Social Media alone is not designed to obtain more attractive customers for your Hotel. There has to be a creative connection between Hotel Marketing and Social Media Marketing.
Social Media makes up the community, and Hotel Marketing makes up the marketplace. Don’t confuse the two!!
The Dilemma of Influence
Today’s modern traveler seeks and owns the information, and from there they make their own decisions. The information has become more available, and their decision has been justified through Social Media Influence.
And a majority of travelers seek information from TripAdvisor where reviews can be the tipping point of their decision without any input from the Hotel at all.
Social Media is, in general, an amplified communication channel. It amplifies content that triggers a set of emotions.
Your Hotels Marketing strategies are where you define your target markets. It is within this framework Hotels sets the customer expectations. And it is also within this framework Hotels have the greatest opportunities to exceed expectations.
Hotel marketing represents a set of processes for identifying or creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationship in a way that benefits the Hotel brand and stakeholders.
The Hotel offer services that are economic transactions offered by one party to another. Often time-based, services performed bring about desired results to recipients, objects, or other assets for which purchasers have responsibility.
In exchange for money, time, and effort, service customers expect value from access to goods, labor, professional skills, facilities, networks, and systems; but they do not normally take ownership of any of the physical elements involved.
For most Hotels reviews represent that traditional influence. Hotel guests will leave a review on sites like TripAdvisor with their viewpoint of the Hotel experience along with a rating of the total experience.
Engagement has always been important
Many Hotels tend to believe that the Social Media engagement process is complex and time-consuming.
But for the traveler engagements has always been important.
Research has shown that ratings in reviews traditionally get higher over time. Typically, the guests have higher expectations when the Hotel is relatively new. And if they experience any type of concern this is usually reflected in their reviews.
Research has also shown that positive online reviews significantly increase the number of reservations in a Hotel. This effect could be due to a viral effect that shapes costumers’ behavior online, for which Hotels with more reviews attract more customers and, in turn, further increases the number of reviews and influences the rating given to a Hotel.
77% of travelers reference reviews before choosing a Hotel. 80% read 6-12 reviews and 73% look at photos by other travelers before booking a room.
For Hotels, it’s incredibly important to reply to online reviews. According to a TripAdvisor study, 62% of travelers say that management responses to reviews make them more likely to book a stay at a Hotel.
No response to a review often is seen in the same way as an aggressive or defensive review. 70% of travelers are less likely to book a Hotel with aggressive and defensive reviews.
85% of TripAdvisor users agree that a thoughtful Management Response to a bad review improves their impression of a Hotel. And in the same manner, 8 out 10 of TripAdvisor users believe the Hotel care more about the guest with proper Management Response.
TripAdvisor research shows that engage with response experience;
- More page views
- Higher marked visibility
- Increased revenue
The Service Performance Framework
Most Hotels today have four Ps in their marketing mix; price, product, place, and promotion.
The price represents the value of a product or service. Your Hotels challenge here is to turn customers into value seekers and not bargain hunters.
The product includes the tangible good and all of the services that accompany that good to produce the final product. A product is a package, or bundle, of goods and services that comprise the total offering.
Your Hotels product should fit the task consumers want it for, it should work, and it should be what the consumers are expecting to get.
Place includes the distribution and logistics of producing a product or service and making it available to the customers.
Promotion includes all of the communications associated with marketing a product or service. The promotion mix consists of advertising, personal selling, publicity, sales promotion, and social selling.
In today’s modern social economy, the marking mix goes beyond the physical product.
People that add value to the Hotels today represent a wide variety of skills. Having the right people is essential because they are as much a part of your Hotel offering as the products/services you are offering.
Processes represent the key moments where the exchange between the customer and the Hotel happens. At this point, Hotels exchange the value proposition the customer paid for.
Physical Evidence represents that actual service received.
Personalization consists of tailoring a service or a product to accommodate specific individuals, sometimes tied to groups or segments of individuals.
A wide variety of o Hotels use personalization to improve customer satisfaction, digital sales conversion, marketing results, branding, and improved website metrics as well as for advertising.
Personalization is a key element in Social Media and recommender systems.
Research shows that a Hotel’s online visibility has a positive effect on revenue growth. Online ratings can have a beneficial effect on the occupancy rate of rooms, which is important for large Hotels with more room capacity. The cost of empty rooms is greater, especially in offseasons.
Today it is important for Hotels to understand the patterns of their target markets. Hotels need to know how the average customer found the information they needed to make an educated decision.
Online visibility can be measured in different ways, but the best option is always the one that takes into account the information sought and the habits of the average customer.
All these principles focus on modern Hotel Marketing strategies. With a clearly defined targeted marketplace, it is much easier to determine where and how to market your Hotel.
Social Media is a tool that amplifies your Hotels message with help from your Community.
Social Media makes up the Community
Social Media is an amplifier of your message. If your Hotels product and service is not good, to begin with, amplifying your message in Social Media might attract more to your presence, but it won’t improve your product and service.
Technology and Social Media is going to be important for your Hotel to achieve a competitive edge. But you need to know the hotel merges the Hotel Marketing Framework with the Social Media Framework.
A community is a group of people who share something in common, such as norms, values or identity. Essentially, building a community around your Hotel marketplace means making your customers feel that the marketplace is a part of their identity.
If your Hotel need help to put it all together then make sure to let us know.
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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
