When renewing or simply looking over your brand strategy, it is important to ensure that you are doing your best to make it as effective and engaging as possible. Given how competitive the hotel industry is, it is imperative to really make your strategy as unique as possible, especially when it comes to reputation management.
Having a clear, cut brand can help differentiate you from the competition while allowing customers to get a clear sense of what you are about and what they can expect. It will help you increase engagement and revenue while offering opportunities with other alliances who will become aware of your sense of identity. To really gage with what your brand strategy should be, you need to fully realise what it is you can offer. Is it that you are an economy hotel that can offer budget rooms? If so then you need to think about factors such as expectations and needs when you are creating your brand.
Think about what your guests will expect and what you would want yourself from a hotel. Bear in mind that travellers may be visiting as students, families, or on business. Take these individual personas that you feel would be your clientele and see how you can incorporate them into your strategy – there is no harm in offering different parts of your brand to fit each individual type of traveller. In fact, it helps to further engage with them and make them feel unique. Another great way to create an effective brand strategy is by networking. Yes, it may seem obvious, but companies can too often forget to try and develop relationships with affiliates, yet it is so important to do so. If you want your hotel brand to be seen as popular, then you need to think about networking with some local creative, digital and fashionable companies, through whom you may get a number of referrals, but can also further expand your marketing efforts. You can help each other to promote your services, perhaps offering deals for clients if needs be.
Make sure that your brand is wholly supported. After all, it would only cause more damage to market yourself as a luxury hotel only for customers to realise that you are anything but. Ensure you are doing your best in-house to live up to the reputation you want to uphold, and don’t be afraid to look for external marketing to support this. If you have a budget, look to advertise in local publications, or even on the television or radio. Speak with local attractions and theatres to see if you can get an advertisement in their brochure, and ensure that when asked to create the artwork that you hire a professional to do so. Clip Art copy and paste jobs don’t quite shout ‘professional’.
Why not look to using your logo throughout the hotel? Have it embroidered onto towels, printed on tissues and used for a variety of labels? It is simple but it really helps to just further engage customers with your brand, especially if your logo is catchy and sophisticated. Similarly, it is a great idea to create relationships with other brands with which you can extend your own. A simple way of doing this is with bathroom products. See if you can engage with a spa company who would be able to become a partner, so that all of your products are from the same company. This will help customers relate the two names together, furthering your brand strategy.
Hotel branding can really make or break how well an establishment performs and making it transferable across to your online efforts is a very important factor when implementing it. Creating a social media presence to support the brand also helps to strengthen it, especially when it is looked after properly and effectively. Being able to engage quickly and cost-effectively with customers is the perfect way to strengthen your brand strategy. Keep them informed on interesting updates and information about your hotel and the areas around to show you are a thought leader in the area. It will help to engage customers in a more effective manner.
