had a case where the hotel had no description (unless it is a brand new hotel and there are no citations from reputable sources such as Booking, Tripadvisor, etc), what I often have to do is request Google to change the description because it is incorrect.

Both hotel experts Tim Capper and Craig Harkins confirm that the best way to modify the "hotel details" text is to contact your Google Hotels Ads account manager and request that it is modified. Contacting GMB support has never worked for me. In this particular case, where there is no description to modify you might want to leave your case in the GMB forum so that a P.E. can help you.

I would also recommend that you identify the sources from where Google is pulling the info to write the "hotel details" and you modify the incorrect information. You will want to clean up your citations, especially in industry-specific business listings and directories. Both Bright Local and White Spark are very helpful for this. This will also reduce the number of suggestions/edits Google will suggest to your listings with regards to hotel amenities and services. During the last weeks, there has been a large increase of Google suggesting amenities and services.

If it is possible, it would be interesting to test how many sources/citations Google needs in order to write the hotel description (if this is the case and it is not a bug of some sort). Do these hotels have already a profile in TripAdvisor, HolidayCheck, Booking, other OTA's, etc?

Awesome info! I'll message you with the specific example.