Romantic Weekend in London on a Budget

Romantic Weekend in London on a Budget

London has a reputation as an expensive city, but there is plenty happening around town that is free, and lots of great options of places to eat and drink on a budget. If you're heading here for a romantic weekend, you might be surprised how many great things there are to do. Here are our top ten things to do on a Romantic weekend in London on a budget.

Check out our post for Equity Point Hostels here

Eating and Drinking in Girona

Eating and Drinking in Girona

If you're looking to head to Girona then check out our recommendations of where to eat and drink in Girona on a budget, from the famous cafe Fabrica to typical tapas.

Here's the post we created for Equity Point Hostel, Girona

http://www.equity-point.com/blogs/equity-point/eating-and-drinking-in-girona/

What to see in Barcelona this summer

What to see in Barcelona this summer

Blog post for Equity Point

What to see in Barcelona this summer, from live music and festivals, to street parties and fireworks displays.
The catalonian capital; famous for Gaudi architecture, Gothic old town alleyways, food, and football, is a great destination all year round, but if you’re planning a visit to Barcelona this summer then check out these events. If you love to party, then try a fiesta Barcelona style!

Read more here

www.equity-point.com/blogs

10 Tips for Stress Free Travel

Firstly, do you want a break from the normal routine of life? If so, then don’t approach it the same way as you do at home. Planning, organising, technology, friendships and rushing around can all be exhausting. If you want to take a break from the norm, then simplify things.


1. Chose your Companions Wisely
Hitting the open road, whether to relax or seek thrills, is a big adventure and naturally you want to share this with friends. However who you travel with is a key part of the experience and good friends aren’t necessarily good travel companion. You need to be able to tolerate them for intense periods of time (and likewise) and have the same aspirations as to how and where you’ll travel, or you’ll find yourself sneaking out in the middle of the night and boarding the next bus out of there.

2. Go it Alone
A favourite of mine for long trips that are going to be life-changing is to travel solo. It offers you a chance to explore ‘you’ for a while, so maybe go it alone and find out how good it is to be just you. You’ll always meet people along the way (whether you like it or not) and if transient or friends for life, these people will make up a part of your travelling experience just as friends from home would.

3. Pack Less
Do you really need every travel gadget out there? Simplify your luggage with a few key items of clothing and essentials. It will hurt less if it all gets lost too. I love the feel of books and swapping along the way, but a Kindle is a great way to pack all your reading needs. Likewise if you want to take a mobile phone with you, a smartphone that can be used for photo snaps, emailing home, booking ahead and using travel apps is ideal. Keep it simple – less to worry about means more time enjoying where you are!

4. Go with the Flow
I love planning trips, I love reading about the places, culture, history, and trawling through maps of where I want to go. Then I just go. Not with any plans, but just with an idea of sites and what highlights I don’t want to miss. I still always pack a guide book because I like to thumb through it, but the rest is a surprise. If you have a tight schedule or are meeting up with people, then check transport isn’t a weekly affair, but don’t get bogged down in booking every night in advance.

5. But Don’t Get Caught Out
If you’re travelling in peak season or want to be in certain places on certain dates, then book ahead to guarantee. Now the whole world is obsessed with online bookings, those people have forced a situation where no rooms are held for ‘walk ins’ – or people just arriving without warning – the old fashioned way. If you want to stay somewhere decent and it’s peak season or during a festival, you’ll only guarantee your desired accommodation by booking in advance. If you like an adventure, wing it!

6. Enjoy the Moment
Don’t be the person who doesn’t see anything because your camera is fixed to your face, or you spent all your time on your hostel wifi telling everyone on facebook what you were ‘experiencing’. Cut loose the technology and open your eyes and ears to what’s actually around you. Other people are more likely to want to talk to you too!

7. Speak the language
Or at least play the guitar. Locals appreciate you making an attempt at their language, and it’s only polite to learn the minimum. It’s also useful to be able to communicate. If you’re not good at languages, learn the guitar. Bought us a meal in India once, and you’ll definitely pick up some hippy girls along the way as a bonus.

8. Trust your instincts
If it doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t. Dodgy men, alleys, drug dealers, cops and food are all best avoided. You’ll thank yourself, the worse that can happen by playing it safe is you mildy offend someone, walk the long way or go without lunch. The other way and you’re in a world of pain.

9. Get Insurance
The downside of traveling (and life in general) is that shit happens. You can easily be drugged, robbed, fall out a tree-house, or leave all your stuff on the roof of a bus. Having done all of these, I’m an advocat of buying ‘peace of mind'; because when you need it, you really really need it.

10. Enjoy it! Don’t force it.
If you arrive at your destination and find yourself feeling disappointed, overwhelmed or even unsafe, then move on. You can always come back another time. Pushing boundaries should be more about trying water-skiing than fear and loathing. And not everywhere is exciting and welcoming either – it’s not just you.

Top 10 Travel Apps from Huffpost

What are the best travel apps?  Here's a list of the top 10 you need to travel c/o #huffingtonpost
From Google Maps to Shazam, read the article here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/chloe-gunning/10-apps-every-traveller-n_b_6068570.html?utm_hp_ref=tw #apps #travel #traveladvice

Fake Accounts on Facebook

With so many of Facebook's profiles being fake, how many are real 'likes'?

Well this infographic from Joyoftech.com might help explain!

Make sure you target the right audience with your posts and campaigns and beware of those fake accounts!

Top 5 Tips for Marketing with Facebook

Having trouble attracting the right audience on Facebook? Try these 5 tips to help market your business

Facebook is moving towards just being an advertising tool, and as such they're developing functions and models that help marketeers. Here are some of the ways to maximise your Facebook marketing.


1. Make a New Product and Boost it Announcement

Despite all the fake accounts on Facebook - boosting posts is still relatively effective as you will stay in the Newsfeed for longer. Use this for announcements, not advertisements - by keeping it to news you don't turn people off.


2. Make use of Your Newsfeed

How often do you look at pages? Most people on Facebook interact via the newsfeed - this is where the shares and likes are won from. Avoid writing updates that require people to go to your page and leave the newsfeed, such as entering a competition. Try using ActionSprout to allow someone to sign, join, enter from the newsfeed itself.

3. Customise your Marketing to your Audience

You can target your marketing on Facebook and reach specific fans. One such tip is using the 'Custom Audience' option, especially if you post in multiple languages. You can also customise it to people who have visited your website, so know your users and set a different marketing message for them. Essentially you're getting to know your market better and targeting them based on what they are looking at.


4. Don't Run the Same Adverts

To make the most of your advertising efforts and maximise your budget - run a trial of adverts and use different keywords for each. Use only a small portion of your budget and find out which adverts have the best engagement. It may sound a hit and miss way to find your return on investment, but split testing gives the best results to find exactly what segments of the market your reaching and with which keywords.


5. Use Audience Insights

These measuring functions are there to help you and should be used! Take advantage of the insights and check when your users are most active - times of day, where and what they're looking at. This should make you better equipped to target your audience so use this as a tool and engage with them.


For more suggestions on how to market your business check out www.hosteldoctor.com

Best Hostel Views according to Instagram

Want a Room with a View?

Instagram has put together a list of 30 of the best hostels with a view worth visiting for!

Has your hostel got the best views in town and didn't get a mention? We think Equity Point in Marrakech has got a great roof top view and deserves a mention!

http://www.thehostelworker.com/30-hostels-with-a-view-according-to-instagram/

How to deal with negative reviews

Top 5 tips on how to deal with negative reviews from customers and turn them to your advantage.

1. Don’t ignore them! Internet use now means that everyone has an opportunity to post about their experiences as customers, but it also provides a platform to answer these posts and create a meaningful response. Use this to your advantage to turn negative reviews around and show that you value their opinion.

2. See negative comments as constructive feedback on your business. There are always going to be customers who complain for the sake of it, but there will also be valid comments about how to improve your business. Take the comments on board about what experience your hostel offers your customers, and make changes based on this.

3. Thank customers for their feedback – good and bad. By acknowledging and improving on any problems you can create a better experience for the next customers walking through your door.

4. Be polite and professional. Not all reviews will be either of these but your replies are there for all potential customers to see, so keep your tone professional and explain any questions or issues raised and what you can do to avoid these problems occurring in the future.

5. Admit when you are wrong. Things go wrong in any business, but it’s best to acknowledge this, apologise, and move on. Some customers may pursue a refund or discount, but most will just want to know that you have heard their complaint and will be taking steps to avoid these issues in the future.

Make sure you regularly check all platforms for feedback and comments – whether it’s tripadvisor or hashtags of your hostel. Many people use social media platforms to voice their experiences so check your channels are up to date and respond to messages accordingly. There will also be mentions in blogs and other forums, so make sure you have Google Alerts set up (it’s free) and can monitor any posts about you. Remember that your customer’s experience of your hostel doesn’t end when they check out!

Top 5 Tips for Using Pinterest for your Hostel

Pinterest is a way to virtually 'pin' or bookmark images and videos of interest to a board in your Pinterest account. For businesses it's a great way to create boards to showcase your product, but also to get images from your website and blog shared by other users for free. It's a great platform for the travel industry as it appeals to people as a way to collect ideas together and places to visit, engage with other users to promote your hostel.


1. Make your account a Pinterest business page

Make sure you use Pinterest as a way to represent your business not just for fun. It only takes a few minutes to set up a business page and means you can access analytics and metrics to find out users, repins and impressions. This means you can quickly analyse which types of images are engaging or appeal most. Then focus your pinning on your audience.


2. Use 'Place Pins'

Pinterest introduced 'Place Pins' in 2013 which is specifically to allow people to plan vacations. There are almost 100 million of these now being used! There's also an iPhone app to pin on-the-go. The place pins are simple to use - just add a map and drop pins with the address and telephone number. You can even create a board of your location with recommended tourist sites and restaurants ready to share with people heading to your destination. Check out Air bnb's 'Loved in Paris' board as an example of how to do it! http://www.pinterest.com/airbnb/loved-by-parisians/


3. Use all your assets

Pin all your photos but also any maps and blog images too. Make sure you add proper descriptions with hash tags and alt tags incorporated and urls where applicable, and that your website images are named for search engines, such as 'xyzhostel-Paris-bar', so when they're shared it has the correct information. You can tag people to pins too using @. If you work with a charity add a board for your photos with them and the activities you work on together. You can even add old pictures showing the history of your brand to create a story board.


4. Add a 'On Hover pin' to your web, blog and social media images

This encourages people to 'pin' an image whenever they hover their mouse over it - a great 'call to action' in marketing terms. Obviously this won't work on touch screens but is an effective way to encourage re-pinning. (Pinterest has instructions of how to do this)


5. Interact with other users

As with other social media sites, engaging with users is key. There is space to comment or converse with people pinning your pins, and equally respond to comments directed to you. Find out what boards people are placing you in, for example 'Paris Vacation Inspiration' and engage with your audience. You can also seek out influential pinners and write messages to them, for example people with the same target audience. Make sure you follow competitors and similar businesses to find out their latest news. You can also create Group Boards and invite users to collaborate (you have to be following each other to invite them).

And make sure you link to your Facebook and Twitter accounts!

Check out other hostel pages to find out what friends are doing, and see what works for you.
Good Luck!

For more advice see the Hostel Health Tips on www.hosteldoctor.com

DOs & DON'Ts for SEO marketing

Search Engine Optimisation is maximising your webpage to achieve higher recognition and listing on search engines through natural (unpaid) search. You should be taking into account all major search engines but Google has a 65% market share globally. If you’re marketing to Asia then there are differences; for instance Google only has a 17% share in China with Baidu having an 80% market share, so do your research on local trends.

Do use meta descriptions, keywords and tags
Use a few concise meta descriptions, tags and keyword for your pages- then repeat them in your content. Don’t use too many – this counts for all search engines. If you have Chinese translation pages, Baidu has a website tool that tells you trending keywords so you can include these in your descriptions to maximise exposure – but you must use keywords relevant to your page. Try to register with search directories – some take a while and some (Yahoo) you can pay for, but they will immediately improve your ranking.

Don’t use ‘black hat’ tactics
If you stuff website with irrelevant keywords, cloak them, and add links to spam sites - Google will punish you. You are also preventing people from finding the relevant material they are searching for. You can even be removed from searches for this, so keep your content relevant and true – you will attract less visitors; but the right visitors. This goes for Social Media too – don’t buy likes, it won’t increase your bookings.

Do Optimise
Add ‘alt’ tags and a title for your images so they load faster, reduce them in file size so they are optimised for the space, and keep your page sizes under 100kb throughout the site – search speed has been incorporated into ranking for search results. Make sure you have a ‘contact us’ page and site maps for both users and search engines.

Do write great content
Despite many changes to Google with the latest algorithm - Hummingbird, overall content is still the most important factor for search. Big changes were made to keyword searches which anyone using Google Analytics will be aware of, but the purpose is to value the content of the whole site for relevance, and provide better search results for users. Focus on useful content for your users – tourist information, places to see, places to go, and information on your hostel. If your bounce rate is high, your content is not that relevant.

Don’t forget your key business
Yes, you need good content on your areas and activities for guests, but your website should be a booking tool and point of information about your hostel primarily. The rest of the information is great, but secondary. Make sure you are marketing yourself as a great place to stay and have an intuitive site that leads to booking. You want people to read about you, book and share positive reviews. Make sure your social pages all use your url also, it’s better for your brand and counts on search too.

Hostel Health Tip
Beware that on China’s Baidu search – Flash and JavaScript don’t work!

To find out more about changes to Google search with Hummingbird
see our blog article HERE.

Is Google+ the Best Discussion Forum?

Google+ is trying hard to be what all forums (back when the internet was invented) have always hoped to be. Relevant. Forums and chat rooms have been around in one way or another since the internet was invented, but so has spam and an overwhelming amount of irrelevant material from prolific users and sharers. The idea behind forums being to share relevant information and start topical discussions has taken a backseat for years.

Overwhelmed with sales pitches and dancing animals? LOL? With so many different mediums now, it's almost impossible to know where to make your posts and read other people's posts, let alone get genuine advice. The biggest sites, such as facebook groups and LinkedIn face constant spam postings and self-promotion instead of being used as a tool for discussions. And for asking questions or seeking genuine advice, you will certainly receive replies that sell you something. I know that my inbox has become full of updates that aren't relevant to me. Is this perhaps where Google+ can step in?

Being the behemoth company they are and ranked #1 in the world, Google had an obligation to create something to challenge or better the existing forums out there. Google+, Google Circles, Google Hangouts, Google Talk, Google+ Communities - what is it all about?!
Well Google+ allows you to create a topic or community or discussion, and talk about it - the same as the other platforms. You can follow what you like, join in what you like, and see a whole host of recommendations for you. You can also have private and two-way conversations as it incorporates Google Talk network directly, as does Gmail. You can also use its instant messaging function, or one of the many IM third party services out there, such as Pidgin. If you want to interact by video or watch youtube clips as a group, then you can use Google hangout. This is essentially a chat session for up to 10 people, with the usual requirements of a webcam and microphone. To be used with select circles or users even.

Google+ Communities focuses on just that, the community. So instead of a category for film that includes documentaries and horror, it's broken down further to find what is relevant to you. You have the ability to create Categories within your Communities (but the Community itself has an owner), so you can drill down to issues that you're interested in, and avoid irrelevant material (and perhaps even less spam due to the 'moderator' function). Being Google there is high tech monitoring taking place, and repetitive content and multiple posts are weeded out and deleted, so this should keep your Community as spam free as possible - better for user experience. Then there is even a community for moderators, a group if you will, to report back on issues. This sounds like prefects in school, but if there are people willing to monitor and keep clean the Communities, then it should work.
Where facebook and LinkedIn groups fall down is control of the groups postings. The are also generic postings that discourage other members from joining discussions as they're not focused enough to engage people. The online community welcomes new platforms, and Google has recognised and embraced this. With millions of users and the easiest member engagement, could Google+ create value in forums rather than playing the numbers game? It's for the user to decide.

Do you use Google+? Do you find it a happier place to avoid spam and interact?
Let us know your thoughts! hello@hosteldoctor.com