Bed and Breakfast Coach

It all started in France

In 2001, Yvonne Halling set out on an adventure to help people from all over the world experience the beauty of Champagne, France, through her bed and breakfast, Les Molyneaux.

For 10 years, Yvonne worked as a one-woman show, developing events and experiences at her B&B, working with the local travel agency to try to fill her guest book, and making every visitor’s stay something they would never forget. However, despite her hard work, she wasn’t hosting as many guests as she’d have liked. Yvonne’s goal was to fill her rooms consistently with new and repeat guests, but she needed help to do so.

That’s when she called on Keap’s small business marketing automation and CRM software. She got straight to work using the platform to:

• Capture leads with custom landing pages and forms
• Automate lead-nurturing email campaigns
• Send invoices and process payments
• Store customer and prospect contact information
• Keep track of notes on contacts and segment them based on that information
• Start sending personalized emails that aligned with each contact’s specific interests and stages

Yvonne was shocked by the changes she saw in her beloved business. Les Molyneaux started experiencing more growth working with Keap than it had in the 10 years prior. The best part? Yvonne’s guest book was filling up with people from all over the world. Previous guests she hadn’t heard from in years were suddenly booking trips to come back, and countless new visitors were reserving rooms for the first time.

“When I automated my bed and breakfast business with Keap sales and marketing automated systems, I was able not only to be fully booked whenever I wanted to be, but I didn't have to drop my rates,” Yvonne explains. “I didn't have to give away free stuff. I didn't have to diminish myself in the eyes of my guests, and I could attract the guests that I wanted to attract whenever I wanted.”

Fast-forward 22 years since Les Molyneaux first opened, and Yvonne has said "au revoir" to her bustling B&B. This may come as a surprise considering all the success the inn owner experienced, but it was a necessary step for Yvonne as the growth she experienced through marketing automation led her to a new dream — one that would help her reach more people than ever before.

Time for a new adventure

While Champagne, France, is a fairytale destination, it’s not where Yvonne discovered her new business venture and passion. Rather, she had to travel 4,132 miles to Kyrgyzstan to realize her next step.

In 2016, Yvonne went to Kyrgyzstan three times to deliver hospitality training classes that she had created. She met, networked and coached people who were in the same place she was when she first started her bed and breakfast.

As she taught hospitality owners and workers the marketing tactics that leveled up her business, her love for coaching only grew. Eventually, it became abundantly clear to Yvonne that coaching was her calling. “I sort of had an awakening because I really loved doing it,” Yvonne recalls. “I thought, ‘I want to do more of this.’"

So, in 2017, Yvonne sold her bed and breakfast, packed up her things and moved back to the UK to launch her new coaching business. That’s when the fun began. Yvonne was getting inundated with inn owners who wanted to know how to achieve the growth and work-life balance she had. Fortunately for them, the B&B marketing expert was already working on launching Bed And Breakfast Coach, a business dedicated to helping bed and breakfast owners around the world achieve growth and freedom through strategic marketing and the use of small business marketing automation.

Yvonne was able to hit the ground running with this new business because she wasn’t starting from scratch — she had Keap. In Bed And Breakfast Coach, the small business owner implemented the same automation framework that grew her first business by 900%, and she quickly saw similar results.

Helping others achieve more through automation

The catalyst behind Yvonne’s new business was hearing about the struggles so many other bed and breakfast owners were constantly battling:

• Empty guest books
• Too many administrative duties
• Little time to focus on the most important part of running a B&B: the guests

Yvonne knew these struggles all too well because she dealt with them for the first 10 years of running Les Molyneaux. But she also knew Keap’s small business CRM and marketing automation software offered a way out. So, that’s what Yvonne set out to teach her clients.

Yvonne now offers B&B owners group classes, 1:1 coaching, one-time courses and an online learning portal. In her courses and coaching sessions, Yvonne helps her students gain confidence with marketing, and she stresses that they need marketing automation and CRM software to achieve the success and freedom they’re dreaming of.

In fact, she tells her clients, “Your CRM, your Keap account, your database, your tagging system, your email campaigns are the engine of your business. If you don't have one, it's like trying to drive a car without an engine.”

For many of Yvonne’s clients, this “engine” is brand new. “Particularly in the hospitality world, people don’t do this… Clients say ‘I run a B&B. What the heck do I need a CRM for?’”

That mindset doesn’t last for long, especially after Yvonne teaches her customers how to use Keap and build automation campaigns that will attract and nurture leads, and turn past customers into repeat customers.

Her clients’ reactions? “They absolutely love it,” Yvonne explains. “Now customers are doubling and tripling their income in just one season.”

Big results

After dedicating herself to changing the lives of other bed and breakfast owners, Yvonne’s happier than ever — and so are her clients.

Yvonne often hears about the difference Keap’s software is making in her clients’ businesses. For example, she recently helped a customer build an automated email workflow within Keap. This campaign targeted past guests of her client’s bed and breakfast because she wasn’t receiving any repeat bookings despite positive reviews. After launching this campaign, Yvonne’s client called her, and she was ecstatic. Within just three days, she had received over 70 bookings from past clients.

Another customer of Yvonne’s had been running her guest house in St. Louis, Missouri, for over 27 years when she booked her first coaching session. She’d hit a wall financially and couldn’t get past it, no matter how hard she tried — similar to Yvonne’s story with Les Molyneaux. After consistent coaching sessions and implementing marketing automation, Yvonne’s client had 8 record-breaking months for her guest house.

These aren’t isolated scenarios. Yvonne hears these types of stories all the time. It’s why she loves her job and can’t imagine doing anything else.