By Susan Deluzain Barry
Been hearing the buzz about social media but not sure how to make it work for
you? New construction, conversion, or reflagging hotels can make great use of
Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and other social media tools. Here are a few ways to
do it.
- To Replace the Boring Old
Newsletter. Rather than sending out a monthly newsletter to update your
clients, create a Facebook Fan Page for your new hotel. Use the status
update tool to do just that – update your fans about the status of the
hotel's construction or conversion. No detail is too minute – people
really are interested in the hand-woven wall covering – but don't
overwhelm. Once a day is plenty.
People. Whether you like it or not, your staff is using Twitter, Facebook,
Flickr, YouTube and everything else. Rather than fight the inevitable, put
the power of their connections to good use. When you hire new employees,
send out announcements to your fans and followers. Then, have your new
hires invite their friends to become fans of the hotel.
Painlessly. Post photos of construction progress to Flickr or a photoblog.
While you wait for corporate to approve your official images, direct
potential clients to these shots so they can start to visualize the
finished product with you. Take and post pictures of clients on site
tours, then email the link as a follow-up. When you're ready to put together
the opening day slide show for the staff, you'll have lots of images to
use.
Printed Brochures. Even the most beautiful artist's renderings of your
ballroom are useless after opening day. Save money and paper by uploading
your latest PowerPoint to a service like SlideShare. You can point
interested parties there with a link and make real-time changes. Bonus:
you avoid storing, and then throwing away, boxes of outdated rack cards
later.
an Expert. Is your hotel positioned to corner the market on weddings?
Begin to establish your credibility before you open by posting wedding
planning tips. Link to vendors who do great work, and post pictures of
their cakes and bouquets. In short, be a part of the conversation, and
contribute valuable information – not just sales pitches.
Before You Mess Up. Many, many policy decisions are made by two people
drinking coffee on no sleep three weeks before opening. Rather than waffle
or deal with backlash later, open the discussion to your fans. You may not
follow their advice (no, I don't think we'll allow beer sales to
13-year-olds), but you will get some interesting perspective.
Clients Care About. Lots of new hotels partner with a local charity to
make contacts and generate buzz (in addition to giving back). Ask your
local tweeps (followers on Twitter) for ideas so you can gauge how well
your support will impact your strategic goals.
Regardless of the supposed ubiquity of Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube for
business, most hotels either don't do social media or don't do it well.
You have to be a part of the conversation rather than spitting out a sales
pitch with every status update. If you get it right, you will be one of
the few.
Fans, Up. Everyone appreciates a mental rest stop. There are zillions of
hospitality-focused diversionary websites out there. Post an occasional
link to one of them. Even if you're the only one laughing, you'll still be
laughing, and you can use as much of that as you can get while opening a
hotel.
The point of using social media for your new hotel is to humanize the
business and create an emotional connection with your fans. Trying to
create a "template" for social media is like building a
snowflake factory – at best, you're boring, and at worst, you fall apart
before you even hit the ground. Be real. Really.
