Websites for a holiday let, B&B or campsite
Booked direct, and booked out by Easter.
We build direct-booking websites for holiday lets, B&Bs and campsites in Bude, North Cornwall and North Devon: live availability, your own prices next to the agency's, and the shoulder weeks sold before you have to discount them. A website starts at £1,195, or we build it free from £25 a month.
From £25 a month, or from £1,195Every price
“Every booking that comes through the agency costs you a fifth of the week, and the shoulder weeks still sit empty.”
Direct bookings without the commission, with availability and prices a guest can trust, so the shoulder weeks fill before you have to discount them.
Changeover day, and the weeks either side.
The words below are the ones you use. We write the site in them rather than translating them into something a stranger would say.
Changeover day runs everything. Strip, clean, restock the welcome pack, check the hot tub, be ready by four, and do it again next Friday. July and August look after themselves. The money and the worry both live in the shoulder season, in the short breaks either side of it, and in the minimum stay you keep arguing with yourself about.
Every booking that comes through an agency arrives with the commission already taken off it. The published range for one national agency is in the next section, with the source, so you can check it against your own statements. That is the trade you make for their audience, and plenty of owners are happy with it. What stings is paying it on the repeat guests: the family who came last year, know the sea view, know which pitches have hardstanding and electric hook-up, and would have booked with you directly if there had been a way.
So the site has one job, and it is not to look like a brochure. It is to let a guest check dates, see the direct price, understand the minimum stay, read what is in the welcome pack, and pay you. Then it has a second job in October: sell the late availability and the short breaks to people who are looking three weeks out, not eleven months.
- changeover day
- occupancy
- shoulder season
- short breaks
- minimum stay
- pitches
- hardstanding
- electric hook-up
- late availability
- repeat guests
- welcome pack
- sea view
Sykes Cottages, owner advice, 2026
18% to 22%plus VAT, per booking, is what one national letting agency charges owners
Source: Sykes Cottages, owner advice, 2026.
www.sykescottages.co.uk/letyourcottage/advice/article/costs-of-running-a-holiday-letWhat your site actually has to carry.
Not a feature list. These are the things a customer of yours is trying to do, and where each one has to sit before they give up and ring somebody else.
| What it needs | Why, for you | Where it goes |
|---|---|---|
| Live availability | A guest who cannot see dates goes back to the listing site to find them, and books there. | A 'Check dates' button in the first screen, on your own calendar |
| Direct booking, at your own price | Sykes Cottages publishes 18% to 22% plus VAT per booking for owners (2026). A direct booking carries none of it, though you still pay card fees and do the admin yourself. | Your direct price shown beside the agency price, so the saving is obvious |
| Late availability | The week that has just fallen through is worth more sold at short notice than left empty. | A block on the home page you can change yourself in a minute |
| Short breaks and the shoulder season | September and October are where the growth is, and a three-night break is a different search from a fortnight in August. | A page of their own, with the minimum stay stated plainly |
| Dog-friendly, hot tub, sea view, half term | People type these words. A tick on a list of facilities does not answer them. | A page each, written as an answer, not as a feature |
| Pitches, hook-ups and hardstanding | A touring visitor needs to know what they are driving onto before they book, or you get the phone call instead. | A plan or a list, with the sizes, on the booking page |
What we’d do first.
Before a rebuild, before a rebrand, before anything with a monthly fee attached to it. In this order, for a holiday let, B&B or campsite.
A 'Check dates' button that goes to your own calendar first, with the direct price beside the agency price so the saving is obvious.
A late-availability block on the home page for the short-notice bookings, and a short-breaks page for the weeks outside August.
Dog-friendly, hot tub, sea view and half term written as pages people actually search for, not as a list of ticks.
And what we wouldn’t bother with
A 360-degree virtual tour
On a two-bedroom cottage it costs more than it brings back. Twelve good photographs, a floor plan and a calendar that is actually right will earn more than a tour anybody has to be told how to use.
The words your customers actually type.
Not keywords. Half-sentences, typed with one thumb, usually within a few miles of you and usually about to spend money.
holiday let Bude
B&B near Widemouth Bay
campsite near Bude
dog friendly cottage Cornwall
Every one of those is either a page on your site or a line on your Google Business Profile, and usually both. Local SEO and the Google profile is priced on its own, set up once and kept right through the season.
Read next: How much should a small business website cost in Cornwall?
What that takes, and what it costs.
Every one of these has a published price. Where it’s a range, a short call turns it into one fixed figure in writing before any work begins.
- Website design and buildFree build from £25/month, or from £1,195A 'Check dates' button that goes to your own calendar, with the direct price beside the agency's.
- Local SEO and Google Business ProfileGoogle Business Profile setup £90Found for 'holiday let Bude' and 'dog friendly cottage Cornwall', with your Google listing matching the site.
- Care planFrom £60/monthHosting and backups, and from the Grow plan up late availability and prices changed when you send them over.
- Photography and videoStock photography £145; shoots quotedThe rooms, the pitches and the view as a guest will find them on changeover day.
- AI searchFree check, then pricedYour facts laid out so an AI answer names you when someone asks for a dog-friendly stay near Bude.
Most of what we can show you so far is holiday parks, glamping and holiday home sales, built by the same two people under our holiday-park name. The thinking is the same and the figures on each study are lab measurements, stated in full. See the work.
Care plans, marketing and the smaller extras are all on the pricing page. When you know what you need, start your project.
The questions we get, answered straight.
Can I take bookings direct instead of paying commission?
Yes, that is the point of the build. You still pay card fees, and you still do the admin the agency was doing, so it is not free. But the commission on a direct booking is nothing, and the guests most likely to book direct are the ones who have already stayed with you.
Do I have to leave the agency to do this?
No, and most owners do not. Plenty run both: the agency fills the weeks you cannot, your own site takes the repeat guests, the short breaks and the late availability. What matters is that the two calendars agree, so we set that up before anything goes live.
Will it show real availability, or just an enquiry form?
Real availability, wired to the booking system you already use so the calendar cannot drift. If you are not on one yet we will talk you through what suits the size of the place, and we do not take a cut of whichever you pick.
What does a holiday let website cost?
A Fast-Track Website, from £1,195, covers the pages, the photographs you supply, and a 'Check dates' button linked to your booking system. A larger site, or one taking payment itself, is a bigger build: a Bespoke Website, from £2,495. Hosting and updates are the care plan, from £60 a month. Or we build it free from £25 a month on a pay-monthly plan. Every price is on our pricing page, and a range is fixed in writing before we start.
Real sites we’ve built.
Every one of these is live. Click through and look at it on your own phone.
We reply within 24 hours
Send us your web address. We'll tell you what's costing you weeks.
Built in Bude: The Bank at Bude, The Triangle, Bar Thirty Five. See all the work
We look at it the way one of your customers would: on a phone, in a hurry, on a Bude signal. Then you get an email from Leonard or Rebecca with the one thing to fix first and roughly what it would cost.
The check costs nothing and there is no sales call after it.