Shoot once, post for months: the three tiers of hospitality content
The best hospitality content does not come from grabbing a photo whenever someone remembers to. It comes from shooting properly, once, and getting months of posting out of it. The trick is knowing what to capture, and how to make a single day on site work as hard as it possibly can.
The three tiers of content
We categorise almost all social content into three tiers. The first is evergreen content: the pans, clips and shots of everything that stays in your business for the long term, like interior decor, furniture, exteriors, bedrooms, dining areas and event spaces. You want these in both video and photographic formats, because they are the constants you come back to again and again.
Evergreen content
The pans, clips and shots of everything that stays in your business for the long term, like interior decor, furniture, exteriors, bedrooms, dining areas and event spaces. You want these in both video and photographic formats, because they are the constants you come back to again and again.
Business as usual content
The everyday posting that keeps your feed alive. It should still align with your sales objectives, but it leans much more on your team and the people in the business. It is about telling the stories of what actually happens in your venue, keeping it human and relatable.
Hero content
Your produced, professionally shot video and photography, think magazine and publication quality. Beautifully made, it showcases lifestyle, the customer journey and your food. It is the content that makes people stop and look.
One shoot day, three tiers
A single shoot day holds far more opportunity than most venues realise, because a good team can capture across all three tiers in one visit. When our team arrives, they are looking to capture as much as possible, and they are clever about how they do it. We know the shots that make good evergreen content, the approach that brings business as usual to life, and exactly how to shoot hero content. In most cases we will have both a videographer and a photographer on site, so we can capture the range and the quantity needed. Evergreen and business as usual are useful to have in our back pocket when there has not been much of a planning meeting, while a bigger conversation around a specific campaign means we go in knowing we are there to shoot hero content.
Planning the shoot, and keeping it fresh
The best shoots are planned closely with the client, and we help with all of it. Because we understand how hotels and restaurants actually run, we can advise on the best times to shoot: when your team is likely to be stretched, when there is a little more breathing room, and how guests will be using the space through the day. We can also reach out to and liaise with models on your behalf so they are there on the day, and the whole thing can be planned with you on a single call. We take real care over this, because the more thought that goes in, the more you get out.
The way to stop banked content going stale is simply to keep topping it up. We like to visit as often as we can, and for larger hotels with lots of services, events, a spa, restaurants and so on, we suggest at least four content days a year, one to catch each season. That rhythm keeps everything feeling current and seasonal, rather than constantly editing and recutting the same material to make it stretch.
Shoot once, post for months
Get this right and you have fresh content rolling through the entire year: new, interesting material that keeps your audience engaged and lines up with your sales objectives. In effect, you have your own production team on hand, bringing your marketing campaigns to life. That is what shooting once and posting for months really means. Not making a little go a long way, but capturing properly so there is always something good to post.
If you would like a content plan built around your venue and your year, we would love to talk.
Book a discovery call and we will map it out with you.
