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Hostel Health Tip
Your brand is your visual foundation - make sure your design looks professional and has a positive association!
Did you know that statistically price becomes a less influential factor for customers who are influenced by a strong brand identity?
This is why luxury and high end businesses don’t need to price match – their strong branding makes them desirable and is associated with high quality, rather than being economical. It's worth doing it right!
Try to incorporate your branding throughout your hostel, whether it's in smart interior design or whether you have promotional posters and maps around. Remind customers of where they are having a good time!
Good Design Makes A Brand
Your design gives the overall impression of your hostel - your logo, colours, fonts and images all create a 'brand story' and create an impression of what your hostel is like to stay in. Fun, chilled, exotic, adventurous - make your logo and design whatever you like, but make it professional! Statistically a weak brand image is likely to influence consumers not to make a purchase.
1. Invest in your Brand
Your logo is the most important brand feature, so make sure you have one professionally designed. Likewise, your branding should be present on all your digital and print channels – with nice, crisp, clear fonts and images. No DIY logos made in Microsoft Word, Paint or clip art should ever be attempted!
2. Be Consistent
Be consistent with your messaging, logo, and visual style – and make them high resolution. Your logos will also appear on various print material and on third party websites such as Hostelworld. Make sure it is consistent in dimensions (do not stretch it) and in your brand colours throughout all these channels. Changing this on third party sites confuses the customer as to who you are and weakens your brand recognition. Be consistent!
3. Be Objective
Try to be objective about how your brand looks. Everyone thinks they know what looks good, but in reality that’s just not true. Yes you should love your brand, but make sure it will appeal to the target audience and not just to you. You have to appeal to the majority of your market segment. This is like dating - sure, everything appeals to someone out there, but it can’t hurt to be the best looking.
4. Be Professional
Printing a flyer with bad quality photos and a low resolution logo is the same price as one that is perfect. There’s no excuse for bad design – especially if you’re sending flyers to other hostels and they are sitting there in between your competitors. Flyers are a tool for marketing and selling your brand – do them properly.
5. Promote Yourself
Creating merchandise is a great way to promote your hostel – wearing a tshirt or hoodie that has your brand on it and a slogan such as ‘I had a great time at …. Hostel’ is free advertising. Not only can you sell merchandise and create extra revenue from happy customers, you can also give away merchandise with tours, parties, or as prizes, and it will still be free advertising for you. Every time it’s worn, and in every photo shared.
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