Marketing has changed dramatically over the years, and it’s now almost unrecognisable compared to the tactics that hotel marketers would use even five years ago. However, there are now such a wide range of tools that it can actually become confusing for marketers to know which are best for their hotel. You will have so many questions when it comes to what you need to be doing to be most successful in your marketing efforts, so it’s always best to set out a solid marketing strategy. How do you build this marketing strategy though?
Well, we’ve done our research and come up with a few steps that can really help you to get started and build a successful and modern marketing strategy.
Focus on Millennials
Whether they’re your main target market or not, you need to make sure that your marketing is relevant to Millennials. This is because, according to eHotelier, this generation currently makes up about a third of hotel guests worldwide, and is expected to rise to over 50 per cent by 2020. With this in mind, whoever you consider to be your target market, you need to also market to Millennials to ensure that you’re bringing in as much custom as possible. So, when it comes to your strategy, you need to know the facts about this generation….
- 90 per cent of Millennials go online every day to visit social media channels, watch videos, shop and research
- 55 per cent use search engines to learn about products
- 75 per cent go online on a smartphone at least as often as a computer, if not more
- 20 per cent find YouTube content more relevant and interesting than television
- 50 per cent comment on or like posts daily on social media
So, it’s clear that in order to connect with these people, businesses need to be active online too.
Make the most of the mobile commerce boom
The question has often been raised about whether or not mobile commerce is really successful. Well, according to Marketing Land, columnist Jason Warnock has got the stats from Yesmail Interactive, which showed that in the final three months of 2015, 51.7 per cent of the company’s email opens took place on a mobile device. In addition, research conducted by Gartner showed that 2015 saw the firm receive 290 million orders from PCs and 196 million from tablets, while a massive 1.9 billion orders were placed on mobile devices. So, all of this information proves without a doubt that hotels need to be putting a good focus on mobile commerce in order to see results.
Build customer personas
When it comes to targeting the right market, it’s beneficial to actually know who that market is. Perhaps you’re thinking “we can appeal to anyone!” Unfortunately though, you won’t – and if you try to then you may well find yourself getting left behind. You need to really research your most common customers. Find out where they are online, what they want from a hotel stay and what you can do for them to make their experience unique. Your customer persona should show you what motivates your target market, what they’re most concerned about when travelling and what barriers they might see to making a booking. Once you have this information, you’ll be much better informed when it comes to efficiently targeting these people.
Be active on social media
It goes without saying that you need to be on social media, but just having profiles isn’t enough. You need to be active and make sure that you’re reaping the benefits of what has undoubtedly become one of the most powerful marketing tools. 75 per cent of marketers say that their social media marketing is paying off, according to research conducted by Salesforce. This is a massive increase from the same survey just a year ago, when just 29 per cent of marketers felt this way. The 46 percentage point increase in just one year shows how successful social media marketing has become, meaning that if you’re not using it, then you’re missing out on some key opportunities. It must be noted, however, that the success of social media marketing is not just because of social platforms alone, but because of how easily they can be integrated into cross-channel marketing campaigns. Of course, these are just the very basics of what you need in your hotel’s marketing strategy.
If you use these areas as a base, you can build on them to create a solid strategy that can really create success for your hotel. However, do make sure that you are consistently reviewing it, measuring its success and updating your strategy to be sure that you’re staying up to date with the latest trends.
