Top 3 travel marketing trends of 2015
July and August is the peak of holiday season in Helsinki. Did you know that July and August each year bring over 350 000 people to Helsinki? During these two months, people visiting Helsinki increase its population by a whopping 35% making this time of the year pretty busy and certainly very critical for people involved in the hospitality industry. Let’s look at the top 3 most promising hotel marketing trends that have been successfully utilised by hotel marketers in 2015, and check out how predictive analytics is changing the landscape of hotel marketing. The general theme of hotel marketing strategy so far this year has been centred on content marketing, mobile optimisation and visual story telling.
Google’s Mobile-Friendly Verification and Local search
Mobile optimisation of travel websites has been at the top of the agenda for just about every travel marketer. Google’s introduction of mobile-friendly verification means that websites have to focus on providing an exceptional mobile browsing experience to earn a ‘mobile-optimised’ tag from Google in search engine result pages.
The most recent updates to Google's search algorithm also put a lot of emphasis on delivering quality local search results. Mobile optimisation is the first step towards converting searchers into guests through your own website and it’s an important tool in a hotel marketer’s tool box.
If you haven’t evaluated your mobile and search strategy so far, this might be the best time to introduce some best practices to enhance the usability of your site for mobile users.
Multi-channel Marketing
A lot has changed in how people research and book holidays. Globally more than 40% of people start searching for their next holiday on a mobile device. Hotel marketers have been focused on providing a device-specific and relevant experience across multiple devices to travel searchers.
Multi-channel hotel marketing starts by understanding a typical travel searcher’s journey across multiple devices. Multi-channel marketing means providing a 360 degree experience to people both during the process of deciding their next holiday destination and assisting them with targeted content during their holidays.
Leading with content
Content marketing is virtually the most significant trend in online marketing across almost every industry. OTA's and especially AirBnB has been making headlines and attracting travel searchers at just about every stage of their research process using content marketing. On the other hand hotel marketers still have some way to go in bringing their content marketing plans up to speed.
Holiday travellers turn to search engines well before they visit an OTA or a hotel website with more than 75% of all travel related online traffic originating from organic (non-paid) visits. There really isn’t any compelling reason why hotel marketers shouldn’t come up with a content plan to attract that traffic to their hotel websites through content marketing.
That wraps up a quick review of the top 3 travel marketing trends and tactics. Now it’s time to see what lies ahead.
Staying ahead of your customer using predictive analytics
Application of predictive analytics is going to be the poster child of hotel marketing in the months to come. For his unfamiliar with the concept, predictive analytics is using customer transaction and behaviour data (data gathered through web and social analytics) to figure out peoples’ likes, dislikes and preferences beforehand. Predictive analytics is a clever way to give your business an edge and offer exceptional customer experience.
At Forenom we specialise in offering a unique service experience to business traveler staying at one of our accommodations all across Scandinavia. Like many other modern service apartment providers our goal is to offer multiple touch points for reaching out to our customers and making it convenient for them to get in touch with us.
Even a handful of touch points can be an invaluable source of consumer data. Having a well-crafted plan to gather insights from this data is the key to diversifying service options as well as offering more compelling services. In addition, predictive analysis gathered through online marketing also has the potential to make your sales process, including handling cross-sell and up-sell opportunities, more efficient.
Lisätiedot:
Jussi Saarinen | Johtaja | Forenom Finland
358 442106864 | jussi.saarinen@forenom.fi
Forenom
Olemme johtava suomalainen majoitus- ja relocationratkaisuja tarjoava yritys. Järjestämme yritysasiakkaiden työntekijöiden majoituksen ja autamme kansainvälisten työntekijöiden kotiutumisessa Suomessa tai ulkomailla. Uniikin konseptimme avulla olemme tuoneet vuokra-asunto- ja hotellimarkkinoiden rinnalle monipuolisia palveluja ja luoneet uudenlaista joustoa eri pituisiin majoitustarpeisiin sekä yrityksille että yksityisille asiakkaille. Tuoteperheeseemme kuuluu Forenom Apartments, Forenom Suites, Forenom Aparthotels sekä Forenom Hostels.
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