Direct Bookings
Holiday let marketing: sell the feeling of getting away from it all
Your guests aren’t only booking somewhere to sleep. A lot of them are booking space, privacy and the chance to switch off. Your website should tell them they’ll get it.
Colin HarrisonFounder7 October 2026
Quick answer
Good holiday let marketing does more than show guests where they’ll sleep. It shows them how the stay will feel.
New research from Visit Sweden and YouGov found that 67% of travellers prefer a destination where socialising feels optional, and 53% would pay more for greater peace, privacy or fewer crowds. Another 41% describe themselves as introverts.
If you run an independent holiday let, that’s an opening. A secluded cottage, a private garden, a quiet woodland setting, a hot tub with a view: these aren’t just facilities to list. They’re your holiday let’s unique selling points, and they’re the reasons a guest picks your place over the one next to it in the search results.
Your marketing should say so.
A new reason to rethink holiday let marketing
Sweden has just opened a travel agency for introverts.
The Introvert Travel Agency is Visit Sweden’s new campaign. It sells holidays for introverts: trips built around quieter travel and the freedom to decide when you’re sociable and when you’d rather be left alone.
The idea underneath it is a good one. What if travellers aren’t looking for more to do, but more say over how much they do?
There’s research behind it, too. Visit Sweden asked YouGov to survey travellers across nine countries, the UK included.
67% of travellers prefer a destination where socialising feels optional.Visit Sweden / YouGov, 2026
And it turns out we’re a nation of them. 48% of Brits described themselves as introverts, the highest of any country surveyed, according to Creative Boom’s report on the research.
You’ll see this called introvert travel, or quiet travel. Whatever the label, it matters if you run independent accommodation.
A holiday let doesn’t need a packed activity programme or a long list of facilities to be attractive. For some guests, not having those things is the appeal.
A private cottage where nobody expects you to join in. A lodge where you can sit outside with a coffee and not see another guest. A rural stay where the footpath starts at the gate. A place where you can spend the whole morning reading.
Those aren’t incidental details. They’re part of the reason someone books.
5 holiday let marketing tips for selling peace and privacy
So how do you put all that into your marketing? Start with these five.
Sell the experience, not just the property
A common problem with holiday let marketing is that properties get described by what’s in them.
“Three bedrooms. Two bathrooms. Private parking. Wi-Fi. Hot tub. Fully equipped kitchen.”
All of that matters, but none of it gives a guest a reason to choose you over the cottage down the road.
Your competitors have three bedrooms too.
If you’ve ever wondered how to write a holiday let description that sells the place, this is the trick: connect each feature to the experience it creates. Here are a few holiday cottage description examples.
| Instead of | Try |
|---|---|
| Private garden | Start the morning with coffee outside while the rest of the valley is still quiet. |
| Hot tub with countryside views | Soak under the evening sky while the hills go quiet around you in a private hot tub |
| Secluded rural location | There’s no passing traffic outside the window, and the nearest footpath starts a few minutes from the door. |
This is the point where holiday let marketing stops being a property description. You’re showing guests why a stay with you will feel different.
Make privacy a feature
The Visit Sweden research also gives independent owners a useful commercial signal.
53% of travellers said they would pay more for greater peace, privacy or fewer crowds.Visit Sweden / YouGov, 2026
That doesn’t mean you should put your prices up tomorrow. A survey answer isn’t a booking. But if you’ve been wondering how to charge more for a holiday let, this is where to start: peace and privacy are worth something to guests, so make sure they can see yours.
Think about what a guest gets at your place that never shows up in a booking platform’s standard property grid:
- A private garden that isn’t overlooked.
- A balcony facing open countryside.
- A woodland setting away from busy roads.
- Your own hot tub, not a shared spa.
- A private entrance.
- A secluded terrace for breakfast.
- Walking routes from the door.
- A quiet bedroom away from the road.
- Outdoor seating where guests can spend an evening without seeing a single car, person, or property.
These are your holiday let’s unique selling points. Build your positioning on them.
They can shape your SEO too. Someone searching for a secluded holiday cottage with a private hot tub wants something different from someone searching for a holiday cottage in Yorkshire. Your website should give both of them somewhere useful to land.
Show guests what a quiet stay actually looks like
Words matter, but holiday accommodation is visual. If peace is your selling point, your photography has to say peace.
That doesn’t mean filling your website with empty landscapes. Show the moments your guest is buying.
A mug of coffee on the terrace first thing. A book by the fire. Two chairs looking across the valley. The hot tub after sunset. A path disappearing into the woods. Breakfast outside. A bedroom photographed for its view, not just its bed.
Think about the order, too. A guest lands on your homepage and sees the property. They scroll and see where it is. Then they see what a day there could feel like.
That last bit is the easy one to miss. Your website should let someone imagine themselves staying with you before they reach the booking button.
So have a look at your own gallery. If it’s ten photographs of rooms and nothing of what surrounds them, you’re showing the property, not selling the stay.
Build your website around the feeling
Good holiday let marketing starts long before the guest reaches your booking calendar.
Your homepage has to answer three questions, and quickly:
What is this place?
Where is it?
Why would I want to stay here?
The third is where an independent property can really set itself apart.
A headline like “The perfect countryside getaway” could describe hundreds of places. A specific one tells the guest why yours is worth choosing:
A private woodland cabin for slow mornings, long walks and evenings in the hot tub.
Now they’ve got something to picture, and the rest of the page can prove it. Show the accommodation, explain the location, introduce the walks and the things to do nearby, and make booking simple. Your website becomes the whole picture of the stay, not an online copy of a listing.
That matters most when a guest has found you on Airbnb, Booking.com or another booking platform first. Keep those listings working for discovery. A specific opening line is also how you stand out on Airbnb, where the listings around yours all say “peaceful”. Then, when a guest looks you up, give them a much richer reason to choose you on your own website.
However you advertise your holiday cottage, the story should be the same everywhere. Download our anatomy of a homepage guide to optimise your homepage.
Use your location as part of the product
Your location isn’t just an address. For an independent holiday let, it can be one of the strongest things you’ve got.
A property in a busy resort might sell how close it is to restaurants, beaches and attractions. A rural one has a completely different story to tell.
You might be:
- Five minutes from a quiet coastal path.
- Surrounded by woodland.
- Close to an uncrowded swimming spot.
- Within walking distance of a village pub.
- Far enough from the main road to hear birds, not traffic.
- Perfectly placed for dark skies and stargazing.
- A short drive from a national park.
- Deep in the countryside but close enough to reach local food producers.
The thing is to be specific. “Beautiful location” tells a guest very little. “Walk from the front door to the lake in 15 minutes” tells them exactly what they’re getting.
It’s good for search, too. Your website can cover the destination, the walks, the things to do and the reasons to visit, and still keep your accommodation at the centre of the page. Search engines and AI assistants can only match a guest to what your pages actually say.
6 things you can do straight away
The quiet travel trend gives you a handy way to look at your own website with fresh eyes. Here are six things to try.
Find the quietest thing you sell
Look at your property and pick out the one feature that creates the greatest sense of space or privacy.
It could be the view, the garden, the location, the hot tub, the access to nature, or simply the fact that guests have the whole place to themselves.
Put that feature at the front of your marketing. Don’t leave it buried halfway down the page.
Replace generic language with evidence
Words like peaceful, tranquil, secluded and idyllic are easy to write and easy to ignore.
Show the guest why the property is peaceful. If your garden is completely private, not overlooked and enclosed, say so. If there’s a footpath from the gate, explain exactly where it goes. Can your guests see the stars from their hot tub in your garden? Show them. If your property is surrounded by woodlands with not a lot around it, or the nearest neighbour is 500 metres away behind a large hedge or down a separate path, photograph it and shout about it.
Also, be honest about any possible noise you do have or any potential neighbours. If the church bells ring on the hour, say that too. A guest who was promised silence and woke up to a tractor will write about the tractor.
Write for people who want different kinds of holidays
Not every guest wants complete solitude.
The research isn’t really about putting people in an “introvert” box. The stronger insight is that many travellers want choice. Mattias Lundberg, the psychologist quoted alongside the survey, says recharging has less to do with being alone and more to do with having a say in when you see other people.
Your guests might want a restaurant nearby one evening and a quiet night in the next. They might want a guided activity one day and nowhere to be the following morning.
Your marketing can reflect that.
Go out when you want to. Stay in when you don’t.
That’s a stronger proposition than telling every guest your property is “peaceful”.
Make your website as calm as the stay
If you’re selling switching off, booking shouldn’t feel like hard work.
Your booking button should be easy to find. Your availability should be clear. Your key information should be easy to scan, and the whole thing should work properly on a phone. A guest should have a frictionless booking journey from start to finish. They should be able to get from your homepage to a confirmed booking without having to ring or email you.
Your photographs should load quickly, too. When we tested 606 independent accommodation websites on mobile, the average took 13.3 seconds to load. That’s a long wait for someone who came to you for a bit of calm.
It’s also worth knowing that the Competition and Markets Authority’s principles for accommodation booking sites cover sites where guests book direct, holiday lets included. Two of them are simple: show the full cost up front, and don’t give a false impression of how popular a place is.
A calm holiday starts with a straightforward booking.
Build content around the reasons people choose your area
Your holiday let marketing shouldn’t stop at the property.
Create useful pages and articles around the things your guests care about. For example:
- Quiet walks near [your destination].
- The best places for a slow weekend in [your destination].
- Dog-friendly walks from [your property].
- Where to watch the sunset near [your property].
- The best local food for a self-catering stay.
- Rainy-day activities near [your property].
- Places to swim, cycle or hike without travelling far.
- A two-day itinerary for switching off in [your destination].
This gives your website more chances to be found before a guest has decided where to stay. It also shows you understand the kind of holiday they’re looking for.
Give guests a reason to come back to you
The first booking doesn’t have to be the end of the relationship.
If someone loved the quiet at your place, your guest list is how you stay in touch. Let them know about future availability, seasonal stays or anything new.
A returning guest already knows what the place feels like. Your marketing only has to give them a reason to come back.
Our conclusion
The most interesting thing in the Sweden research isn’t the word “introvert”. It’s the idea that choice has value.
41% of people described themselves as introverts, and another 45% as a mix of introvert and extrovert.Visit Sweden / YouGov, 2026
So the opportunity is much wider than marketing a holiday let to introverts.
Guests might want a busy weekend, a quiet week, a family adventure or a few days where nobody expects anything of them. Independent accommodation is unusually good at offering all of that.
And you’ve already got the raw material.
The private garden. The woodland path. The view. The firepit. The hot tub. The village pub. The empty road. The birdsong in the morning.
Holiday let marketing should make those things visible.
The properties that tell guests not just where they’ll stay, but how the stay will feel, are the ones that give them a reason to book.
Make your website sell the stay
Your website might describe your holiday let perfectly accurately and still not make the stay feel like nowhere else. That’s what a homepage redesign is for.
It puts the things your guests value most at the centre of the booking journey, from the first impression to the moment they book direct.
Apply for a homepage redesign and see what your homepage could look like before you commit to anything.
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FAQs
What is holiday let marketing?
Holiday let marketing is the work of attracting the right guests to your property and giving them enough information and confidence to book. It can include your website, search visibility, content, photography, email marketing, paid advertising and your presence on booking platforms.
How can I market a holiday let without relying only on Airbnb or Booking.com?
Keep your booking-platform listings where they work for discovery, but give guests a strong reason to visit and book through your own website. Clear positioning, useful content, good search visibility, strong photography and a straightforward booking journey all bring more direct bookings.
How do I make my holiday let stand out on Airbnb?
Open your listing with one specific thing the listings around yours can't copy: the garden nobody overlooks, the footpath from the gate, the view from the hot tub. Lead with the photograph that shows it. Then make sure a guest who looks you up finds a website that says the same thing in more detail.
Should I market my holiday let specifically to introverts?
Not necessarily. Introvert travel makes a good headline, but the Visit Sweden research is more useful as an insight into a wider desire for choice, privacy and flexibility. You can market the things that make your property peaceful without labelling your guests.
How can I sell privacy in my holiday let marketing?
Be specific. Explain what makes the property private instead of simply calling it “secluded” or “peaceful”. Talk about private outdoor space, whether the garden is overlooked, how close the nearest property is, where the walking routes go and what guests can see and hear from the accommodation.
Can I charge more for a peaceful holiday let?
The Visit Sweden and YouGov research found that 53% of travellers would pay more for greater peace, privacy or fewer crowds. That suggests these qualities have commercial value, although it doesn't mean every property should put its price up. The first step is making the value visible to the guests who are looking for it.
What should I put on my holiday let website?
Start with what guests need to decide whether the property is right for them: what makes the stay different, where it is, who it suits, what they can do nearby, what the accommodation includes, availability, pricing and how to book. Your photography and copy should make the experience easy to imagine.
Does content marketing work for a holiday let?
Yes. Useful content reaches people while they're researching a destination or planning a type of trip, before they've chosen where to stay. Articles and guides on local walks, activities, food, seasons and itineraries bring relevant visitors to your website and give them more reasons to choose your property.