Using Social Media to Enhance Revenues:The Social Hotel

February 17 2010Suresh Sood,

Advisor Online Communities&

Social Media Marketing Researcher UTS

The Anthropomorphy of Destination Brands : Building the Emotional Link with Consumers through Film and Social Media, November 2010

http://www.bit.ly/socialhotel

Topics for Discussion

1. Social media marketing 2. Social Traveller3. Importance of Facebook 4. Social Value Chain and Ancillary Revenue5. B2B Social 6. The Social Hotel 7. Recommendations for 20118. Social Media Customer Contact Centre 9. Resourcing for Social Hotel10. 2015 vision (consumer and travel participants)

Social Media Marketing is not Conventional Marketing

“a many-to-many mediated communications model in which

consumers can interact with the medium, firms can provide

content to the medium and, in the most radical departure from

traditional marketing environments, consumers can provide

commercially oriented content to the medium.”

Hoffman & Novak, 1997

1:1 Marketing

ShotgunMarketing

Segment Marketing

‘All Customers the same’

‘All Customers in a segment

the same’

‘All Customersin a network interrelated’

A New Way of Marketing ?

Social Network Marketing

‘All Customers are different’

suresh.sood@uts.edu.au

Geektoid Mangala

www.linkedin.com/in/sureshsood

twitter.com/soody

www.facebook.com/sureshsood

ssood

www.bravenewtalent.com/talent/suresh_sood

Hero5!

scuzzy55

soody

GreatMystery14

Social Traveller: sources content & inputs from social travel sites

General social networks and sites:Facebook (e.g. referrals to hotel web sites) Flickr (uploads from destination) Twitter (alerts on posted reviews, special offers e.g. Tornoto at 50% discount from Virgin America and geotagging use www.connectme360.com to check out ground content from destination tweets)LinkedInYouTube (video of destination experience)

Mobile social networks – foursquare and Gowalla

Travel Blogs – Travelpod and TravelBlog

Social Travel guides/networks – WAYN

Travel review sites – trip advisor and Travel Post

Online Travel Agencies (hotel reviews)

Inbound Tourist Study Bangkok Airport(April 2010)

• A quantitative survey of 320 outbound travellers• Face-to-face intercept survey• The survey establishes buying patterns of consumers and

particular impacts for travel purchasing• Distribution channels and information sources • Interviewed in the departure lounge transiting to

Australia. • Composition both European transit passengers and Thai

travellers departing to Australia.

Online Social Networking

• Not using - 45.5%

• Facebook - 42.9%

• Not using Facebook – 11.6%

Facebook is My Newspaper(Susie Wilkening, http://reachadvisors.typepad.com/)

Travel Distribution Chain Consumer Perspective

Traditional Travel Value Chain

Social Online Travel Distribution Value Chain Expands Beyond Traditional Chain

12

Landscape Online Travel 2010-2015

Airlines Hotels Rail/Ferry

Leisure BusinessFIT

VFRMICE

Packaged Tour

GDS/CRS

Wholesalers

Online Travel Agencies (OTAs)

Retail Travel Agents

USA:ExpediaOrbitzPricelineTravelocity

AmadeusGalileoWorldspan

Skyteam

FarebundlesAncillary Fees

B&B

Tour Operators

Accommodation

UK:ExpediaOpodoBooking.com (Priceline)Lastminute.com (Travelocity)

India:MakemytripYatraTravel GuruCleartrip

CruiseRoad

Ancillary Revenue US Airlines Source: Bureau of Transportation Stats, Form 41; Schedule P1.2

In 2009, the American airline industry collected $7.8 billion with Delta $1.6 billion from Ancillary services

Ancillary services are non-ticket related charged services e.g. blankets, excess baggage, flowers, flight insurance, frequent flyer, meals, hotel bookings, in-flight entertainment, pet transportation, pillows, theme parks, theatre/concerts, trains and even advertising space on trays.

B2B Social • Airlines and frequent flyer

lounge operators• Travel agents• Travel management companies• Global distribution system

operators • Charge card providers e.g.

Amex, Visa, Mastercard and Diners

• Corporate booking engines• Online Travel Agents – Expedia,

priceline, Travelocity and Orbitz• Meta search – Kayak, bing

(Microsoft) and fly.com

90% of B2B technology buyers view online video.

80% read blogs.

37% post questions on social networking sites

16% engage customers on Facebook

69% are active in social networks.

Webbiquity, Best Social Media Stats, Facts and Marketing Research of 2010

The Social Hotel

• Social media as asset and deep integration with networks• Gen Y as customers (15 – 25)• At moment of truth– Who am I, What I do, What I look like, What I like to do

• Content well beyond room booking• Content generation by hotel staff• Bedside iPad (optional) • Social Hub and content curation vs Web site• Provides real time experiences

RS Hotel ?

Conversations -> relationships -> transactions

Prospects -> friends->fans -> contacts -> customers

Recommendations: Hotel Industry Participants 2011

1. Social media marketing for all destination assets

2. Social Content mechanisms e.g. wikis and video

3. Listening to conversations systematically

4. Engage with travellers on social networks and knowledge sharing about destination independent of sales activity

5. Establish a social media customer contact centre

Blog Pulse Trend Search

Social Media Customer Contact Centre

MembershipCRM

Feeds Dashboard

EDM TemplateTrack opens

Social Media Press Release

Centre

FAQsForum links

Offers Calendar

TwitterTime schedule

TravelCommunity

B2C & B

Data AcquisitionFrom

Mobile Apps

Serve customers through listening and responding to needs vs. marketing or advertising. Focus on launching and growing the community through: Invite creators and influencers to become charter members of the community Create evangelists through providing exclusive access to new information, attendance at pre-launch party and have them provide feedback for future initiatives

Start community with conversations and have community manager encourage sharing stories of problems, overcoming issues and successes Ensure community can be readily found with links from web sites, blogs and other popular social media. Accelerate community adoption through existing marketing efforts including emails newsletters and create a sense of urgency.

Community Manager/Curator

2015 - Travel Industry Participants • Facebook as a travel intermediary providing recommendations via

9 million Australian users of social networks to international visitors

• Connected and Instant bookings available via Apple iTravel, Facebook, Google Television or an equivalent consumer interface allowing processing of transactions.

• Splinternet in full operation with travel guides on iPad devices and travel experts available on demand via social networks directly imbedded into the social guides and travel blogs.

• Travel substitution products exhibiting Australia’s natural assets to be viewed and sold via High Definition 3D Immersive capabilities for Go nowhere Gamers and visitors in the pre-planning stage of purchasing an experience.

2015 Key Scenario – Consumer Perspective

• Travel substitution e.g. in home travel experiences available at time of dream and post travel

• Recommendations from family and friends

• Instant Booking of destination ground assets including everything from hotels, restaurant table, reservations, transportation and theme park rides

• Straight through processing of Booking → check-in → in-flight → baggage • Efficient and effective automated language translation e.g. Chinese

Go-Nowhere-Gamers

• “Perhaps worryingly, a new generation will reject travel altogether in favor of gaming, social networking and ‘always on’ media,” the report states. “As in-home leisure is becoming more engaging, a group of young people will emerge who do not go out any more.”

Future of Free Time, April 2010