All Hoteliers with a real backbone look at profitability and how it impacts property value. One challenge for many years has been rising customer acquisition costs.
The Hotel Industry is known for its complexity and fragmented structure. A hotel can be owned, operated, branded and asset managed by four different entities and needing that many decision-makers on the same page can be a major roadblock to innovation.
Today at a minimum most Hotels are paying three times what they historically been paying for customer acquisition.
We can categorize customer acquisition costs in two categories.
- Direct costs that can be related to the various types of transactions, such as commissions, loyalty costs, and net-rate markup
- Sales and marketing costs that cannot be assigned to any specific transactions
The End of traditional Customer Acquisition channels
Hotel and Hoteliers have for centuries lived in a comfort zone with utilizing traditional push marketing strategies.
Not only are these methods getting outdated, but they come with a tremendous cost. And the reality today is that new alternatives are popping up that is more cost-effective for all parts involved in the transaction.
It’s not often I make a prediction, but this time I will make an exception. 2017 will be the year where the Hotel Industry will have to draw a line in the sand! By the way, customers have already drawn this line.
The key is that you still have time to be on the right side on the line. If you choose to stay on the side with traditional push marketing strategies customers will put you out of business. On the push marketing side, customer acquisition costs will not just raise – they will skyrocket!
Optimize your Hotel brand with Social Media
The Hotel must look at new alternative solutions to optimize profit and prevent loss. And this must be done through more cost-effective channels.
This will require Hotels to shift towards more pull marketing strategies. Modern pull marketing uses various new media channels to generate interest in a product or company, encouraging customers to seek out the product or company on their own.
A pull marketing campaign is customer-focused, but should still start with the analysis of the service the Hotel wants to promote. The Hotels needs to determine what the service key features are and who is most likely to demand it through extensive market research.
The Hotel should start researching several months before any given season or event to learn the who, what, where, when, and how their service will add value to their customers. It based on this date the Hotels can launch relevant cost-effective campaigns.
The key to successfully cut down your Hotels customer acquisition cost with Social Media today is build upon three simple principles;
- Awareness
- Foundation
- Collaboration
1. Awareness
With awareness, you keep your eye on key overall Social Media goals like;
- Humanizing your Hotel brand
- Manage your reputation
- Create brand advocates
- Generate leads and sales
- Resolve customer service issues
- Handling crises
- Security / Integrity
2. Foundation
Social Media can be a very cost-effective marketing tool for Hotels that help with awareness, presence, and loyalty. But it is important to know that it is in no way a quick fix.
Social Media don’t support the traditional way of selling. Hotels must tell a story that is helpful and provides value.
And trust me I understand this is a hard concept selling to your Hotel Management team, owners, the board of directors, etc. It’s is not very sexy to present a plan saying their Hotel(s) need to stop selling like we do today and start telling stories that are helpful and provide value.
Hotels must understand the role Social Media can play in their overall marketing and brand building plan.
Hotels need to have complete Social Media profiles on all Social Networks they are active on. Know your targeted audience and where they are.
What type of content will your audience find interesting, helpful and valuable? Share content in authentic ways that customers can relate too.
Invest in tools and resources that support your Social Media efforts. Build a Social Media Task team for your Hotel.
3. Collaboration
Build communities, and from them identify influencers. Manage your Hotels reputation, and focus on building new and renewed relationships.
Any Hotel brand that wants to work with a relevant influencer, with the view of inspiring them to talk about a product to their audience, needs to collaborate with them to find the most authentic and genuine way of doing this. Ultimately, this will then generate the most engaging and valuable content that will have an impact and deliver the best results for all.
With Social Media, there are various forms of influence:
- 92% of people trust personal recommendations over brands – even if they don’t know the individual making the recommendation
- 81% of people are influenced by their friends’ social media posts
- 71% of customers’ report having an improved perception of a brand when they read positive reviews on Social Media
Influence isn’t just having a lot of followers. It’s also driven by expertise and credibility on the subject matter and the relationship between the influencer and his or her followers.
In 2017, it is predicted that as much as 75% of brands in general plan implementing influencer’s in their content strategies.
Conclusion
Social Media is no quick fix, but with the right strategies, techniques, and team in place, you can reposition your Hotel and start to energize new Hotel revenue.
If you wait too long customers will move on to new alternatives that meet new demands. You can’t blame current situations on circumstances. And this is not a fad that will pass by.
Start with drawing a line in the sand. Let us meet on the other side of the line.
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Our Social Media Management team has refined these processes to help Hotels. Contact us today to learn more.
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Try something new it will magnetize your Hotel!
Be flexible and identify new ways to make guests happy.
As guest behavior and pattern continues to evolve, expectations will continue to rise. Navigating these changes can be challenging. Learn more about how we can help your Hotel.
About the author
Are Morch is the founder and owner of Are Morch – Hotel Marketing Coach. Get more from Are on Facebook | Twitter | LinkedIn | Pinterest | Instagram| Podcast