WordPress Hotel Website - Direct Booking Conversion + SEO Architecture

I own an independent 50-room motel on the Connecticut shoreline and am looking for an experienced WordPress professional to rebuild the property website around direct bookings, performance, and search visibility. This is not a template-installation job. I want someone who understands architecture, SEO strategy, conversion, and how to build something that can evolve. PROJECT Build a new primary hotel website from the ground up. The property is expected to rebrand in the future, so the underlying SEO, content, analytics, URL structure, schema, and technical architecture should be designed with an eventual brand/domain transition in mind. I am not expecting the future design to remain unchanged. I am expecting the underlying digital assets and search equity to be portable rather than unnecessarily tied to the current brand. Property details will be shared with shortlisted candidates. REQUIRED STACK Self-hosted WordPress GeneratePress or Bricks Cloudways Cloudflare Cloudbeds booking integration GA4 Google Search Console Hotel / LodgingBusiness schema Minimal plugin footprint Mobile-first development Strong Core Web Vitals Target page-load time under 2.5 seconds PRIMARY OBJECTIVES Increase direct bookings and reduce OTA dependence. Build substantial organic visibility throughout the Connecticut shoreline. Create an SEO architecture capable of surviving and transferring through a future property rebrand. Establish the foundation for a broader search ecosystem around the property. Long term, I want the property competing for searches well beyond its immediate town — across the Connecticut shoreline and, where realistic, statewide. SEARCH ECOSYSTEM In addition to the primary property website, I want to explore a small ecosystem of approximately 3–5 page/content sites or microsites built around useful traveler search intent. These should not be thin doorway sites. Each should have a legitimate purpose and useful content of its own while supporting the broader organic-search strategy and creating natural pathways toward the property. I want someone who can advise on whether this architecture makes sense, what should live on the primary domain versus separate properties, and how to execute it without creating duplicate-content, cannibalization, or search-quality problems. YOU SHOULD UNDERSTAND WordPress architecture Hotel/hospitality booking journeys Conversion optimization Technical SEO Local SEO Content and internal-linking architecture Structured data/schema Domain and brand migrations Redirect strategy and preservation of search equity Performance optimization Analytics and conversion tracking AEO/GEO and emerging AI-search visibility DO NOT APPLY IF YOUR DEFAULT APPROACH IS Elementor Large prebuilt themes Excessive plugins Proprietary systems Vendor lock-in Outsourcing the project after being hired Generic mass-produced proposals I retain full ownership and administrative control of all websites, domains, hosting, Cloudflare, analytics, Search Console properties, plugins, code, credentials, and project assets. WHO I WANT Preferably one strong independent professional or a very small team. The person I interview must be the person who will actually lead the project. I want someone capable of disagreeing with me when the architecture or SEO strategy does not make sense. INTERVIEW Shortlisted candidates will have a video call with me before a final SOW is requested. AI tools are fine. Reading prepared AI-generated answers, scripts, or notes back to me during the interview is not. I want a real conversation and to understand how you think. WHEN APPLYING Please provide: Three live websites you personally worked on. Briefly state what you personally did on each. Tell me whether you would use GeneratePress or Bricks here and why. Maximum 5 sentences. Explain how you would architect the site today knowing the property may later change its name and domain. Give me your initial view on using several small, useful content sites to expand Connecticut shoreline search visibility. Confirm whether you personally will be doing or leading the work. Do not send a long agency biography or portfolio dump. BUDGET & TIMELINE Fixed-price project. Target budget approximately $6,000, with flexibility for the right candidate. (the supporting-site ecosystem is a future phase, not included in the initial build) Expected initial build period approximately 6–8 weeks. Potential ongoing work involving SEO, CRO, maintenance, content properties, and future hospitality web projects. To filter out automated bids, begin your proposal by answering this question: What is a boat powered primarily by wind called? English does not need to be perfect. but clear thinking and timely communication is required. You should take ownership and pride in your work.