Social media ideas for hotels, inns and B&Bs

Showing rooms, food and the area

The best hotel social media feels like a friendly local showing you round, not a brochure. Think of your posts as the tour a guest can't take until they arrive.

Rooms

• One room per post. Show the bed, the view from it, the bathroom and the small touches: the tea tray, the local biscuits, the reading lamp. A carousel lets you share several angles in one post.
• Honest photos. Show the real view and the real size. A guest who finds a smaller room than the photos suggested starts their stay disappointed.
• Daylight. Photograph rooms in the morning with the curtains open and the lamps on.
• The details people choose on. Dog-friendly rooms, family rooms, parking and step-free access, if you have them. Be specific: "step-free from the car park to the garden room, with a walk-in shower" is more useful than "accessible".

On Instagram, save your best Stories as Highlights, with names such as Rooms, Breakfast, The area and Getting here. Stories disappear after 24 hours, but Highlights stay on your profile until you remove them. You can also pin up to three posts to the top of your profile: a room tour, your breakfast and how to book direct make a good set.

Food and drink

• Breakfast. It's in the name for a B&B and it matters at an inn too, so show it: the cooked breakfast, homemade jam, local eggs, the view from the table.
• Dinner and the bar, if you have them, for residents and locals alike: the Sunday roast, the specials board, the fire lit in the bar.
• Extras. Afternoon tea, picnic hampers or packed lunches for walkers, if you offer them.
• Your suppliers. Name the butcher, the bakery and the farm down the lane.

Our guide to taking food photos with your phone covers light, angles and quick styling.

The area

Sell the area as well as the room.

• A weekly local tip: a walk from your door, a market day, a garden in bloom, a museum for a rainy afternoon.
• Seasonal moments: bluebells, autumn colour, the first frost, the Christmas lights going on in town.
• Collab posts with local attractions and businesses. On Instagram you can invite another account as a collaborator. If they accept, the post appears on both profiles and is shared with both sets of followers.
• Location tags. Add your hotel as the location on every Instagram post. When people tap it, they see your post alongside other photos and videos tagged at the same place on the Instagram map.
• Getting here. Trains, parking and the last mile down a narrow lane. Practical posts save you answering the same questions on the phone.

Guest content and seasonal breaks

Social media in tourism and hospitality is word of mouth you can see. Guests take lovely photos of your place, and those photos can do a lot of your work for you.

Guest content

• Share Stories that mention you. Instagram gathers Stories that mention your account in one place, called Stories about you, where you can reply to them or share them to your own Story.
• Ask before reposting to your feed. Instagram's copyright guidance says the safest content to post is content you created yourself, and that it's a good idea to get written permission before posting someone else's. Send the guest a message, and credit them when you post.
• Make it easy. Leave a small card in each room with your Instagram username, and make sure there's a spot worth photographing: the bench with the view, the fireplace, the breakfast table.
• Reviews. Share a line from a genuine review now and then, and reply to reviews on Google and Facebook, good and bad. Our guide on how to reply to reviews shows you how.
• Children. Don't post guests' children unless their parents have clearly said yes.

Seasonal breaks

• Plan the year around why people visit you: spring walks, summer holidays, autumn colour, cosy winter weekends, Christmas and New Year, plus local festivals and events.
• Start early. Promote each break well before people book it. For Christmas and New Year, start in the autumn, not in December.
• Run each break as a short series: the announcement, what's included, the room, the food, a local highlight, then a reminder.
• Fill quiet nights with midweek ideas, such as a walkers' break, a Sunday supper and stay, or a winter warmer with dinner included.
• Keep it honest. Only say "last few rooms" when it's true, and check every price and date before you post.

For the key dates to plan around, see our guide to seasonal marketing ideas.

Posting rhythm for small hotels and inns

Plenty of advice on social media for the hospitality industry assumes you have a marketing team. For a small hotel or inn, the goal is simpler: post steadily, reply quickly and make booking easy. Aim for a rhythm you can keep, rather than bursts of activity followed by weeks of silence.

A week to start from

• Three feed posts: one room or stay post, one food post and one local post.
• Stories most days: today's breakfast, the weather, the fire lit, a guest's Story shared with thanks.
• One Facebook post about something happening: an event, a new menu, a seasonal break, or news for locals who use your bar or restaurant.
• Replies every day. Answer comments and messages promptly. A question in your inbox might be a booking.

Make it manageable

• Batch your photos. Set aside an hour each month, or each season, to photograph rooms, food and the view.
• Schedule ahead. Write a week or a month of posts in one sitting. Meta Business Suite lets you schedule Facebook and Instagram posts, reels and stories in advance.
• Point people to booking. Put a link in your Instagram bio that goes straight to your booking page, or to one simple page with booking, menus and offers. Our guide to link in bio for venues explains how.
• Look back once a month. Note which posts led to messages, calls and bookings, and do more of those.

Social media in the hotel industry is a conversation, not a noticeboard. A quick, friendly reply to a comment shows guests the welcome they can expect.