Spain is the world's second tourist destination and yet most hotels buy the same content they did ten years ago: pretty photos of the pool at sunset. What decides a booking is something else.

What travellers really want to see

The real room, without a wide angle lens

The number one doubt is size. A video walking from the door to the window answers more than twenty photos.

The real distance to the beach or the centre

"Five minutes away" means nothing. A video of the walk does.

The actual breakfast

Not a catalogue buffet: what is there on an ordinary Tuesday.

The noise

Especially in coastal destinations and city centres. Opening the window and letting the street be heard generates enormous trust.

The testimonial from the guest who hesitated

"I thought it would be full of tourists." Starting from the objection converts better than starting from the view.

Which creators to hire

The one who resembles your guest, not the one with the best camera.

A family with children, an older couple, a group of friends, a solo traveller: each sells to a different audience.

And here is the decision with the most impact in Spain: hire creators who film in the languages of your source markets. A coastal hotel receiving British, German and French guests needs content in those languages, not subtitled translations. Almost nobody does it and it is the biggest available advantage in the category.

How to buy content that lasts

Always ask for two versions: one with the promotion and one clean, with no dates or prices. The second serves you for three years.

And define the licence per property. If your group has five hotels, using the material across all of them does not cost the same as for one.

The brief that produces good material

Include: which room is filmed, which journey to show, what is included and what is not, three hooks, the disclosure wording and a list of what cannot be promised.

That last point prevents bad reviews, which in tourism cost more than any campaign.

The Spanish calendar

Buy the content between January and March, so you have it before high season. Easter week, the May bank holidays and August are the peaks. And winter tourism in the Canaries has its own calendar, inverted relative to the mainland.

Where to go next

In travel, honest information books more than the sunset. Our complete UGC guide for brands explains the rest of the process.