5 Web trends that will change Hotel Internet Marketing
5 Future Developments that will revolutionize Online Hotel Marketing: “For tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today”, says a famous proverb…and what better fit to apply this than in the world of technology and marketing?
The breakneck speed of tech evolution is inspiring (and often scary) but the two keywords that will set winning developments apart from the ‘also ran’ are ‘love’ and ‘simplicity’. It doesn’t take a degree to understand that people adopt technologies that fuel their imagination & passions…and the rate of adoption is in close sync to the simplicity of its interface and operation. Great technology needs to adapt to the needs of the user and future breakthroughs will bear testament to this.
Given another 5 years of development and refinement, here are 5 developments I think we’ll see in the world of online hotel marketing and distribution:
1. Choice is king.
The clear winners of the online distribution race will be suppliers and 3rd parties that provide the most choice to the customer. “Experience building” will become key to the looking and booking process online. This will mean that successful suppliers (hotels) will have to break down elements of their inventory like rooms, dining, sports, spa and supporting services into individual units that can be booked and packaged both internally and externally. The more elements you provide to what I like to call the “Experience Engine”, the better the choice available to customers to personalize and tailor their experiences. This creation of experience units will also allow tourism industry suppliers to collaborate more effectively online, as well as spur the evolution of 3rd party providers who provide superior experience engines, taking destination marketing to a whole new level.
2. Search rankings become irrelevant.
Currently, with the heavy emphasis on search rankings and generic paid search, this statement may come as a bit of a shock…but surely, this is the natural evolution of search. The days of pure search are already on the way out. Try a search on Google today and the evidence is there…a mashup of text, images and video results. That’s not all…if you’re signed in with a Google account, you’ll probably see different search results and rankings based on your past search behaviour. Combining personalization, multimedia, social bookmarking and niche search, it’s not hard to see that the way we place importance on search rankings today may need a dramatic rethink. Aggressive paid search and website SEO to get at the top of Google search results just won’t cut it. Successful hotel search marketing of the future will be more about optimizing content of all types and reaching the right audience through the right niche and social search channels.
Article continues here: http://thetalentjungle.com/future-hotel-internet-marketing-trends/
Jitendra Jain (JJ)
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About the author: At work, Jitendra Jain (JJ) is employed with Starwood Hotels & Resorts in Dubai as an E-Commerce Manager and handles hotel online marketing & distribution. At play, he is the founder of various online initiatives like www.hotelemarketer.com, www.thetalentjungle.com and www.younghotelier.com (among others) that dream, connect, educate and share all that is glorious about hospitality, technology and most importantly…the people that define our times
Related posts:
- Hotel Internet Marketing by 2013 – Are we on Track?
- Future Hotel Trends – 8 Hotel Guest Demands that will shape hospitality
- Hospitality Bloggers and Experts – Thoughts on Hotel Internet Marketing in 2009
- The new era of Hotel Experience Marketing – Choice is the new King, All hail the King
- Hotel Referral Marketing – Hotel Guests are a key Distribution Channel of the future
I wonder if rankings deserve to be number two most important thing, i see a lot of hotel (particulaly those privately owned) fall flat with SEO campaigns. i guess i would heed the warning that a lot of hotels dont know how to market online, so the ranking is not as important as the knowlege of how to get it.
[...] on from the earlier articles, Back to the Future: Meet the hotel guest of 2020 (September 2008) 5 Future Developments that will revolutionize Online Hotel Marketing (October 2008), here are some thoughts on the role of Choice in successful Hotel Marketing of the [...]
[...] One thing is certain – consumers would trust other consumers over hotel / company marketing departments any day. “Trust” of course, is the key word here. That trust is based on bias and the faith that the even though you’ve never met the other consumer, there’s a fair chance that there is an element of truth and perhaps even ‘objectivity’ in the review. But what happens when you can no longer trust other consumers? What if those consumers were no longer consumers…but computers? Artificial Intelligence may just cause the ‘run on the bank’ that brings the house of cards down for online reviews. Here’s a great comment I received recently from Jeffrey Frankel following a LinkedIN conversation on my previous article “5 Web trends that will change Hotel Internet Marketing”: [...]
[...] came across a piece I’d written about 17-18 months ago on the future of hotel internet marketing. The article talked about 5 broad tech trends that I thought would radically alter the way we [...]