The Revinate Blog: Twitter

Twitter

April 22, 2013

New Keyword Targeting for Twitter Advertising

Twitter has recently unveiled a new keyword targeting feature in their Twitter Ads platform that will allow businesses to more specifically cater to their most sought-after followers. There are two ways advertisers can use this targeting feature. First, advertisers can target Twitter users that have similar interests with a specific username (e.g. if you're a Washington DC hotel seeking promotion, you may want to target users similar to @washingtondc). Second, advertisers can target by more than 350 wide-ranging interest categories outlined by Twitter. In addition to the new targeting flexibility, advertisers now also have the ability to define exactly which platforms their promoted tweets will show up on (e.g. desktop, iOS, android, etc.) as well as target to a specific gender if desired. To learn more about this new feature, read Tnooz's recent report on the topic.

Posted by Greg in Twitter, What's New | Permalink | Comments (0)

April 16, 2013

Hotels Show Social Media Transparency in Wake of Marathon Bombing

In the immediate aftermath of yesterday’s horrifying bombing at the Boston Marathon, spectators and runners alike existed in a state of confused panic as law enforcement and rescue teams rushed to the scene to tend to the injured. Fearful of more bombs to detonate along the marathon route, the Boston police quickly instructed bystanders to leave the area and return to their homes and hotels until the imminent danger had subsided.

As the race finish line was in the tourist-trafficked Copley Square, there were dozens of hotels in the immediate area that were impacted by the event. With attendees frantically rushing out of the area and desperately trying to contact loved ones, it was imperative for the hotels to show transparency and responsively engage in the real-time social media conversation. Fortunately, many of the area’s hotels took to their respective Facebook and Twitter accounts immediately to communicate with worried guests and assure their families and friends that all were safe. A few of the nearby hotels truly stood out during this crisis period with their real-time responses:

The Fairmont Copley Plaza

Positioned directly across from the site of the bombings, The Fairmont Copley Plaza took to Facebook soon after the news of the disaster spread to assure followers that the hotel’s colleagues were safe as well as to inform guests about an impromptu check-in station set-up for them to reconnect with loved ones. This message was well received by the hotel’s followers, many of whom were relieved to hear about the state of affairs.

As messages continued to flood in via Twitter throughout the day and into the next morning, the hotel’s tweeters made a concerted effort to personally respond to each and every tweet sent their way, working hard to ensure that each follower was addressed and thanked for his/her concern.

The Lenox Hotel

Located in the heart of the disaster scene, The Lenox Hotel was similarly quick to update on its Facebook page, announcing the immediate evacuation of the hotel. Hours later, the hotel continued its transparent communication with updates on when the hotel would be re-opened and answering guest questions regarding their left-behind luggage and how to arrange for alternative accommodations.

The Facebook updates continued throughout the next day and were time stamped to assure followers that they were receiving the most up-to-date information available. On Twitter, the hotel followed a similar communication strategy, providing updates intermittently before finally signaling guests to return to the hotel to gather their belongings.

Mandarin Oriental, Boston

Similar to The Lenox Hotel, the Mandarin Oriental, Boston is located right in the middle of the explosion site and was forced to ask its guests to immediately evacuate. To spread this news, the hotel posted a note on Facebook assuring that, while guests and staff needed to evacuate, everyone was safe. The hotel likewise posted frequent updates on Twitter and used the platform to make significant announcements.

Social Media Crisis Takeaways

What we can learn from each of these hotel properties is that, in the wake of an unexpected disaster, real-time, responsive communication is essential. These hotels were cognizant of follower concerns and swiftly allayed them with direct and transparent messaging. Each property addressed incoming questions and concerns received through each channel promptly and worked hard to broadcast the safety precautions they were taking. Finally, each hotel appropriately suspended any form of communication that was not relevant to the ongoing disaster and avoided any form of promotional or unrelated posts that may have been originally scheduled. While no one ever wants a disaster like this to occur, it pays to have a social media crisis plan in place and be prepared. Clearly, each of these hotels knew what they were doing.

Posted by Greg in Facebook, Hotel Examples, Social Media, Twitter, What's New | Permalink | Comments (0)

April 8, 2013

How to Earn More Twitter Influence

As Twitter usage matures, marketers are appropriately moving their focus away from follower acquisition and towards maximizing the impact of their messaging on the platform. And the beauty is that by increasing engagement with your followers, you will acquire additional followers. Following are some quick best practices for Twitter engagement:

Growing Your Audience Through Optimized Tweets

Twitter experts often say that influence should be measured not by a user’s follower count, but by how often his/her tweets get retweeted. Retweets lead to increased exposure for your hotel or restaurant and are key to building an engaged following. We’ve written about the importance of retweets in a previous post about Twitter analytics but have yet to touch on what kind of messages to embrace (and avoid). Here are some tips to consider:

Avoid truncated automated tweets from Facebook. Nothing is more annoying to users than to see an automated, “bot-like” message flow through your newsfeed that is either too long to read in full or sends you to a Facebook page that requires you to log in to your account.

Stick to only a few hashtags. While hashtag use has become a pervasive phenomenon across all media channels, overusing them in your tweets will result in lower engagement. New York Times editor Daniel Victor says that hashtags fail to attract new audiences.
Nevertheless, a report from Twitter states that tweets with up to two hashtags receive nearly 50 percent more engagement.

Use appropriate punctuation and formatting. The biggest misperception about tweeting is that audiences do not care about style or formatting. Social media scientist, Dan Zarrella, reports that retweets consistently contain correct punctuation than non retweets. Moreover, it has been shown that the tweets most often retweeted follow proper formatting. That is, each tweet should begin with a capital letter, utilize proper grammar, and avoid any semblance of text message-like abbreviations.

Optimization Will Lead to More Followers

Once you consistently commit to the above practices, you will be prepared to grow your follower base. In addition, Twitter recommends that you share a heavy dose of visual media (e.g. photos and video), respond to mentions and feedback and participate in live, real-time Twitter conversations to extend your reach. Fusework Studios and Buddy Media report that real-time engagement will have a maximum reach during the following days and times:

Tweets sent on Saturdays and Sundays see a 17% higher engagement level compared to weekdays.
Wednesdays and Thursdays are the days with the lowest rate of engagement.
Tweets that are published between 8 AM – 7 PM in your time zone see a 30% increase in engagement throughout the week.

By following the above recommendations and taking advantage of a helpful social media dashboard, your brand will be headed toward higher Twitter engagement and audience reach.

Posted by Greg in Best Practices, Social Media, Twitter, What's New | Permalink | Comments (0)

March 5, 2013

How to Measure Your Twitter Performance

Last year, we shared some best practices around on how to most effectively manage and optimize your hotel's presence on Twitter. This article covers the importance of using hashtags in your tweets, keeping your messages to a re-tweetable length and scheduling posts in advance, among other tips. As we will discuss in our upcoming webinar, measuring your social media marketing performance through results-based analysis is the next imperative next step. Here are a few key performance indicators (KPIs) to use as part of your Twitter performance evaluation:

Clicks: Since you only have 140 characters to work with on Twitter, using a URL shortener is essential, especially given the fact that posts between 100-120 characters are far more likely to be re-tweeted (RT). Fortunately, nearly every URL shortener - whether you are working from our Twitter Client or a third-party social dashboard - gives you the opportunity to track the number of clicks each tweet receives. This KPI is useful as reviewing which tweets are most popular will help inform your content strategy moving forward.
Re-tweets: Similarly, measuring the number of re-tweets your posts receive is a great metric to evaluate your messages' reach and will help you refine your posting strategy on-the-go forward. Paying attention to the times your tweets are most re-tweeted will help you determine when to schedule your messages.
Mentions: The amount of mentions (@) your handle receives is another engagement KPI that reports on your messages' reach and relevance. Have in mind that the number of re-tweets your messages receive may overlap with the number of mentions you acquire, as users that edit a tweet before re-tweeting will fall into this category. Revinate clients can easily track the number of mentions their properties receive from our Twitter Client.
Referral traffic: Traffic that your website or blog receives via tweets should be measured as part of your KPI evaluation. Google Analytics not only allows users to see how much social media traffic your website receives by segment, but also gives users the chance to learn more about these visitors and see how they behave on your site.

Keeping close track of these KPIs is a jumping off point when starting to evaluate your performance in the space. Remember, however, that the main objective of your Twitter strategy show focus on creating and sharing engaging content, not merely just acquiring more brand mentions and re-tweets. If your content is interesting, these KPI improvements will follow.

Posted by Greg in TweetConcierge, Twitter, What's New | Permalink | Comments (0)

February 6, 2013

Social Media for Hotels - #WebWednesday Must-Reads

Happy #WebWednesday everyone! Last week, we hosted two webinars focusing on best practices in social media and digital marketing for hotels. In case you missed either session, we've published recaps of both webinars here on the Revinate Blog and encourage you to review them at your leisure.

For this week's #WebWednesday round-up, we're sharing some social media resources that will be helpful for all hoteliers to be aware of. As always, we encourage you to engage with us on Facebook and Twitter and let us know what you think.

How Local Businesses Can Leverage New Facebook & Foursquare Features tips for how local businesses can and should adapt to take advantage of the opportunities (as well as overcome the challenges) that these changes present.

Study Says Twitter Is Fastest-Growing Social Platform in the World overall, 21% of the worldwide Internet population now actively uses Twitter on a monthly basis - or 288 million monthly users.

L2 Digital IQ Index® of Hotels report benchmarking the digital competence of 57 Hotel brands on more than 675 data points across four dimensions: Site, Digital Marketing, Social Media, and Mobile.

The State of Instagram [Infographic] helpful information for marketers to convince their stakeholders (or themselves) that Instagram is the next place to start engaging new customers.

Pinterest may be worth $2 billion, but travel brands struggle to keep pace advanced-level Pinterest tips for marketers, first for larger brands and organizations — and then for smaller ones.

Facebook Promotions: What’s Right for Your Brand? by understanding and defining the goal of your campaign, you can better decide which Facebook promotion is right for you.

Top Social Media Mistakes, According to the Experts ten highly experienced social media strategists identify the top mistakes they see businesses making on social networks.

Twitter Enhances Viewing Options For Photos, Videos and Related Tweets Twitter is also making it easier to view related tweets, making the channel more conversational.

Posted by Greg in Facebook, Social Media, Twitter, What's New | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 26, 2012

Facebook or Twitter...where should hotels focus?

While hotels know the benefits of social media engagement, with limited time and resources it is best to have a focused approach to your engagement choices. By the numbers, Facebook and Twitter are the obvious leaders in social media participation but there are a few surprises when you consider which social channel deserves more time and attention. Should hotels focus more on Facebook or Twitter?

Here are some insights that might help...

Demographic Profiles

I often hear the perception that Twitter users are younger, less affluent, and less likely to buy than Facebook users. However, actual demographic data does not support this theory. Here is some demographic information for each social network.

It turns out that Twitter users are 1/3 more likely to be college educated and more likely to be making over $75K per year. It is also worthwhile to note that both websites claim about 13% of their users make over $100K per year.

However, disposable income is only one part of the equation when considering Facebook vs. Twitter. Purchase likelihood is also important. Twitter offers a much higher rate of purchase by its users than Facebook. According to Digital Surgeons about 67% of Twitter users will buy from a company that they follow. On Facebook, only 51% of users will buy from a “Liked” business or brand. While this information is based on all industries, it shows that hotels with a high level of repeat business might benefit more from Twitter.

Community Mindset

Another factor to consider is the community mindset for both sites. Where Facebook is used to connect with friends, Twitter’s micro blogging format is used to create and share with friends, as well as people you don’t know personally. This subtle difference can influence how your business is mentioned on these social channels. For example, I sometimes see Facebook friends discussing personal details that may mention a product or brand that they admire or despise. On Twitter, I see many more tips regarding how to use things, praise for superior products, or scorn for disappointing ones. This may come from the high levels of engagement on Twitter (57% tweet daily), but it may also come from the ease of re-tweeting. Compliments and scorn on Twitter have far more viral potential than on Facebook where a post is mostly limited to friends.

Hotels who are engaging on Twitter are finding many more opportunities to perform service recovery than they are with Facebook. Emarketer reported in 2011 that 77% of hotel and airline Twitter accounts experience customer service enquiries and complaints. Only 46% of Facebook accounts dealt with customer service. It appears that more customers are engaging on Twitter in real-time to get their service issues resolved. It is critical that all businesses on Twitter be prepared for this.

One Revinate client also uses Twitter to monitor customer satisfaction during large events. By monitoring the hash tag of conferences at their hotel, The Manchester Grand Hyatt San Diego address customer problems in real-time:

“By watching the stream of tweets during meetings, I have a real-time look at how things are going. A few months ago I saw a meeting guest tweeting about trouble with the Wi-Fi. Within minutes, I was able to send a technician to the room to fix the issue before it became a problem. The guests were floored at how responsive and on-the-ball we were.” –Kristin Spitz, Electronic Sales and Marketing Manager

Again, our friends at Hyatt were able to make a very high profile customer service save, this time in New York. Chipper Jones, from the Atlanta Braves, tweeted to his prolific following that his A/C and movies did not work. Within minutes, the Marketing/PR coordinator and the Grand Hyatt saw the tweet and the increase in social mentions in Revinate and contacted the front desk manger. The following is the tweet that Mr. Jones posted after his issues were handled.

Advertising and Booking Conversion

When it comes to the sophistication of its advertising and reported booking conversion for hotels, Facebook has some definite advantages over Twitter. Ads on Facebook allow for fairly granular targeting including the following:

Location (city, state, and radius)
Gender
Relationship Status
Age Range or exact age (Birthday often included)
Interests- based on pre-loaded options (drawn from profiles not usage)
Education (Levels and specific schools)
Employer

For example, you could set up a simple Pay-per-Click ad on Facebook with a birthday staycation offer for locals in your area within a week of their actual birthday. This could be a great way to drive last minute business during slow periods.

Facebook also allows for a fully integrated booking engine for Hotels. L2 reports that 64% of the hotels studied had either full or partial Facebook booking. Furthermore, hotels with a booking engine on Facebook sent about 50% less traffic to online travel agencies.

Facebook does not yet allow for targeting based upon post content. So a post asking friends where to stay in New York, would not allow New York hotels to target ads to that user. However, on Twitter, that question would be public so a tool like Revinate could highlight that tweet and publish it to your hotels social media dashboard for quick response and an offer.

Twitter is farther behind Facebook in the sophistication of their advertising options that could be useful to properties. Promoted tweets allow you to position tweets to be seen by your followers and those like your followers. There is some geographic targeting but other options are limited. Promoted accounts can help you build a community of followers by listing in the Twitter search results and the “Who to Follow” section, which will highlight your handle for those who have shown interest in similar businesses to yours. The company has launched promoted trends but this marketing vehicle is better suited to brands and mass marketed products rather than individual properties.

Booking conversion is also where Facebook holds an edge. I have seen reports of ad conversion from Facebook at as high as 4%, and Twitter also claims a 4% click through rate on all links. The difference is that Facebook’s 4% is attributed to ads, where Twitter includes all links from tweets in their calculation. This means that the actual conversion rate on marketing tweets could be much lower.

Both Offer Clear Benefits

The Facebook vs. Twitter choice should be made based upon your time and resources. Revinate can make managing both communities easier which can help a resource strapped hotel benefit from the advertising strengths of Facebook and the open forum benefits of Twitter. Either way, hotel brands and individual properties are landing significant business through social media channels.

Social media engagement is also becoming a major driver for website referral traffic. Shareaholic reports that in 2012, three of the top nine referring sites were social media sites. Facebook referred about 6% of all traffic on the web, more than Yahoo and Bing combined. Regardless of the direction that you choose, social media engagement can be an important factor in driving eyeballs to your site.

Posted by Michelle in Best Practices, Facebook, Social Media, Twitter, What's New | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 21, 2012

How a Hotel & Resort Leverages Social Media for the Holidays

During the holiday season, there is a host of hotels, resorts and restaurants running holiday programs and promotions for their guests. While many of these properties have chosen to stick to offering holiday packages bookable through the traditional online channels (e.g. OTAs and direct) there are some hotels that have taken the holiday season guest experience promotion to the next level by integrating multiple social media components into their distribution strategy.

One Revinate client, Destination Hotels & Resorts' the Terranea Resort, is a luxury oceanfront property located in Los Angeles’s nearby Ranchos Palos Verdes. Terranea is truly an exemplary resort offering a guest experience that is defined by superlative service, luxurious accommodations and an impressive array of dining and meeting facilities. While each of these qualities is notable to begin with, the resort reaffirms its esteemed position with a social media and online reputation presence that is as top-notch as the resort itself. To celebrate the holiday season, the resort has creatively promoted its “Terranea Traditions” program – which is “a celebration of over 100 events from Thanksgiving to New Years” – by employing a comprehensive, integrated social media strategy to extend the reach and awareness of the program.

Beyond the requisite website landing page describing the program, Terranea has incorporated a series of social media exclusive contests and offers to engage its audience in a more dynamic way and has benefitted from some of Revinate’s social media dashboard features along the way. The specific holiday contests the resort has run include:

12 Days of Terranea Traditions Giveaways on Twitter – This compelling offer called for Terranea Resort Twitter followers to pay attention to the resort’s Twitter feed, as each day the resort offered a unique prize to a lucky follower who re-tweeted the message to his/her followers using the hash tag, #TerraneaTraditions. The resort promised followers that the prizes would be tweeted at specific times each day, which made Revinate’s Tweet Concierge a valuable asset when needing to schedule the messages up to days in advance. Also, with Revinate’s tweet tracker and Social Media Searches tool available to Revinators at the property, the hotel is able to easily measure the reach of the #TerraneaTraditions hashtag and, more importantly, evaluate the increase in brand discussion generated over time by the giveaway across all social media, including Facebook, Google+, Twitter various blogs, news and forums.

Terranea Traditions Pinterest Contest: Pin to Win – Earlier this year, we held a best practices webinar on Pinterest urging hoteliers and restaurateurs to engage on the emerging platform. While many hotels and restaurants continue to find the best way to interact in the space, Terranea has discovered an excellent way to not only build up a more engaged audience within Pinterest itself, but more importantly, incentivize pinning (links that direct users to a specific site) that drives direct, qualified traffic back to Terranea’s website. Moreover, by offering bonus points for pins that incorporate past #TerraneaTraditions experiences, the resort gains yet another golden opportunity to leverage user-generated content – a social marketer’s dream – when telling its brand story in the future. In addition, the resort has smartly cross-promoted this contest across all social channels to enhance participation, many of these mentions again track-able through Revinate’s tools. If hotels and restaurants are looking for ways to get inspired about what to do with Pinterest, here’s a great example to follow.

To wrap-up, not only do these efforts provide online visibility of the Terranea brand, but they send more direct traffic to their website and, in turn, provide a potential impact on bottom-line profits. They are text-book best practices in giving brand enthusiasts (fans, if you will) a reason to engage on the social space. Regardless of what the eventual return-on-investment (ROI) is for these campaigns, the return-on-engagement (ROE) is clear. Terranea wins, in the end, as stronger brand loyalty is built, user-generated content becomes more available, and the opportunity to weave increasingly personal Terranea tales about the guest experience for future seasons to come becomes a reality.

Posted by Greg in Best Practices, Hotel Examples, TweetConcierge, Twitter, What's New | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 11, 2012

How To: Twitter Tips for Hotels and Restaurants

With over 170 million active users, Twitter has firmly established itself as the leading microblog platform. For the traveler, Twitter can play a useful part at each phase of the guest experience. It can be used as a tool to learn more about the destination pre-stay, a means to discover ongoing specials and events during his/her time on-property and an opportunity to stay connected with and informed by the property long after the visit has ended. Accordingly, Twitter has truly emerged as an integral marketing tool in the social media toolbox that can extend both the reach of your brand's message and authenticity of your reputation.

Once you have mastered the Twitter basics and, if you're a client of Revinate, understood our fully integrated Twitter client, Tweet Concierge, it may be worthwhile to consider leveraging some other ways to maximize your Twitter engagement. Here's a round up of tips that have direct application for hoteliers and restaurateurs alike:

Schedule Your Tweets -Tweet Concierge now allows you to schedule your tweets in case you don't want to be tied to your screen in the evenings and on weekends. Of course, Revinate will monitor and track all your Twitter activity, regardless of the Twitter client you use, so in addition, low-cost applications like HootSuite, TweetDeck and Buffer App may be worth a trial, as they provide auto-scheduling functionality (allow for scheduling your tweets at optimal engagement times) and are convenient for tweeting on-the-go from a mobile device. These features are especially important when you're looking to visually capture behind-the-scenes looks at your hotel or restaurant's operation in real-time or, more importantly, maintaining an active social media presence on the weekends when social media activity remains significant.

Utilize #hashtag searches - Twitter.com, in addition to the services mentioned above, allows you to search for and save hashtags from both your desktop and mobile application. As a hospitality professional, you may want to do a hashtag search when attending a conference or event (so your tweets are tracked as part of a conversation) or include them in your hotel or restaurant's tweets when speaking about a particular topic (#amenities), neighborhood (#UpperEastSide) or interest (#dessert).

Try out Advanced Search - Twitter's revamped search function can further assist you with identifying users and content that may be relevant for your hotel or restaurant to engage with. The search feature allows you to filter results by specific words, accounts or locations, which may provide useful if you are looking to engage with similar users that follow, for example, your local destination management company (DMC) or convention visitors bureau (CVB).

Visit the Discover page - The microblog's Discover page offers a helpful way to uncover compelling re-tweetable content that you may have missed by showing you what content your followers have shared, favorited and re-tweeted. The discover section also allows you to explore the browse category, which is extremely helpful when looking to follow travel-related brands, thought-leaders and small businesses.

Limit Your Tweet's Length - To ensure that your content is most shareable, limit your tweet's length to 100-120 characters. Nothing is more annoying to an active tweeter than when a message is not easily re-tweetable (RT) due to its maxed-out length. By limiting this length, you allow your user to share the content easily, add a comment to your message and ultimately give your content the best chance at maximizing its reach.

Love the URL Shortener - Building on of the previous tip, it is imperative that you utilize a URL shortener when creating your tweets to ensure you maximize the limited Twitter message real estate. Each of the tools in Step #1 also provide some handy click data information on each of your tweets, which can help you identify as a marketer which kind of content your audience is most interested in. For example, you may find after analyzing a month's worth of tweets that a list of your concierge's area recommendations was more popular than a photo of a new menu item. This kind of intelligence will be useful when putting together your content strategy in future months.

Organize with Lists - In addition to Twitter's discover page, creating lists on Twitter is a handy, if a bit time consuming, way to organize and segment your followers that have specific areas of focus. In the hotel and restaurant context, this could mean putting together specific lists of followers that you would like your brand to engage with (e.g. food bloggers, past guests, travel writers) and can be used to optimize engagement with each focus group.

Maintain a Balance - While it's important to engage in real-time on Twitter, inundating your followers with a barrage of tweets consecutively is a sure-fire way to diminish your influence. By scheduling some tweets in advance and incorporating some public replies into the mix, you will maintain an ideal conversation balance that is compelling yet not annoying to your network.

Use Hashtags Judiciously - Even though the hashtag (#) can certainly be a helpful way of identifying new users that your brand may want to engage with, overusing them in your tweets without purpose will be just as detrimental to your Twitter effectiveness as an overlong tweet. When sending out a tweet, limit the use of hashtags to no more than three (one to two is most typical) and be sure that you are tagging appropriately. To learn more about how small businesses can leverage the hashtag, check out this recent Mashable article.

Mix Up Your Content - As mentioned previously, the best rule-of-thumb with Twitter is finding a balance. This applies not only to the frequency of your posts, but also in terms of the kind of content that you decide to share. While there is no finite formula that will yield you optimal engagement levels, visual posts - whether that means sharing photos or video - typically receives higher levels of shares. With the emergence of Instagram as a tremendous photo-sharing application, a marriage between the two is a perfect union in the travel space where photos are paramount.

For more information on hospitality social media how-to as well as travel technology trends, be sure to follow Revinate on Twitter.

[Image source: creativeguerrillamarketing.com]

Posted by Greg in Best Practices, Social Media, TweetConcierge, Twitter, What's New | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 7, 2012

How To: Instagram Tips for Hotels and Restaurants

Last month, we hosted a Social Media State of the Union webinar that focused on the rapid emergence of three newer social platforms: Instagram, Google+ and Pinterest. While each of these channels has certainly sequestered significant industry buzz throughout 2012, the major of hospitality marketers are still testing the waters to figure out how each platform can contribute to a more engaged, integrated social media plan. Over the next few weeks, we will take a more in-depth look at each of these channels and provide some tips and insights as to how to best manage your hotel or restaurant’s presence on each channel. First up: Instagram.

The Fundamentals of Instagram

Long before Facebook’s $1 billion acquisition of the company, Instagram has existed as a mobile photo-sharing application, allowing users to enhance their photos and disseminate the content across an array of social networks. The app’s rampant adoption growth, coupled with the inherent photo-friendly nature of the travel experience, cements Instagram as an essential tool to utilize in building your hotel or restaurant’s social media content strategy. Here are some steps to take and tips to action when creating and managing your hotel or restaurant’s presence on Instagram:

Step #1: Create an Account

Even if you are unsure what kind of content you want to post using the application, creating an account will allow you to survey the landscape and source user-generated content that has likely already been tagged about your brand. When signing up for an account – which you can only do by downloading the free app on a mobile device through the Apple Store or Google Play – make sure to:

1) Register with an email address that is already the default login for other social media sites (e.g. hotelXYZsocialmedia@gmail.com)

2) Select a Username that is easily recognizable and consistent with your branding across other social sites (e.g. if your Twitter handle is @HotelXYZ, your Instagram name should follow suit)

3) Upload a recognizable hotel or restaurant photo as your default Picture.

After signing-up, you will be brought to your Instagram account’s home page. Before you jump in and start exploring the various tabs, be sure to Edit Your Profile by clicking on the button furthest to the right on the app to ensure that your:

1) Bio section describes your brand and utilizes as much of the 150 characters of text real estate

2) Website is listed to ensure users can find you on their mobile device.

Step #2: Survey the Landscape

Before you begin posting through the application, it is a good idea to learn what kind of user-generated content (UGC) has already been shared about your brand. By using websites like Webstagram, Statigram or Pinstagram, you can easily discover posts from other users that pertain to your hotel or restaurant brand. This gives you the opportunity to:

1) Identify and start following other Instagram users that are interested in you

2) Discover which hashtags (#) are most associated with your brand

3) Determine what kind of content most resonates with those users.

It’s worth noting that you can also search for you brand by using the Explore > Hashtags feature that is accessible via the mobile application directly.

Step #3: Get Inspired by Others

By utilizing the same websites as listed above, begin to formulate a content strategy based on what kind of photos are most engaging on the platform. While your hotel or restaurant’s content should be wholly unique to your brand’s identity, there is often much to be learned from companies that are more experienced in the space. As we pointed out in our social media state of the union webinar, hotels like the Fontainebleau Miami, Beverly Wilshire and W Hotels in New York City are all utilizing the application extremely effectively. Use these examples as a jumping-off point when determining what kind of content you will want to share.

You will also want to consider following Instagram users that are interested in your destination or local neighborhood. You can search for these users by searching for the same hashtags that you may be following on Twitter and are associated loosely you’re your brand (e.g. #NYC #UpperEastSide, #hotel, #vacation).

Instagram also last month released a 3.0 upgrade that – in addition to updating users’ profiles – brought in a photo map feature that allows users to search and discover previously posted photos by the location they were posted at. From a destination hotel perspective, this rollout marks a huge opportunity for the hotelier to tag his/her photos to specific locations (e.g. restaurants, local attractions) and, more importantly, bring historical photos to the front of the fold. Says CEO Kevin Systrom, “Up until now we made it too difficult to access [those old photos], you had to scroll back pages and pages. We want to let you browse those photos in a fast and efficient manner, and we realized that the way to organize them wasn’t time, but [location].”

Step #4: Start Snapping Photos

Once you’ve identified what kind of content fits best with you brand’s identity, begin posting from the application. Remember that you can only post photos via Instagram through the iPhone or Android mobile application. Similar to Twitter, utilizing hashtags (#) when posting your content will allow your photos to be seen more prominently. As far as what kind of content is most appropriate to share, remember the golden rule of social: stay true to your brand while remaining real. This means sharing behind-the-scenes looks of your chef preparing a signature dish or your bellman playing with the dog outside the lobby, and not simply adding a filter to a professionally shot website photo. For more examples of brands that are leveraging Instagram effectively, have a look at this list published by Business Insider.

Step #5: Share Your Content

Perhaps the best feature of Instagram is its sharing capabilities. As social marketers have less and less time to devote to managing social media, one might assume that Instagram is just another consideration that will absorb even more time. On the contrary, Instagram is a tremendous timesaving tool that, in reality, will make your social media outreach both more engaging and efficient. With photos driving the most engagement on Facebook and Twitter, it is imperative that you give permissions to your hotel or restaurant’s respective social media accounts (Twitter, Flickr, Tumblr and Foursquare) to the application to achieve the maximum social reach of your message. At the time of this writing, you are only able to directly share an Instagram photo to a personal Facebook page (associated with an individual) and not a brand page. That said, it is absolutely worth using an Instagram photo or compiling an album of photos as part of your Facebook content strategy.

Final Thoughts

Once you’ve gotten into your groove on Instagram, start to think about other ways you can engage and excite your customer. Holding an Instagram contest to encourage your customer to share, for example, proved very successful for this Los Angeles-based restaurant and can be similarly effective for your hospitality brand.

Posted by Greg in Best Practices, Hotel Examples, Social Media, Twitter, What's New | Permalink | Comments (2)

September 5, 2012

#WebWednesday Must-Reads

Happy #WebWednesday friends! (if you're an active travel tweeter like Revinate, then you'll appreciate this reference) With an overwhelming abundance of content available to those passionate about hospitality social media, marketing, e-commerce and technology, we thought we'd take an opportunity to share with you some must-read articles and industry resources that we've recently come across here on the blog. Be sure to stay subscribed to our feed as we'll be sharing some of our favorite stories every week on-the-go forward. Also, find us on Twitter for daily updates on all things related to hospitality-related technology, social media and online reputation management.