Getting Clients To Choose Your Venue
As we’ve mentioned before, the venue hire and meeting room booking market is a large and competitive arena to operate within. Get it right, and you can turn your facility into a popular and profitable revenue stream, with a full diary and plenty of satisfied, returning customers. Get it wrong, and your venue can quickly gather dust.
Therefore, making sure that your venue is appealing, well-marketed, and easy to book can make all the difference between success and failure. In this article, we take a look at some of the key reasons why a client is likely to opt for you, rather than the competition.
Location
Location is always going to be a factor when it comes to making a choice of venue. For a work event such as a sales team meeting, the likelihood is that the organiser will be looking at a location that’s convenient for people travelling from different parts of the country.
Similarly, social events may require a location that’s in close proximity to those attending.
Of course, you can’t move your location – but you can make life easier for clients by being proactive in relation to travel and transportation help. For instance:
- Can you communicate with event organisers the best routes, maps and public transport options? GPS or integration with Google Maps, perhaps?
- Can you offer a tie-in with a local taxi or transportation firm; or an online provider like Uber or Lyft?
Accessibility
Your location may be fixed, but the degree to which you make your venue accessible for all can make the difference when it comes to clients deciding to use your facilities.
- Are your parking facilities as good as they can be?
- Do you have appropriate disabled access?
Clear Understanding of Your Services
People are pretty specific when it comes to searching for venues for an event; after all, a wedding reception is going to be somewhat different to a company conference, or a comic-book convention (probably).
Make it clear on your website and marketing collateral for event organisers to know exactly what your venue is suitable for, and the services that you offer, so that you are targeting the kind of people more likely to book your venue.
Appearance
It probably goes without saying that event organisers are going to be more likely to book a venue that looks good, is well maintained and appeals to them visually and aesthetically.
Having great visuals and other media on your website and across your social media activity can play a key role in encouraging potential customers to come to your venue. And, of course, how your site looks in pictures needs to be reflected in how it looks and feels to customers when they visit.
Word of Mouth
Like any other business model, word of mouth can act as the best form of advertising. Having delivered great service and a great experience for your customers, by keeping engaged, encouraging them to share their experiences on social media, to write positive reviews, feedback and testimonials can serve as great collateral to entice both returning clients and new custom.
Easy Booking Process
Complicated booking processes can be a major turn-off. A room booking system that’s clunky, time-consuming and potentially not in keeping with the look of your website can be a key reason for customers to abandon ship and look elsewhere.
Of course, many people will want to visit the venue before booking. Whether online, in person, or over the phone, the customer invariably wants a booking journey that’s as hassle free as possible, with appropriate follow-up communication and confirmations.
And confidence that they won’t be subject to the dreaded ‘double booking’ scenario.
Positive Customer Experience
Ultimately customers are inclined towards booking your venue if they are confident that you are providing them with an all-round positive customer experience.
This is not only during the event itself, but across every touchpoint before, during and after the event.
- An appealing website with excellent user experience
- Easy to navigate booking journey across all online and offline channels
- Exceptional customer services and engagement, in person, on the phone and on social media
- Well-maintained facilities that are clearly appropriate for the event
- Good communication channels such as confirmation and reminder emails, information messages including travel, transport, general booking details or confirmations of any changes
- After-event engagement including opportunities for customers to provide feedback, testimonials and reviews that feed into long-term relationship building and future ‘word-of-mouth’ sales.
At thinkBooker, we specialise in online booking systems for training courses, classes, activities and events – optimised for efficiency, growth and ongoing client satisfaction.
Browse the site to learn more about course booking systems, sports booking systems, event booking systems and more, or get in touch directly to find out how we can help you.
