Preparation calendar: from autumn to the winter holidays and the slower months

Example scenario. A small guest house with eight rooms in a mountain town. The dates, the number of rooms and the tasks are fictional and serve as an illustration. Adapt them to your own property, season and team.

Why a calendar and not a list

Most owners prepare the website and the offers when the questions are already pouring in: two weeks before Christmas, on the day someone asks about a New Year’s Eve dinner. Then everything is done in a rush, and guests discover the mistakes in prices and phone numbers. A week-by-week calendar does not add work; it spreads it out: an hour or two a week instead of a whole weekend in a panic.

The calendar below is for a small property where one or two people make the decisions. If you have a team, assign the tasks by name.

Scenario assumptions

• Eight rooms; the owner answers enquiries and maintains the website alone.
• The main winter interest is around the holidays and at weekends, while January and February are quieter.
• The website already has pages for the rooms, a gallery and an enquiry form.
• Preparation starts in mid-October; the festive dates are illustrative and you replace them with your own.
• There are no calculations and no occupancy forecasts: the calendar is only the order in which to do the work.

Weeks 1 and 2: checking what is already there

Start with what the guest already sees. Open the website on a phone as if you were a stranger.

• Return to every page and check the prices, the phone number, the address and the check-in and check-out times.
• Delete or update everything that still describes last summer: summer offers, a pool that does not operate in winter, old dates.
• Check the enquiry form: send yourself a test enquiry and see whether it arrives and where. An enquiry is not a reservation and does not hold a room, so also check what response the guest receives.
• Write down on one sheet the questions guests asked last winter: heating, parking, ski storage, pets, breakfast.

Week 3: photos and descriptions

Winter is different from summer, and most websites show only summer photos. On a clear day, photograph the rooms warmed up, the entrance, the yard with snow or autumn colours, if there are any, and the breakfast.

• Replace the main photo of each room with a winter one, or at least a neutral one.
• Add to the descriptions what the guest asks most often: what kind of heating there is, whether there is a shoe dryer, how far it is from the centre.
• Remove the photos that no longer match the rooms.

There is also a separate guide on preparing photos and texts; the links below lead to it.

Weeks 4 and 5: offers for the holidays

Decide in advance what you are offering and for which dates, before you write it on the website.

• Set a minimum number of nights for the festive dates, if you have such a condition, and write it clearly.
• Write the offer in a few lines: who it is for, what it includes, what it does not include, until when it is valid and how to enquire.
• Prepare it as a draft and publish it when you are sure of the terms and prices. Do not publish an offer in advance that you will later have to withdraw.
• Prepare ready answers to the most common questions about the holidays, so that you do not write them from scratch every time.

Week 6: the actual publishing and checking

Publish the changes and review them on a phone, because that is where most guests come from. Send the link to two people you know and ask them only one thing: where would you press to make an enquiry? If they hesitate, the button is not clear enough.

The festive weeks

Busy days are not the time for new things. Just keep an eye on things:

• answer enquiries within the day, and if you cannot, at least leave a short message saying that you will reply;
• state in the offer text or on the page which dates are already taken, so that you receive fewer enquiries for them;
• write down every new recurring question.

The slow period: January and February

In the quiet months the work is different. There is nothing to hide here, but there is something to explain.

• Give the guest a reason to come on a weekday: quiet, rest, walks, remote work, if you really do offer them.
• Prepare an offer for weekday nights with clear terms and a time limit.
• Refresh the website with new content: a photo, a short text about the surrounding area, an answer to a new question.
• Use the time for small repairs and for a better list of photos for the next season.

After the season: one hour for conclusions

At the end of the period, set aside an hour and write down three things: which questions were repeated, what confused the guests and what on the website was not needed. That way the next preparation starts from a ready list.

Where ISKA Website helps

If you maintain the website yourself, it is important that changes do not go out half-finished. ISKA Website lets you keep changes as drafts, review them and publish them when you are ready, and go back to a previous version if there is a mistake. The website shows the rooms with photos, offers, a gallery and an enquiry form; it is not an online reservation system. It is offered by individual quote.

Check before you start

• You have a date when preparation starts: six to eight weeks before the season.
• You know which pages you will check first.
• You have decided the terms of the festive offer before writing it.
• You have an hour set aside for the conclusions after the season.