The Garrison Hotel is a well-known Sheffield landmark. The historic Hillsborough Barracks, originally built in 1854, has undergone many changes of identity but in 2001, the former accommodation and Guardhouse areas were converted into a hotel, bar and restaurant.
Whilst the website for the hotel had done a good job for many years, the advances in technology and tastes meant it was time for an update.
After many discussions and research we came decided a list of key points:
- Visual update to better showcase the collection of images of the Hotel.
- Calendar of events.
- Promote private events.
- A way of making the bar and restaurant more prominent as a independent parts of the business.
- A way of promoting local events unconnected to the hotel but whose visitors need somewhere to stay.
- Online booking for rooms and restaurant.
- Promote seasonal menus.
Behind the scenes we needed to make the site easier to update and to improve its search engine ranking.
What we Did
Early on, we recommended moving over to WordPress as the system for managing content. On top of this we added several customised functionality including an events manager, photo galleries, booking system and ways of making the different areas distinctive in their own right whilst keeping a consistent look.
The hotel is very photogenic and we wanted to make photographs the main feature of the site, so a lot of work was done to let the hotel take advantage of their existing library of images. New photographs were also shot especially for the relaunch.
Word-of-mouth is a major factor in the hotel’s success and social media and links from other sites play a large role. Social sharing and TripAdvisor integration was important, as we realised the website was only one part of the hotel’s online presence wit all needing to work together.
Search engine optimisation can be controlled from within the site admin area on a per-page basis.
The Results
Staff at the Garrison now look forward to updating the site and are easily able to add new content – especially photographs. The ever-changing content is helping keep the site fresh and attractive to search engines.
New menus and events can be easily distributed to customers.
Bookings online have begun to take an upturn as the new design gains traction.
