Marketing is an essential and multifaceted effort that begins with creating a hotel narrative and value proposition, conveying it through physical and digital channels, and then measuring results—quantitatively when possible. As the leader of a full-service in-house agency, Michael Cady, chief marketing officer, Charlestowne Hotels, shares his recommendations in several key areas:
1. Prioritize email data.
About a year and a half ago, the acquisition of customer data for remarketing purposes was compromised with new privacy laws that enforced “zero cookie data” unless the consumer opts in. “Our remarketing pool has gone down drastically because we now need consent to follow and advertise to individuals that visit our website,” said Cady. “That’s why email data and CRM strategy is more important than it’s ever been. We’re able to run paid social media ads that remarket to our email database, as well as continue the conversation through promotional and automated email campaigns.”
2. Target active bookers via social media.
A dynamic social media presence for the hotel with many followers can be a source of pride for owners. But that following doesn’t necessarily translate to bookings. “It should be more about the paid social media strategies,” Cady maintained. “While having followers and engagement can be beneficial for a property, we find that highly targeted paid social advertising can generate stronger revenue results. That is why, in many cases, we choose to concentrate on the active booker rather than the passive follower.”
3. Focus on tangible metrics.
Whether social media based or not, marketing campaigns that aim to build general awareness of the hotel tend to lack ROI metrics. Thus, “the metric that we look at the most on a day-to-day basis is the booking entrance rate: the number of people that went to our booking engine from the website versus the number of people that exited the website before entering the booking engine,” Cady pointed out. “If the booking entrance rate is high, but conversion rate is low, this could suggest price resistance or perhaps an issue with the booking engine all together.”
4. Build a robust brand identity.
“Storytelling” has proven its effectiveness in hotel marketing. Today’s traveler is more interested in the history of their lodging site and how it connects to the local community. “The owners we work with have a deeper reason for why they’ve invested in the hotel, beyond making a profit,” said Cady. “Maybe it’s providing a cornerstone for the community, or maybe it’s building up a tertiary market with a world of potential. If we can tap into why they developed the hotel, then all the marketing and branding can showcase that.”
5. Get input from frontline staff.
Core brand strategy should be informed by on-the-ground insights on guest needs and preferences. “When we hold kickoff meetings for branding, we often include the front desk and guest services manager because they can actually give us more insight into the guest journey than any executive or owner,” Cady related. “They speak to the guests all the time. They know where they came from, how they found the hotel, their interests, their feedback, etc.”
6. Consider a full-service, In-house agency.
In-house agencies tend to have a closer, more regular interaction with key parties including the owner, sales and revenue management, and the operations team. And when that agency offers the full gamut of marketing services, the marketing team is optimally efficient and self-sufficient. “We have 20 individuals on our team, including art directors, copywriters, graphic designers, marketing managers, project managers, email managers, etc. We’re running the entire ecosystem,” Cady explained.
7. Make the website a marketing powerhouse.
In addition to being ADA and GDPR compliant and integrated with the CRM system, a promotionally strong hotel website will have “a variety of strategies to assist in converting a website visitor,” Cady advised. “However, one of the single most important investments you can make to create a successful website is by capturing strong photography and videography,” he added. “Make sure your imagery is high quality, and use powerful yet simple headlines to grab guests’ attention.”
