You already understand the importance of link building for search engine optimization purposes, so it’s time to take your link building to the next level. Obtaining links from quality websites can help raise your hotel’s organic search rankings. In addition, by creatively utilizing some of your current sales strategies you can obtain links on sites that encourage extended stays, which in return can help you increase your hotel's average length of stay (LOS).

Start by talking with your sales team and asking a few questions: Who are they already reaching out to for sales leads? You may find that just by having this simple discussion you can already come up with a list of new sites to target for link building. Your sales team is probably already in various discussions with a variety of companies attempting to negotiate group rates for upcoming conferences or meetings near or at your hotel. Work with your sales team to build each group a specific booking code to place on their company site to make it easier for attendees to book their stay at your property. Link building can be as simple as that!

Then, build upon the list they provide to you. Consider this: Why would someone want to stay at a hotel for longer than a few nights? In what situations would be a potential guest need week-long or month-long accommodations? Below are a few suggestions to help you brainstorm:

• Partner with local area realtors and ask them to refer house hunters to your hotel verbally and on their website. When a family is relocating, typically one or more members of the family will do the majority of the house hunting. Since this can be a longer process, this family member will typically need to stay close to their new location. Offer a local realtor an incentive for referring clients to your hotel, and be sure to ask them to link from their site to your hotel sites. You could even set up special rates for “house hunting” family members looking for accommodations for 3+ days. Work with local moving services to explore opportunities for marketing on their sites.

• Stay current with construction plans in the area. Any time there is construction happening in the area, there will be a need for housing and opportunities to book extended hotel stays. If a new neighborhood is under construction in the area, new residents may need a temporary housing solution until their new home is complete. Ask for links from the new neighborhood’s informational website to the hotel’s website to get in front of the new residents. Likewise, if a new shopping center or restaurant is opening in the area, you’ll want to be listed on these sites as well; many companies will send employees from different stores or restaurants to help open the new establishment and these teams will need somewhere to stay.

• Contact local businesses to discuss relocation for employees. For example, if you have any family members that work with an airline, you may know that airline employees frequently relocate. Work closely with the airline to form a partnership to become the referred hotel for extended stay while these employees search for permanent housing.

• Work with local moving services to explore opportunities for marketing on their sites. Talk to moving van & storage facilities to ask for leads. Also, ask them to include a link to your hotel site to your hotel website.

• If your hotel is located near a symphony or concert venue, work with the talent coordinator to secure your hotel as a preferred property for performers. Often, groups like symphonies or bands would prefer to stay in hotel accommodations while in your town than to try to sleep on a crowded tour bus. Although it won’t be a constant revenue-generator for your hotel, securing a partnership now could result a large group for an extended time period in the future.

• Contact the webmaster at your local hospital and rehabilitation center. While the patient will most likely be staying in the hospital, friends and family may need a place to stay to be close to their loved one. Become a recommended hotel and ask the hospital to link to your website. If you can, offer a discounted rate to family members of hospital patients to encourage them to stay with you, rather than sleeping on a hospital chair.

• Local police and fire stations may also be a good resource to acquire extended stay guests. When tragedies happen, like a house fire, people will need somewhere to stay fast, and for an undisclosed time frame. You may be able to speak with the Red Cross as well, as they are known for helping displaced homeowners after a disaster.

• Reach out to local divorce attorneys. When couples decide to split, most likely someone is going to need some temporary housing. Ask local divorce lawyers to direct their clients to your hotel.

Even if you’re not technically an "extended stay hotel," partnering with local organizations that could help you attract guests with longer length stays. Depending on your property and market, some of the suggestions above may not work for your hotel. However, if you do end up with a guest with a 30+ night stay as a result, you’ll be happy you took the time to acquire these links.

Recently, there has been some discussion in the SEO community regarding traditional link-building methods in the face of the new updates from Google.  With link building coming into full-focus again, it is important to refresh your link-building strategy and realign it with the overall goals of your online marketing campaign.  We have already given you a link-building 101 refresh with ideas on how to earn links with partners in other industries, so I'm here to tell you another non-traditional way to get quality links and positive publicity.

Hotels can take advantage of link building with business relationships that are already established through your sales, catering, and events teams. While these teams play an integral role in hotel business, they are often overlooked because of the "heads in beds" focus in the industry.  However, the business brought in by the sales, events and catering team offers low hanging fruits of link building opportunities that are ripe for the picking! I'm here to give you a few non-traditional link building tips that can easily help you leverage your efforts by strengthening existing business relationships.

Every time you host an event at your hotel, you could be missing out on a number of link building opportunities.  It doesn't matter whether you are a small boutique hotel or a convention property, or whether you are hosting an annual convention, company retreat, sales presentation, theme party or formal affair.  Regardless, these tips will help make sure you are getting the most online marketing value from your existing business relationships and the events that you host on property.

1. Websites for groups and events - During the sales and event planning process, make sure that your sales managers inquire about the online status of events or groups that will be coming in-house.  Ask if the group has a webpage and if they have a separate landing page for the event that you are hosting at the hotel.  If they do, ensure that your hotel name, address, phone number and website address are listed on the event/group webpage.  You can also provide a link to the custom group webpage on your hotel's website or a booking widget for that group, which allows attendees looking to easily make a reservation.
2. Social media channels for groups and events - In the same conversation about the status of the group's website, ask if the group is active on social media.  If they are, make sure to give them permission and encourage them to link to your social media channels.  In promoting the event on Facebook, encourage the client to link to the hotel's profile page, post on the hotel's wall, and tag any pictures of the event with the hotel's location.  In promoting the event on Twitter, encourage the client to use the hotel's handle (@username), create a hashtag (#sample) for the event that both the client and you as the hotel can follow, and tell the event attendees to do the same. Now, when we talk about link building strategies we usually talk about inbound links (links on other channels pointing to our website) more so than outbound links (links from the hotel pointing to other websites).  Social media is one platform that can benefit from using outbound links.  In order to gain more social media exposure, a good practice is to promote events, groups, meetings, and weddings through our social media channels, with the permission of the client.  Outbound links to the client's social media profiles allow you to promote the event to attendees, engage with them while they are on property and ask for feedback or offer assistance during the event. This is just another avenue to get the word out about your social media presence and extend your online presence.  With sales and event managers often preoccupied with managing the group on property, it is easy to forget that the attendees are engaging with the hotel in online areas while they are on property.  By working together with the event planners to create a hashtag for the event and promoting that for attendee use, you can easily track what the attendees are saying about the event and their experience at the hotel.  Monitor your hotel's Foursquare account to see who is "checking-in" at the event and engage with those guests to ensure they are having a good time and offer assistance if needed.
3. Vendors associated with the in-house group - In getting to know a client--whether it be a couple that is hosting their wedding ceremony and reception at your hotel, a family hosting a bar or bat mitzvah, or charity hosting a banquet or silent auction--most hotels allow outside vendors to contribute to the production of an event.  These vendors include florists, photographers, bakeries, dance lesson companies, or caterers who most likely have web pages and are active on social media.  By learning about the different vendors with which you will be working and co-coordinating, you can easily cross-promote services, build links, and increase engagement.  Another important factor in linking with vendors is the ability to share and link firsthand imagery and photography on both your social media outlets and on your webpage.  Get permission from the event hosts to take pictures of the event and post them on your website and social media channels. You can also ask them to tag their own photos at your hotel along with the other vendors that they have used.

These outreach tips are much easier to implement than other traditional linking methods and are a great way to cross-promote groups, meetings, and events at your property. All of these interactions provide valuable publicity and strength in your online marketing campaign, particularly within a given in-house group. There's also a good chance that your competitors aren't doing this type of link building, so it's an excellent way to set yourself apart from the crowd.

One of the most important tactics in optimizing your website for search engines actually takes place off-site.  Link building is the on-going and at times daunting task of connecting with other relevant, quality websites to add a link back to your web property.  The benefit is twofold: not only can you tap into new traffic sources from these link partners, but increasing your link equity actually has a tremendous impact on your site's ability to rank in the search engines.  Every good link increases your site’s SEO relevance, ultimately causing it rank higher on search engine result pages.  We search marketers refer to it as "link juice." It signals to engines like Google and Bing that your site is a credible and useful page for searchers.  As you learn to link build you will be better able to determine which sites are more valuable link partners and which sites can actually detract from your SEO power.

One of the first steps you will want to take is to research the different industries relative to your hotel that you would want to link back to your hotel website.  Think about what services your hotel offers and what current industries already drive business to your hotel.  Then begin searching online for these types of sites that can link back to your website and ultimately drive these searchers to book their stay with you.

Suggestions for relevant link partners in other industries:

• Attractions – Start by contacting larger local attractions like museums, zoos, theme parks and sports teams that attract the most visitors to your hotel’s local area.  Then think on a smaller scale of the local businesses that bring out-of-towners to the area.  It can be beneficial to team up with attractions such as a local golf course, mall, garden, winery or state park and request to have a link to your site added on their website.
• Schools - Top level domains such as .edu are some of the most valuable sites in terms of link juice.  That is because .edu, much like .gov, .mil and to some extent, .org, are usually domains reserved for well-known, established institutions--a highly desirable link partner.  To connect with .edu sites, search local universities for accommodation pages for campus visitors, parents and alumni.  Special events like homecoming, parents’ weekend or graduation often have their own landing page and can be a great place to add your hotel as a nearby lodging option.
• Local Events – Nothing brings people to an area quite like a popular event.  Know an annual event that happens in your area? Find the event website and request to have your hotel added as a nearby place to stay for people traveling into town for the big event.  Think beyond events happening directly in your town.  Often times events taking place in the second town over will have an overflow of visitors needing to find a hotel outside of the event’s immediate location.
• Restaurant – Building links to promote other products and services your hotel offers is a great strategy to bring in additional revenue at the hotel beyond room nights.  If your hotel has an on-site restaurant, look for websites supporting local area restaurants and request to have your hotel restaurant added.  Follow these restaurant link building tips to get started for your hotel.
• Event Space – Similar to link building for the hotel restaurant, you can establish links that feature the hotel’s event space.  Search for websites about local meeting rooms, banquet halls and conference space as appropriate to have your hotel facilities included.  Start with wedding sites like theknot.com and mywedding.com to add a listing for your hotel.  Also connect with Convention and Visitors Bureau websites to ensure your hotel is not only mentioned as nearby lodging, but also lists the hotel event space available for business conferences and conventions.
• Pet-Friendly – Are pets welcome at your hotel? Be in front of people searching for pet-friendly hotels on sites such as TakeYourPet.com and BringFido.com.  Ranking organically for pet-friendly hotel keywords may be difficult, but being present on pet-friendly hotel directories is an excellent plan to be found for pet owners looking for hotels where their furry friends are welcome.
• Blogs – Another smart way to build links is to connect with local bloggers and travel bloggers.  Reach out to bloggers who write about the local area and ask to have an article written about the hotel.  There are many bloggers who write about travel experiences, who will offer to write about your hotel and the nearby things to do.  Being featured in a blog is great exposure and can even go viral when shared across social media channels.

Pursuing these industries is a great starting point for your hotel’s link building efforts.  Acquiring new links to your hotel website is a never-ending task, and searching for industry-relevant sites is just one tactic you can take.  Create a strategic link building plan for your hotel and see your hard work pay off in the form of higher search rankings and increased site traffic.