SEO for hospitality: what 69 venue websites get wrong
We ran the same checks as our free scan on 69 independent restaurants, cafes, pubs, hotels and B&Bs across the South West in September 2026. Here is what came up most, what it costs a venue, and what to fix first.
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The problems that came up most often
Based on 69 hospitality businesses, pooled across restaurants, cafes, pubs, and hotels and B&Bs. Each figure shows how many sites it was measured on.
95%of sites took more than four seconds to show their main content on a phone (56 of 59). Only 1 loaded in the time Google counts as good.
People choose where to eat, drink or stay on their phone, often standing in the street. If your menu or booking page is still loading, the place next door gets the table.
First fix: Start with the large photo at the top of the homepage: resize and compress it, and make sure nothing else has to load before it. Put the menu and booking link where they load first.
36%of sites were missing a page title or description on more than 30% of the pages we sampled (21 of 58).
Google then writes your search listing for you, often from whatever text it finds first, such as a cookie notice or an old events banner.
First fix: Give the menu, rooms, events and booking pages each their own title and description: what it is, where you are, and why someone should book.
Check your titles and descriptions33%of sites did not tell Google what kind of venue they were, or even that they were a local business, in their structured data (19 of 58).
Structured data is how you state outright that you are a restaurant, pub or hotel, where you are, and when you are open, rather than leaving Google to piece it together.
First fix: Add structured data for your type of venue (Restaurant, CafeOrCoffeeShop, BarOrPub or Hotel) with your address, phone number and opening hours.
Check your structured data61%of sites had no DMARC record at all, and only 11 of 69 told inboxes to quarantine or reject fake email sent in their name.
Booking confirmations and deposit requests are exactly what fraudsters copy. Without DMARC, a fake one sent in your name is harder for inboxes to spot.
First fix: Add a DMARC record to your domain, start it in monitoring mode, then move it to quarantine once your own email passes.
Check your DMARC record
What to fix first
If you run a hospitality business, this is the order we would take these in. Then run the free scan to see which apply to your site.
Make the first screen fast on a phone
This was the most common problem by a distance. Compress the hero image and make the menu, opening hours and booking button the first things to load.
Write a title and description for every page
Menu, rooms, events, private hire: each needs its own title naming what it is and where you are.
Tell Google what kind of venue you are
Add structured data for your venue type with your address, phone and opening hours, matching your Google Business Profile.
Protect the email your bookings go out from
Add SPF and DMARC records. It is a one-off job for whoever manages your domain.
About this research
- 69 independent hospitality businesses across twelve South West towns, audited on 26 September 2026 with the same checks our free scan runs. No site is named on this page.
- The figures are for the group as a whole. Some of its sectors had too few sites to quote on their own, so no figure here describes any single one of them.
- Homepage plus up to six further pages per site. Mobile speed is Google PageSpeed Insights lab data, measured twice and averaged.
- A site counts as failing a check only when it clearly misses it. Borderline results, such as a DMARC record in monitoring mode, are counted separately and not included in the fail figures.
- Some checks could not be measured on every site, for example when a page would not load. Each figure says how many sites it is based on.
Common questions
Further reading
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Read moreWhat Is a Title Tag? The One HTML Element Most Small Sites Get Wrong
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Read moreLocalBusiness Schema: The Structured Data That Actually Matters for Local Search
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