Beyond the Press Release: How Hotels Can Win Coverage That Actually Drives Bookings

The hotels that win great press coverage are rarely the ones with the most news. They are the ones that know how to make their story matter to someone else’s audience.

In our latest webinar, Arise Hotel Marketing CEO and founder Ben Walker sat down with Amelia Selby, Head of PR at north9.

Amelia has spent almost a decade in PR, working with hotels, tour operators, cruise lines and travel tech brands. She has spoken at BrightonSEO, and one of her data campaigns even got a mention from the Prime Minister of Thailand in a press conference.

At Arise, our vision is to help others arise, and these sessions are all about sharing practical insight you can put to work straight away. Here are the biggest takeaways from the conversation.

Why most hotel press releases fall flat

Press releases still have a place, but Amelia explained that most hotels use them the wrong way. Too often they read like an internal announcement: a new F&B manager, or an upgrade to the bed linen. These stories are written to keep owners and stakeholders happy, not to give a journalist something their readers will click on.

The usual result? A generic PDF gets blasted out to 200 journalists and deleted almost immediately. The format isn’t the problem. What goes into it is.

Create news instead of waiting for it

The biggest mindset shift is moving away from waiting for news and towards putting yourself into the news. Journalists care about what their audience wants to read, so that is where your story needs to start. Amelia’s team leans on:

• Trend hooks backed by your own data. A rise in solo travellers, girls’ trips or hen dos choosing a quiet corner of Yorkshire over a big city night out is a story. A new seasonal menu isn’t (though it can be woven into the pitch).
• Expert commentary. If something happens in your destination, or touches on something you’re known for, such as farm-to-table dining, you’re well placed to comment.
• A local perspective. People are less likely to search “hotel in Yorkshire” than “things to do in Yorkshire”. Being mentioned in those articles is the brand recognition that PR is perfect for.
• Your people. Your head chef, your housekeeping team and your front of house all have insight readers love. Think “the ingredients a top chef would never cook with” or “the items housekeeping finds time and time again”. That’s human interest, and journalists lap it up.

As Ben put it, many hotels don’t realise what they’re sitting on because they see it every day.

Plan around the calendar, but stay ready to react

The best approach is a mix of proactive and reactive PR. There are predictable moments every year: right now journalists are writing about cosy autumn stays, and by January they’ll be thinking about Valentine’s Day.

The most missed opportunity, though, is looking beyond the obvious booking occasions. Someone booking a Valentine’s break isn’t necessarily reading about it. At this time of year, journalists are also asking what’s hot for 2027, which trends and cities are on the rise, and those stories are easy to overlook in the rush to talk about Christmas.

Awareness days can be a goldmine too. One of Amelia’s clients, an African property with elephants on site, landed perfectly on World Elephant Day. If your hotel has a niche angle, there’s probably an awareness day to match. And when something happens locally that nobody could have planned for, be ready to jump on it.

Niche publications now matter more than the nationals

Everyone wants to be in the national press, and those titles still have value: big audiences, strong domain authority and links that help organic visibility. But the rise of AI search has changed the picture.

AI overviews and LLMs tend to favour niche, relevant industry publications, because their consistency on a topic is a strong trust signal. Amelia referenced a recent study of around half a million AI citations, which found that 89% came from niche industry publications, 7% from major news outlets and just 4% from major outlets behind a paywall.

The same logic applies to audiences. A tour operator launching a golf trip will get more from a specialist golf title than a general travel section, and a hotel near a birdwatching hotspot will find its ideal guests reading birding publications.

Prove you’re real

Journalists are being flooded with AI-generated pitches, and some have been burned by fake “experts” quoted in PR content. This year, for the first time, Amelia has had major news outlets ask for a photo of the person behind a quote, or a quick WhatsApp voice note to prove they exist.

AI can be a huge help in PR, but it should support the process, never replace the human voice. Be ready to show the real person behind every quote you send.

Partnerships and micro-influencers build trust

With the way people research travel becoming more fragmented, partnerships are more valuable than ever. Two non-competing brands with the same audience, such as a boutique hotel and a premium luggage brand, can lift each other up. Partnering with a trusted local body, like a hotel teaming up with the Peak District, can also earn a high-authority link that’s great for SEO and AI visibility.

When it comes to influencers, bigger isn’t better. Accounts with millions of followers rarely have time to build a real community. Micro-influencers with around 50,000 followers who reply to every comment have audiences that genuinely trust them. Think beyond travel too: a family blogger for a family-friendly hotel, or a fitness creator for a wellness package.

Awards are worth it again

Amelia admitted she used to see awards as a vanity exercise: expensive to enter, followed by an expensive table at the ceremony. That’s changed. Awards are now a powerful trust signal for AI search, which gives heavy weight to third-party mentions and earned media.

If a guest asks ChatGPT for the best hotel in Yorkshire, an award win gives it a reason to cite you. So don’t just post the badge on social. Add it to your website headers, booking engine and email signatures too.

Look after what others say about you

What third parties say about you carries more weight than anything you say about yourself. If a guest emails glowing feedback, send them a link to your Google or Trustpilot page. Reply thoughtfully to reviews, including the ones that get the facts wrong. And keep your bio and description consistent across every platform, so neither people nor LLMs get mixed messages.

Make your coverage work harder

Once you’ve won coverage, put it to work:

• Add an “As featured in” section to your website for instant credibility.
• Include it in sales decks for weddings, corporate events and group bookings.
• Test press quotes as ad headlines on Meta and Google.
• Share it with other journalists. Coverage in one outlet builds credibility with the next, creating a snowball effect.
• Use it on social. A national title naming you the best place for stargazing in the UK beats a generic seasonal graphic every time.

Measuring PR’s impact on bookings

PR usually sits at the start of a long booking journey with lots of touchpoints, so exact attribution is tricky. Amelia shared several ways to build a picture:

• Use UTM links in pitches (though journalists may remove them).
• Track referral traffic from coverage links in GA4 and follow it through to key events and bookings.
• Offer custom promo codes to specific outlets or influencers.
• Watch for spikes in branded organic search after major coverage.
• Add a “How did you hear about us?” field at checkout, or ask in a post-booking email.

Referral bookings are more likely to come from niche publications, because you’re in front of exactly the right audience.

PR is a long game

One of the most common mistakes Amelia sees is giving up too soon. Newsrooms are shrinking and lean heavily on freelancers, so the time between pitch and publication can be long. Her team recently landed coverage in September for a story pitched the previous November.

Her advice: treat PR as a continuous cog you keep turning. If a story doesn’t land, find a new angle or subject line and go again. And don’t chase journalists a week later asking where the story is.

She also challenged the idea of the PR “little black book”. Around 80% of the coverage her team secures comes from journalists they’ve never spoken to. What matters is the right story, pitched to the right journalist, at the right time. Journalists have targets too, so making their job easier with a ready-to-run story beats a coffee catch-up every time.

No budget? You have rooms

For hotels with no PR budget, Amelia’s tip was simple: use your quiet periods. Inviting a journalist to stay in a room that would otherwise sit empty is a low-cost way to build a relationship. Beyond a review, that journalist may think of you months later for a roundup of the best seaside hotels in Yorkshire or things to do in Whitby.

In-house or agency?

Amelia was refreshingly honest here: there’s no reason a hotel can’t handle PR in-house if someone has the time, patience and commitment. The challenge is that hotel teams are often small and stretched, and you can’t leave a guest waiting at reception while you answer a journalist request. An agency can react quickly and bring a fresh pair of eyes, spotting the stories you’re too close to see.

Reframing the bed linen story

Amelia’s favourite example tied everything together. New bed linen on its own won’t make headlines. But step back and you’ll find a bigger story: the rise of sleep tourism, pillow menus and sleep-focused treatments, and guests who say they’re booking simply for a good night’s sleep. Frame your upgrade within that trend, and suddenly you have something a journalist wants to write about.

Watch the full webinar

This is just a taste of the conversation. In the full recording, Amelia goes deeper into each of these ideas, with plenty more real-world examples of hotel PR done well.

Whether you’re planning your 2027 PR calendar, rethinking your next press release or wondering how to show up in AI search, it’s well worth your time. Watch the full webinar below, and if any questions come up afterwards, feel free to reach out to Ben or Amelia on LinkedIn. We’d love to hear how you put these ideas into action.