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The guiding principle to follow when marketing a gite or rental property is that it is as lucrative to have one rental property and market it very well, as to have two properties poorly marketed. Having seen the large numbers of properties near us that are empty except for five weeks in July and August I know this to be true. So what do you need to do to increase your occupancy rate?

Price

First I will just make the comment that we can all fill our properties most of the time if the prices we charge are a lot less than our competitors. So the challenge, of course, is to achieve bookings at a market price, not at any price. What we are trying to achieve is maximum net profit ( broadly income, less wear and tear, taxes, and bills incurred). I am suggesting  that by increasing marketing spend, or simply spending it more effectively, you can increase this net profit. The main additional 'cost' is the time involved in planning and implementing the marketing.

 

Personal Websites

An internet site is very important, because it provides additional information about your property, answers any questions potential holidaymakers may have, and ensures that people know exactly what they are booking. It also should increase the number of enquiries received that you can convert to actual bookings. (Just to throw in a bit of publicity for our own services, we can get you online with a website for less than £90 including hosting - see Website Design section.)

However, your internet site alone will not fill your property. Having your site feature high in the results in Google and other search engines can take months or years to achieve, and may never happen. The Factsheets section offers some suggestions on how to improve your search engine rankings.

Meanwhile get yourself listed in the France Directory and start boosting your website popularity in the search engines...