Social × Video Marketing
Social Media Management POV Studio Influencer PR Social Ads Management Inbound Tourism Marketing Full-Funnel Marketing Recruitment Marketing Japan Market Entry Marketing EC Operations & System IntegrationProduct × Travel
Travi Travel AppAI × R&D
AllRev AI Marketing Tool UGC Lab WORKS COLUMNS TEAM CONTACTSNS Advertising for Hotels & Ryokan
A cost per acquisition in accommodation only means something set beside what the OTA takes. We work back to an upper limit, agree it first, then go after direct bookings.
Instagram
Meta
TikTok
YouTube
Numbers
72,273yen
One booking is worth 70,000 yen a head
Travel spend per person per overnight trip in 2025, up 4.2% year on year. It is the starting point for setting a ceiling on ad spend
Japan Tourism Agency, Travel and Tourism Consumption Trend Survey, 2025 annual figures38.2%
At ryokan, 60% of rooms sit empty
Room occupancy at ryokan, roughly half that of business hotels (75.3%) and city hotels (74.1%)
Japan Tourism Agency, Overnight Travel Statistics, final figures for 202544.9%
Half of bookings go through an OTA that takes a cut
Share of ryokan bookings coming through OTAs. Direct bookings account for 27.4%, of which 12.6% come from the property's own website
Japan Ryokan Association, FY2025 Survey of Trading Conditions, published December 202517.8%
Women under 30 weight social media above all
Share of women in their teens and twenties naming social posts by individuals or travel media as the single most important source when choosing where to go. Overall it is 5.6%
Jalan Research Center, Domestic Overnight Travel Needs Survey, spring 2025 (people intending to travel, n=3,151)Issues
01
A traveller sees the ad, searches the property name again, and books on an OTA. In that sequence you pay the media and the commission both.
The fixWe fix the destination to your own booking page and set the ceiling for one direct booking from OTA commission.
02
Without measurement in place, all that is left is impressions and clicks. Whether to continue or stop becomes a matter of instinct.
The fixIn month one we set up the pixel, CAPI, GA4 and UTMs on the booking engine, and count through to a completed booking.
03
Recycle the same guest-room photos and neither the temperature of the water nor the size of the dinner comes through. Weekdays and quiet seasons stay unfilled.
The fixWe run vertical video split by angle across rooms, baths and dinner in small budgets, then scale what works.
Solution
01
We set up the pixel, CAPI, GA4 and UTMs on the website and booking engine, and fix ad destinations to the official booking page. Where the engine is on another domain, we establish what can be measured within the first month.
02
The rooms, the bath, dinner, what there is to do nearby. We run vertical video split by angle in small budgets simultaneously, and only what the response leaves standing goes to full delivery.
03
We set the gross margin on a booking beside the commission an OTA takes, and fix the ceiling you can pay for one direct booking. Budget then goes to whatever works inside that.
04
Monthly reporting covers spend and bookings won, plus CPM, retention and the ratio of OTA to direct bookings, together with what to produce next month.
What we watchCompleted bookings, cost per booking
What we watchCPM, retention rate, arrivals at the booking page
What we watchCompletion rate, growth in branded search
What we watchEarly retention, saves
What we watchDirect bookings, the ratio of OTA to direct
The mix is one example. Where you start changes with room count and location.
Results
Hotel / Paid Social
Video that performed well on the managed account, lifted into paid social unchanged.
Revenue at 4-8x ad spend
Bookings up 433% year on year, ROAS 701%, ROI 245%
What advertising should grow is the number of bookings.
Which is why we find the video that works first.
Process
Delivery design and measurement set-up through creative production, picking the winners and reporting, supported end to end
Phase01
Eight tenths of an ad's outcome is settled before it goes live.
The first job is fixing the ceiling you can pay for one direct booking, from gross margin and OTA commission. Then we pick platforms and objectives and install measurement on the site and booking engine.
Phase02
The aim isn't one perfect video. It's a set you can test.
Rooms, the onsen, the food, what there is to do nearby: vertical video for each angle. Filming is POV, with nobody on camera.
Phase03
Instead of gambling, we confirm it in the data, then spend.
Several run simultaneously in small budgets, judged on CPM, retention, CTR and early conversions. Only what survives goes to full delivery.
Phase04
Budget moves to what works, and it gets swapped before it wears out.
Budget moves to the creative and segments that perform, and variants with new opening hooks extend their life.
Phase05
It doesn't end at spend and bookings. It comes with what to make next.
Monthly reporting leads with cost per booking and ROAS, with CPM, retention and arrivals at the booking page alongside. Next month's plan gets decided there too.
FAQ
It isn't which pays better; it's what is left per booking, compared on the same terms. OTA bookings stack payment fees and coupon funding on top of the base rate. That is exactly why we fix the ceiling for a direct booking first.
In most cases, yes. In month one we check whether tags can be installed and parameters carried through, and where they can't we substitute bookings on a social-only rate plan or a coupon code.
You can choose between fully performance-based and management-fee based. Performance-based where the conversion completes online; a management fee for awareness or a concentrated push over a set period. There is more on the social ads pricing page.
Advertising only in the quiet months is what we would suggest. Filling days that fill anyway does less than pushing at empty weekdays and quiet seasons. We set the peaks and pauses by the days of the week where occupancy drops.
Filming is ours to handle. We produce POV vertical video with nobody on camera, from filming through editing. One operator traces the guest route, so batch shoots outside your busy hours are enough to build the material.
At Izura Yukokuinden-ato Onsen, revenue came in at four to eight times ad spend and bookings at 433% year on year. The figures are in the case section on this page.
Services
End-to-end support from account strategy through filming, editing, posting and analytics
First-person short-form video. No cast, fast turnaround, low cost — and the experience comes through
Cast the right creators for your goal from a network of over 20 million combined followers
Small tests identify the winners first, so budget goes only where it drives traffic and revenue
Multilingual social marketing that maximizes the inbound visitors you attract
Awareness, conversion tracking and nurturing in one pipeline, powered by our playbooks and AI
Recruitment marketing that reaches the 94% job boards never touch, through short-form video ads made for you
End-to-end Japan market entry for overseas brands: localization strategy, official social accounts, POV video, PR and on-site activation
Shopify and BASE store operations, plus channel manager, LINE and Meta ads integration with your booking system, so your marketing has somewhere to land
Free consultations and quotes available
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