The most important checklist any Marketing Director should be doing to promote the hotel property.
As COVID subsides, hotels worldwide are struggling to revive themselves. It’s become evident that, particularly within the travel and hospitality industry, a new standard of care is expected, and company-wide revisions must be made. While a full recovery is certainly possible, hotels must continue to be proactive in their efforts, and take the steps necessary to best position themselves for the return of travel.
With the current pause on travel and a rebound in travel demand on the horizon, there is an opportunity for hotels to take advantage of this time and use it to edit and refine their strategies, policies, and marketing tools. Best positioning your hotel for a full and efficient recovery doesn’t necessarily involve significantly dropping room rates. There are a multitude of steps you can take to best optimize this time and set your hotel up for success.
Outlined below, you’ll find our suggested steps to help you re-assess and revise your communications, marketing efforts, relationships with other local businesses, and employee experience. With efforts focused in these areas, your hotel will inevitably maximize its revenue.
Messaging & Client Communications
Refine your messaging to effectively communicate with your current clientele and network
- Update collateral and website with your sanitization practices & procedures
- In high-traffic and exposure areas post the corresponding sanitization messaging for guest safety with liquid hand sanitizer stations
PRO TIP: These can be branded for your hotel or even an event
- Reengage your vendors, strategic partners, travel agencies, and sales teams with time-sensitive appropriate messaging to have them be aware of your opening dates, times, and procedures to relay to their clients and prospects
- Adjust messaging for Sales Department to reengage events, group bookings, and conferences
- Explore how to adjust incentives and promotions
PRO TIP: Do NOT just lower pricing, explore other ways to add incremental value to their experience & increase the length of stay or group size - New Branded Assets. Aside from waters & hand sanitization stations, what is new that you can brand or enhance the guest experience with your brand association?
Digital Marketing
Remain active and empathetic on marketing fronts and update your online presence accordingly
- Creative should reflect the experience they are going to enjoy, not just a price and promotion
- Multiple types of creative will be needed for different mindsets as well as where they are in their research and buying journey as this is now extended before they commit
- Bring transparency to the property’s new cleaning standards via the website in a banner, pop up, badge or seal of verification, etc.
- Campaign Type
- Target Location – this may need to change, focus on more regional traffic and review previous traffic trends of high traffic geographics that converted to isolate new campaigns
- Frequency & Time of Retargeting – Consumers are going to be in the Research stage for some time, explore expanding your retargeting time, number of touchpoints, offering via different creative in the customer journey etc.
- Website Experience – reduce clicks, important traveler information, local contact or
- Explore providing a Real-time Chat feature to your website to speak with someone at your front-desk or sales team about questions they have
- Create high-touch points following the acquisition as well via email notifications for experiences to tailor their trip and collect as much customer data as possible
A Localized Rally Cry
Team up with local businesses in an effort to leverage your destination.
- Messaging for the Region or Location that is experiential for visitors to the hotels & resorts
- Creative that highlights the area, activities, culture & food and beverage over just the properties
- Unite in pricing and promotions, discounts and services so that everyone wins
PRO TIP: Look at how quickly airlines increased their pricing and their strategy to mirror yours around value, not discounts - Collaborate with tours, activities, and local events (when possible) to increase engagement and duration of stay. Otherwise, how is it possible to promote adjacent towns and travelers traveling locally to multiple destinations?
Internally to Employees
Change starts within. Consider revising your employee’s experience within your company.
- Update health care policies, internal procedures & best practices for employees in collateral, work logs, etc
- Revised PDF’s and Video Training focusing on streamlining procedures and training
- A dynamic Sales & Marketing Plan that each department has transparency into their initiatives & how to collaborate to achieve the properties goals
PRO TIP: Work in a 90-Day Year format off Smart Goals to be able to be agile & hit KPI’s more quickly. If you need help with this contact us to update your Sales & Marketing Plan (link) to by Dynamic - Email and Team Meeting Updates – Develop a new Win’s of the Week system to spotlight employees or major initiatives that are going well to boost morale
Contact us for more information on how to best position yourself for a full recovery from COVID. We’d love to connect with you to give you a better understanding of the steps listed above, and share the resources we’ve put together with the International Tourism Resource Network, which was launched as a result of COVID to help hotels get back on their feel through curated events and essential resources.