“What if you shut off the OTAs?”

What if you shut off the OTAs?

Not forever, and maybe not even literally, but as a thought exercise. What would it take to become the hotel that travelers actually search for by name?

For most properties, especially independents, that sounds ridiculous. Distribution is so tied to OTAs that turning them off feels impossible.

If you said it out loud to most revenue leaders, they would probably laugh. But the question forces you to think differently. Instead of asking how to capture demand, you start asking how to create it.

To get there, you have to go all in on building awareness. Too many hotels chase short-term, “measurable” wins and forget what actually makes a property memorable. ROAS has its place, but it is not the only way to judge whether marketing is working.

I care just as much about whether more people are coming through the booking engine directly, whether more people know our name, and whether we are becoming part of how travelers view our destination. That doesn’t show up when you just look at ROAS.

Some of the most important work marketing does is building a brand people recognize and trust, and that is a lot harder to measure on a dashboard.

That kind of awareness does not come from one perfect campaign. It comes from consistent storytelling and showing up where people are actually paying attention.

I love channels like connected TV, OTT, YouTube, and social media for that reason. They give you the chance to tell a bigger story while still targeting people based on real behaviors, not just assumptions.

But those channels don’t work if you don’t know what makes your hotel special. That is where I think a lot of properties fall short. They rely on the destination to do the storytelling for them.

In a place like Jackson Hole, it is easy to assume the skiing or the national parks are enough. But guests still choose one property over another for a reason. If you cannot define your hotel’s story, your marketing will sound just like everyone else, and good luck trying to shift travelers off the OTAs.

Sometimes what makes you special is big. Sometimes it is small. Maybe it is the deeply personal experience that comes with having only a handful of rooms. Maybe it is that you are quiet, dog-friendly, or known for a ritual guests remember year after year. Maybe it is something as simple as evening s'mores becoming the thing people come back for.

When you understand what makes your property special, you stop marketing like a commodity and start marketing like a brand. And that kind of work does not always show up neatly in a ROAS report.

So, are you ready to shut off the OTAs? Probably not. But if the thought makes you nervous, that's exactly where the work starts.