I have several clients and I have an easy time (or at least MORE calculated) tweaking ad copy and bids to help conversion rate, and cost per conversion. I have a puzzle. I have a top line brand name hotel, an amazing rate (listed in the ad) and a 2nd tier city (ie, not san francisco, new york etc) so very little competition.
Here is my problem. I have booked 2 rooms out of almost 2,000 clicks. I primarily focus on keywords like city + hotel, city + hotels etc.
I have theorized that people are maybe NOT seeing the rate we advertise when they search reservations the rate is different or the dates are not available. Also, I have not had a ton of experience with hotels - mabe a LOT of browsing...and eventually they go through the parent site and find my property and THAT site gets credit for the booking?
Is there anything else I can do?
The obvious things I checked were things like pre-qualifying buyers from casual browsers (eg, try putting the price in the headline), big negative keyword lists etc, making sure that you're targeting Las Vegas, NV not Las Vegas, NM, that sort of thing.
I think you're right about users browsing for hotels; I know, as a user I'll shop around and try to get a discount on the rack rate.
I'd be interested to hear how you get along. If I think of anything else, I'll post it.
