Social Media Tactics For Hotels

Hotels should be more involved in social media because their business will greatly benefit from it. Social Media keeps growing in importance, not only as a means for interacting with customers, but also as it impacts organic search and ranking of the hotel. Hotels that take advantage of this trend may see major returns as far as online placement and revenue are concerned.

But how to boost social media and assess the ROI in the hotel industry? Be it a passing craze, as some people argue, Social Media is today the fastest growing component of Internet Marketing as far as new users are concerned. Facebook boasts more than 250 million users and 120 millions log in every day. Even though at first Facebook was considered to be a toy for teenagers and college students, now, according to facebook.com, two thirds of its users are out of college, while the fastest growing demographic segment is people over 35.

Social Media gives you the opportunity to establish a direct bond with your customer in a way that previous media was not able to. You can create a one-to-one relationship in which you may receive repeated feedback on how your customers are receiving your marketing messages and products.

With Social Media you can establish yourself as an authority in your niche market and by means of blogs, twitter, facebook, etc you can also establish yourself as an expert in your specific destination. People prefer to buy from experts and also are more likely to follow experts on their blog posts, tweets etc.

Customer reviews and user-generated content determine hoteliers' notion of Social Media. While consumer reviews are particularly crucial and a potential profit for hotels receiving good reviews (just as the opposite is a penalizing), Social Media goes beyond just that into numerous other social media channels.

Indeed, social media optimization is the new thing of internet marketing. Today, Search Engines dedicate high relevance to businesses linked through various social media channels and the result is higher ranking in search engines, and thus more internet visibility.

Yet, how to do Social Media Optimization in the best way for hotels? These strategies may be useful for hotels that do not already have a Social Media strategy and wants to experiment in Social Media without a major investment. The main Social Media goals for such hotels can consist of:

1. User-Generated Content Channels like Trip Advisor 2. Facebook Profile 3. Twitter profile 4. YouTube video channels 5. Flickr photo profile 6. Myspace profile 7. A Blog in which you may add specials and any recommendations on what to do in your destination.

It's easy for a hotel to set up these channels without the help of an expert or alternatively employ a company that can do that. At any rate, here are a few points that need to be taken into consideration while opening up these profiles:

1. Channels need to be tagged with suitable keywords 2. Channels need to be linked back to your hotel website and vice-versa. 3. Interlink the channels through a plug-in so that the content you upload in one platform is automatically loaded in the others. The benefit of interlinking is that a post on your blog automatically goes to Facebook and Twitter. Any pictures posted on Flickr automatically show up on your Facebook and Myspace profiles, etc.

What needs to be done after all those channels are set up? The key to Social Media optimization is being actively involved in these channels and initiate conversations. These conversations might be started in two different ways:

1. User generated Content: hotels should track the reviews posted on a weekly basis and respond whenever interventions require a follow up. Even an initially negative review about a hotel can be turned into a strategic marketing pro with the proper response from the management.

2. Social Media Channels: channels such as Facebook, Myspace and Twitter allow hotels to be part of communities that shares mutual interests. By joining these groups, the hotel can interact constantly with the group and acquire importance in the field. For instance a hotel may:

Join communities that share interests, such as destination, golf, beach, mountains. - Discuss any initiatives of your property, like pet-friendly, environmental programs, etc. Talk about the activities that can be done in your destination, an attraction, an event, anything interesting going on in your city. If there is a conference or an event in the area, join their social media group and offer specials and packages for that event. Make a photo album of the hotel, and keep the pictures updated on flickr, facebook. Post videos on youtube or facebook, etc.

After having started getting involved in the Social Media world and having seen reasonable success through the initial strategies, hotels can try more focused actions, advanced steps to venture deeper into the world of social media. In order to proceed with more aggressive strategies, hotels should track the success of their social media strategies. How to do that?

By tracking the hotel's social media buzz. EBuzz Connect, for example, is a Social Media Management System dedicated to the hospitality and travel industries. This product by Milestone manages online reputation and social media channels from a single integrated tool. This is just one of many other devices out there that allow you to find what people are saying about you and your business on various channels and track your performances month over month to gauge whether the social media strategies are successful.

By measuring the Return On Investment revenues, website leads and revenue generated

The ROI from social media channels is more difficult to trace if compared to the social media buzz. The conversion from Social Media Marketing strategies takes on different channels: from the social media channels, for example, a client will book on a hotel website or on the phone although they might have found the hotel on Facebook or on Twitter. The best method to track the conversion from social media channels is to measure the leads (website traffic) created from the social media channels. This is easily accomplished using basic website analytics tools. Using conversion ratios, you can get a fairly accurate estimate of the ROI from your social media channels.

In addition, to assess the ROI and success of the social media strategies the hotel can monitor the impact of social media optimization on its search engine results. By typing your hotel's name on the search engines, after the first couple of results which should be your hotel website, you should find listings from the 3rd party affiliate websites. With persistent social media optimization, you should see that universal search results will help your hotel's social media channels gain relevance in the search results pages. That ensures that all the leads come directly to you and is an indicator that your overall search engine recognition is growing.

Even though the abovementioned techniques are less objective than measuring conversions from paid search advertising or banner advertising, these systems provide hotels with a reasonably good notion of the returns and effectiveness of the social media operation. Future technologies will indeed offer more accurate ways to measure social media effectiveness.