How I Work with Hotels as a Creator
I’ve spent the last three (ish) years working with hotels and beautiful places to stay in a creative capacity, so I thought it felt like a good time to reflect and share a little bit about my journey - plus some tips on how to get started you’re interested in working with hotels as a creator too.
For context, I currently work part-time as a freelance photographer and content creator so while this is more than just a hobby, it’s not my full-time career either. Despite that, I’ve had the chance to work with lots of hotels and brands so you don’t need to be “full-time” to start working in this space!
In this post, I’ll cover:
How I Built My Portfolio
What I Offer as a Service
Why I Rarely Pitch to Hotels (and what I include in a pitch if I do)
What to do Instead of Pitching
Accepting Gifted Stays
How I Built My Portfolio
Before you can start building your portfolio, I think it’s important to be super clear on the types of clients you want to work with so that you can create content through personal trips or just at home. For example, I genuinely love staying in characterful and independent hotels so for any personal trips I had planned, I would stay in one of these types of hotels and use the opportunity to capture some content.
There were a couple of times at the beginning where I booked a one-night stay (between Sunday-Thursday when it’s usually the cheapest) in a couple of hotels I really admired (The Rose in Deal and Port Hotel in Eastbourne) for a mini staycation from London but also to build my portfolio. If you are able to do this, you could also ask if you’re able to peek into some of the bigger available rooms to take some photos. Alternatively, if you have any upcoming trips, you could also reach out to see if the hotel would be happy to upgrade your room in exchange for you taking photos (more on gifted stays at the end).
When I wasn’t travelling, I’d practice photography styling a lot at home (example photos here) — Covid lockdown was a huge help here as it encouraged me to use the space and props I had at home to create beautiful images. For example, using my bedding, books, radio etc. helped me to refine the “feel” I wanted to bring to hotel photography and content. This then helped build my confidence and allowed me to build a consistent style.
Overall, this approach meant I slowly built up a portfolio of work that reflected my style, while also showing potential clients exactly what I could create for hotels similar to theirs.
What I Offer as a Service
There’s a big difference between a photographer and content creator - when I work with hotels, I usually position myself as a combination of the two. My passion is photography, so high-quality imagery is always at the centre of what I offer. But over the past few years, I’ve also built an engaged online community (currently around 44k people across Instagram and TikTok) who engage with my travel diaries.
That means when a hotel works with me, they get professional photos which they can use on their channels and social reach as I share the hotel and my experience with my community.
As an example, I might provide the following package to a hotel:
10x high-res images - focused on storytelling rather than just interiors.
1x edited reel - you should always agree the length of the video in advance too as for example, a 60-second video will take considerably longer to edit than a 15-second video so you need to ensure the fee reflects the editing time.
20x unedited video clips
1x in-feed post on my Instagram and TikTok
Usage rights for an agreed period
For guidance on fees, what to charge, how to get paid, usage rights and lots more, you can review the free guides set up by Kelsey Heinrichs.
Why I Rarely Pitch to Hotels
When I first started out, I used to set myself a monthly goal of sending pitches. But over time, I realised cold emailing wasn’t the best use of my time so I very rarely do it now and here’s why:
Hotels get hundreds of emails from creators every week so standing out is extremely difficult and often your message goes unread or simply ignored.
Cold emails rarely line up with budget cycles. A hotel might love your idea but if they don’t have budget allocated, they won’t be able to work with you. They may keep you in mind for future projects but they’ll likely rely on you reaching back out to them.
When you reach out, hotels know they have the upper hand. Often they’ll offer a gifted stay but not payment. In contrast, if a hotel approaches you, it’s because they have a need, which makes it much easier to secure paid work. So it’s much better to focus on being found.
Pitch Structure
Whilst I’ve learned that spending my time building my online presence is more effective in the long-run, I do occasionally come across a hotel I love the look of or have a particular creative vision for so I will pitch to them. If you’re going to, I’d recommend a structure that looks a bit like this:
Greeting - if you know a contact name, use it. If not, reference the hotel: “Hi Artist Residence team”. You could also message them on Instagram and ask for a specific name/contact.
Introduction - A one-line intro and why you’re reaching out to them e.g. “I’m Tanya and I’m a London-based travel and lifestyle photographer and creator. I’m reaching out to discuss a potential collaboration opportunity”.
Why you want to work with them - have you visited the location before, do your audience engage well with similar hotels etc.
What you can offer - be super clear and share an example of what you could provide and why this could be valuable to them - try to use marketing specific terminology here too e.g. brand awareness, fresh content, audience reach etc. This makes it clear you understand a hotel’s marketing goals too.
Link to your portfolio - this could be a website or Canva portfolio. I think this is more professional than just social media feeds. You could also try to highlight work of a similar style or location. For example, if you are a pitching to a hotel in Cornwall, have you created any similar work from another seaside location?
What to do Instead of Pitching to Hotels
Build a website or Canva portfolio
You certainly don’t need a website when first starting out but it’s an online space you can make entirely your own so once you are able to, I’d highly recommend setting one up. A website allows you to showcase your best work in one place, shows professionalism, and can help with SEO so potential clients can discover you via Google. I use Squarespace for both my website and blog and highly rate it - the interface is so easy and you can create a professional-looking website in just one day.
As a travel blogger, I see it as my own digital magazine and generate affiliate income from my blog so it has extra value. However, you can also easily create a free portfolio on Canva.
Post consistently on social media
This is by far the most important thing you can do instead of pitching. The more you create and share, the more exposure you gain over time, which makes it much more likely that clients will find you. For me, posting consistently looks like 3-4 times a week on both Instagram and TikTok, which I find manageable with my other commitments. I also try to plan my feed in advance. Try to share content that shows what you’d like to be hired for!
Repurpose your existing content
You don’t always need to be travelling or staying in new places to share relevant content. Look back through your archives and reuse the content that has performed well, but with a new angle (and repeat!). For example, I know my Lake District content performs well with my audience so I will often repost the same content with different on-screen text or a slightly different edit. You can also create themed round-ups, like “Best Hotel Spas” or “5 Cosy Hotels for Autumn” etc.
Introduce yourself to Travel and Lifestyle PR agencies
Hotels often outsource their marketing to PR agencies which means those agencies are usually looking for creators who fit their client’s values/needs. Instead of emailing hotels directly, you can get on the radar of the agencies that represent them. Start by finding a travel PR agency on Instagram, then look at the “suggested” accounts to discover similar ones. Follow them, engage with their posts, and make a brief introduction by email. If they like your style, they’ll likely keep you in mind for future campaigns.
Accepting Gifted Stays
Finally, I wanted to cover the topic of gifted stays as it’s hugely common in the travel industry. I think it’s completely normal to accept a handful of gifted stays, especially at the start of your journey when you are building a portfolio. It’s a great way to practice capturing content, hone in on your style and practice communicating professionally with clients.
However, it’s really important to not accept gifted stays long-term in exchange for deliverables. Once you’ve built a portfolio, your time, skill, and editing hours deserve to be paid for. Hotels will often say a stay is worth some sort of monetary value e.g. “£600 plus breakfast” etc. but the reality is you’ll be spending most of your time shooting and later editing so you deserve to be paid for your time. It also de-values other creators in the same space.
I accept a very small number of gifted stays if I’m able to fit it in to my schedule, if it’s a hotel that I’d really love to add to my portfolio or if I believe I’m getting enough value in exchange e.g. the hotel offers a 2 or 3-night stay which means I still have some time to relax as well as work. If you do accept a gifted stay, make sure to set boundaries in place in advance and in writing e.g. you may agree to 10x images only and state that anything above that would be a paid collaboration.
