Social Media Best Practices for Hotel Marketing: Be Involved Without Breaking the Bank

Social Media Best Practices

How to be involved without breaking

the bank!

Carrie [email protected]

@CarrieHill on Twitter

mailto:[email protected]

About Blizzard Internet

• Provide ROI-centric Online Marketing Solutions to the Travel, Tourism & Hospitality Industries.

• Offer Comprehensive or A-La-Carte plans for SEO, Paid Advertising, Linkbuilding and Social Media starting as low as $500 a month INCLUDING up to an hour of consultation each month.




About Carrie

• Director of Search Strategies at Blizzard.• Twitter Addict &Conversion Evangelist.• Small Business SEM columnist at SearchEngineWatch.• In the Trenches columnist at SearchEngineLand.com.• Questions? PLEASE contact me however you like!

– Twitter = @CarrieHill– Facebook = facebook.com/carrie.hill1– Email: [email protected]– Phone: 888-840-5893 direct extension: 131





What happens if you ignore Social Media

• Negative impact on your brand message.• You open the door for your competitors to

grab that market share. Be first and be the best.

• You miss the conversations that matter most.




Hmmmmmm

The Numbers• 100,000,000 - number of users who log on to Facebook at least

once each day.• 200,000,000 – number of active users on Facebook.• 3,000,000 – number of Tweets/day(March 2008).• If social media users were a country, it would be the 4th largest.• Years to reach 50 million users:

• Radio = 38 years• TV = 13 years• Internet = 4 years• iPod = 3 years• Facebook added 100 million users in less than 9 months.

http://thefuturebuzz.com/2009/01/12/social-media-web-20-internet-numbers-stats/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIFYPQjYhv8



http://thefuturebuzz.com/2009/01/12/social-media-web-20-internet-numbers-stats/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIFYPQjYhv8


More Numbers• TripAdvisor receives more than 25 million unique visitors a

MONTH.• The fastest growing segment on Facebook is 55-65 year old

females.• 80% of Twitter usage is on Mobile Devices.• 34% of bloggers post opinions about products & brands.• 78% of consumers trust peer recommendations.• Only 14% trust advertisements.• Successful companies in social media act more like party

planners, aggregators, and content providers than traditional advertiser.




How do I find them?

• Find the Demographic by Keywords.– MSN Demographic Tool

• Watch the bloggers that cover your area.– Search your key terms in Blog Search

• Look at your referral traffic.

ASK!Carrie Hill

[email protected]@CarrieHill on Twitter


How Far does a Tweet Reach?




How a few Fans turn into many…

Me

My Friends

My Friends

My Friends

My Friends

My Friends

My Friends

Friends of My Friends Friends

of My Friends

Friends of My Friends

Friends of My FriendsFriends

of My Friends







Pretty soon a small network looks like this:



YOU!


Getting Involved

• It’s not about being everywhere – it’s about being where the conversations are.

• Choose the platforms with the best chance of reaching a targeted audience.– Start broad and narrow based on results.– Watch your analytics for incoming traffic.– Where are your competitors? Are you there too?




How do I track the Conversation?

• Use URL Shortners that track clicks.– Kl.am is my preferred– Ow.ly is part of Hootsuite – good graphics for stats

but frames the landing page of a link• Correlate Tweets & FB updates with spikes in

site traffic – use this to sell the “C Suite”.• Alerts are always useful.




What’s The ROI?



Social Media is a tactic, NOT a platform – an avenue for you to communicate with your audience and market, much like your telephone system.

It’s time to CHANGE how you think about investing in Social Media


Facebook Tips

• Be Genuine, Personable and ALWAYS Professional

• Set up a fan page and promote it on your website

• Don’t only post links and promotional material– Share videos, images & stories that you’re reading– Answer questions




Tips

• Short Bursts of 140 Characters• Grab attention with deals• Offer exclusive deals & codes• ANSWER QUESTIONS• Promote your presence on your site• DON’T:– Auto follow or Auto Direct Message new followers– Post a link in every single update – it looks contrived




Integrating your approach• Use a 3rd Party client to help you – my new

fave is Hootsuite with Ping.FM– Post to Twitter, Facebook, Myspace & LinkedIn all

at once– Schedule tweets for future posting– Save keyword searches to closely watch who is

looking for information about your area– Track link clicks (with Kl.am or Ow.ly)– Integrate in your staff’s email signature




You’re Doin’ it Right!• We set up a Facebook fan page for Chula Vista in

May of 2009.

• From May – Today they’ve seen:– 1312 fans added (466 since 9/30)– 1483 referrals to the Chula website since May!

(806 since 9/30)– 1135 referrals to the Chula site since August 1 – Top demographics are

• Males 25-34 – 43%• Females 25-34 – 29%• Females 55+ - 0%• Males 35-44 - 14%• Females 18-24 – 14%

• Guests are interacting, adding photos, comments, sometimes over a dozen a day!

• Guests are acting as brand advocates and refuting negative comments and encouraging positive interaction without the managements’ involvement




Where should you start?• Hands on is the best place – give it a try• Read A LOT!• See how others are doing and try their tactics for yourself.• Blizzard can help – contact us about a Social Media Focus Plan!

– Consultation on Social Media and Reputation Management – 1 hour per month– Facebook fan page setup or overhaul– Twitter account setup or overhaul– Create/Claim Tripadvisor listing and update– Create/Claim Yelp listing and update– Create/Claim Google local listing and update– Create/Claim Yahoo travel listing and update– Flickr account setup and media load– And Much More!




Social Media Best Practices for Hotel Marketing: Be Involved Without Breaking the Bank

Technology

carrie hillchillblizzardinternet

social media

blizzard

twitter

facebook

month

friendsfriends

carriehill