Managing Homhero Specials on your Website

Special Rates are something that can be configured in Homhero to offer discounts to guests and increase bookings. Once you have created a special rate, you will probably want a way to market this special to your guests.

If you have a Homhero-built website, you most-likely have the ability to do this built into your website. The process will be the same in most cases, if anything on your website is different to the below, or not working as expected, please reach out to [e-mail]

Step One

The first step is that you should have already created your Special Rate in Homhero - This will be one of three possible types: Night-Based Rates, Last Minute Rates or Promotional Codes.

For more information about setting up Special Rates in Homhero, see below:

• Adding a new Last Minute Rate
• Adding a new Night Based Rate
• Adding a new Promotional Code

Step Two

In the dashboard of your website, you should see the Specials option on the left hand menu. Hover over this and select "Add New Special"

New Special - Tab One (Presentation)

The first page/tab on the Specials editing screen is primarily to do with marketing the special - how it appears on the front end of the website.

1. Title - Give your special offer a title. This can be a simple title, it doesn't necessarily have to include details of the offer
2. Description - This is where you would write an enticing description, ideally one or two paragraphs, about the special. Again, you do not need all of the details in here, it is more to sell the idea of a summer escape or a winter getaway or whatever the angle is.
3. Discount Description - This will appear as a sub-heading beneath the title, so the idea is that this heading WILL describe the actual saving or benefit to the guest in a clear and concise way - eg. "Stay 3, Pay 2 this winter"
4. Terms and conditions - Put any additional terms and conditions here - please note that anything related to the start/end dates of the special will be appended automatically based on the date settings entered later, so you don't need to add this here. 
5. Banner Image - this is the image that will appear once a user clicks onto the individual special page. Recommended size is 1920px x 600px or larger. Please refrain from adding too much text as this may be cut off on some displays.
6. Thumbnail Image - this image will appear on the "Specials" page. Recommended size is 800px x 600px or larger.

It is ok to use the same image for both the banner and thumbnail, these will just be cropped differently.

New Special - Tab Two (Homhero Settings)

If you click on the Homhero Settings tab, you will see some new options appear.

The first option on this tab is Special Type. You should select the option which matches whatever type of special you set up in Homhero earlier.

The fields that appear under this will change depending on the type of special that you have selected. But importantly, the names of the fields should match the ones in Homhero, so all that needs to be done here is that the same details you entered in Homhero should be entered here.

There is a field called Homhero Account Special - in most cases this will only have one option, which will be your Homhero account name, so just select that. The purpose of this field is so that we can then display the correct list of Seasons to select from, to match your settings in Homhero. 

The final visible field is called Deal Applies to - 

If your Homhero special is restricted either by Categories, or by Exclusive for Listings, use this field to select which, and then you will see further options where you can select the Categories/Listings to match what you have selected in Homhero.

If you have set something for either of these, select the option from this dropdown.

If you used Exclusive for Listings in Homhero, then you want the Selected Properties option.

Under Include / Exclude Properties in most cases you will use Include Below Properties. This means the special will only be displayed for the selected properties.

The Exclude Below Properties option is meant for a scenario where all but a small number of listings are participating in the special - in these cases its easier to select the ones that aren't participating than the ones that are.

Final Step - Publishing

Once you have added all the necessary info, scroll to the top of the edit screen and press the Publish button (top right).

The display of the special will depend on your website theme, it may appear something like this, on a "Specials" page.

Please note that the three coloured boxes on the top right are only visible to the website administrator and show info about the type of special, whether or not it is visible to website guests (the below example is NOT) and a link to edit the special. This is where the thumbnail image displays.

The display of the specials page may look something like this, again this will be different depending on your website theme.

If you have any issues setting up your special offers on the website, please reach out to [e-mail] for support.