Hotels were never desired as much during a holiday. That is until boutique hotels hit the scene and took the travel industry by storm. They came and made travellers want to inhabit them, make them home, and even take back some elements to their own homes. Boutique hotels are now the ultimate in lifestyle living.

Image source: TripSavvy

This boom has also seen supply catching up to demand across major destinations around the world. So, how can hotel marketers continue to grow revenue as more and more players join the fray? Driving more direct bookings are obviously the one major solution, but for that to succeed, your content marketing strategy needs to be on point.

Here’s our list of strategies that we think will help your hotel deliver on the promise of providing the best experience in 2018:

1. Video will take centre-stage
Internet users love their videos. Studies show that 61 percent of all marketers expect video to dominate their strategies. This makes it absolutely crucial that you make video marketing a central part of your 2018 marketing budget. To generate direct bookings, video marketing needs to begin at your website. Your hotel website should act as the central hub of visual content. Moreover, any video content on your social media platforms should also be available on the website. The type of video content will depend on your property’s unique selling proposition.

2. Virtual Reality will gain more ground
Luxury travel and hospitality brands are increasingly teaming up with virtual reality production agencies to help bring the luxury to life through immersive experiences.
For instance, Four Seasons is already looking at a marketing virtual reality application. Your boutique hotel will need to create unique, immersive experiences that attract customers.

Image source: AppATrip.com

Virtual reality experiences can bring your brand to life from anywhere in the world. They help transport potential guests to experience the hotel before booking it and allows them to navigate their own experiential experience. Additionally, it offers a personalized viewing experience, unique to each brand to extend their reach and boost visibility.

3. Mobile will remain top priority
According to a report by Deloitte, mobile is poised to overtake desktop as the savvy traveller’s go-to tool for research and booking. About 27 percent (and counting) of online bookings are completed via smartphone. This trend goes past the booking stage. When guests arrive at their destination, they’re turning to their mobile devices to find activities to do around town. In fact, a majority decide on activities only after they’ve arrived at their destination. By sending guests updates about what is happening around town during their stay, your hotel can provide them with an empowering experience.

4. Experiential marketing will rule the roost
As a boutique hotel, it is more important to sell an experience, rather than a product.

With the increase in the number of millennial travellers, experience is steadily taking centre-stage as travellers look for unique experiences over preplanned, packaged itineraries. That is what your hotel will need to create for your customers.Whether it is a person travelling for business, or a young couple looking for a perfect weekend getaway, the goal is to create memorable experiences. Read more about how APAC millennials are transforming global trends here.

5. Automation is going to be the next big thing
For efficient marketing, automation is the key. It is going to be vital for boutique properties to make sure their CRM is set to respond to different actions the customer may take on the website. Make the check-in and check-out process easier by building apps or sending an email that lets them do it from their phones. Another area where your property can stay ahead of the curve is by automating the internal sales process. When someone submits a contact form for enquiry, make sure it triggers an email to one of the salesperson who can deliver more context and personalization to the booking process as the guests finalize their choice of stay.

Any other trends you have in mind? Let us know.

The post Top 5 content marketing strategies your boutique hotel needs for 2018 appeared first on TravHQ.

If you don’t get it right, your job as a Content Marketer can pose some serious questions. When you see those crazy number of comments on the “Great Ixigo Travel Quiz“, you are like I could have done that too or when you see Lonely Planet’s numbers skyrocketing on Social Media, you tell your buddy, it’s all because of the cult status of the brand. If that’s not enough, your mind says give me the ad-budget, I will show you how I can do a launch campaign like Yotel Singapore, though viral content marketer Aashish Chopra strongly advocates not running after paid views.

Sometimes you hate content marketing to the core as your day job isn’t about those viral content pieces, the client (if you’re an agency) or the boss (if you’re on the brand-side) wants you to follow the content calendar, push the brand as he has got sales on his mind. You question yourself, question your content’s value and whether your efforts are doing any good for the brand.

Image Source: Free Vectors via www.vecteezy.com

This brings us back to the game of “Content Marketing”. What really it is? Simon Kemp, recently wrote a great post on finding content ideas.

He starts of by defining the key goal  for a content marketer i.e. ‘Create content that delivers increased brand value’

I am lifting the below image directly from Simon’s blog where he has emphasized that you should maintain the balance between the needs of your audience and what your brand wants to say. Quite right, if you go on addressing your brand’s needs without considering what the audience want, there will be a big disconnect.

Not being able to balance the needs of your audience is the key problem with most content marketers today. A lot of us are too obsessed with the brand – this is what our brand has to offer, this is how we can change the consumer experience. But on a second thought, are we thinking about what our consumer wants.

In a mobile-first world, where your content is competing for attention span in the news feed, think about why, just why would the audience really care about your message. What is the value you are delivering to them?

Start with Content Discovery

Using Answer the Public, you can find some great ideas on what the audience is actually searching for. Imagine your hotel wants to promote the newly opened Chinese restaurant in its premises. As a content marketer you might want to discover what do people want are people searching for? Answer the Public, gives many combinations depending on user search queries and the below are just some of the example search results.

Trends around What:

• What is Chinese cuisine
• What characteristics make Chinese cuisine distinct
• what is authentic Chinese cuisine
• what is northern Chinese cuisine

Trends around Why:

• why Chinese food is healthy
• why Chinese food is so good
• why Chinese food on Christmas

Break the Daily Content Routine

Fixed publishing schedule is one of the reasons why most content marketers cannot imagine contagious marketing ideas. You have daily goals for content and are under regular pressure to produce box office hits everyday. Instead, break the daily posting cycle and change it to an optimum frequency that’s most relevant for your brand and audience. Initially, it might require some convincing however if you can show the value, change can be brought in.

Provide useful information to your audience

Rendezvous Hotel Singapore does a great job of giving tips on nearby surroundings.

They also do a good job of linking customer testimonials with relevant images from within the hotel. In the below image, they have linked the wedding image with customer’s feedback message.

ParkRoyal SG is targeting the Instagram generation with its thematic series #parkroyalpicks. The question that they have to ask is who is their audience and whether they will go to Instagram for these backdrop shots.

Speak the language they understand

Wanderlust, a hotel in Little India is targeting the voyagers and millennial generation with its smart messaging and break the status quo content. The hotel seems to be targeting the travellers and not the tourists, the adventure theme of the hotel is well supported by relevant creatives/copy.

Quincy Hotel, another boutique hotel at Mt Elizabeth in Singapore is using a unique teddy toy to talk to its audience on Social Media.

The teddy is a cohesive part of the brand’s communication strategy on Social Media.

The above post is a part of multi-part series to examine the “Content Marketing” landscape in Singapore & India. While we have started with hospitality industry, going forward, we will be delving into more industries within the travel landscape!

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If you have been following the viral video feats of travel search engine, ixigo, the name Aashish Chopra doesn’t need a second introduction. Be it getting recognised for the most shared brand post on Facebook in Asia or winning the DMAi Content Marketer Of The Year Award, he has done it all.

We recently spoke to him on the opportunities for content marketers and the changing face of Digital India. Here’s a short video from our conversation with Aashish Chopra. To learn more about him, visit his personal website http://www.aashishchopra.com/.

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The FICCI auditorium witnessed the Travel and Hospitality Tech Conclave 2016 fold with a huge round of applause from the leaders and participating organizations from the travel and technology sector. The two-day event saw some stirring discussions and prime concerns being debated upon. The panel discussion on the nuances of Content Marketing was exhilarating and the mojos had some key points to give away.

The panel included Sesh Seshadri, Director at Lonely Planet India; Aashish Chopra, Head Content Marketing at ixigo; Bhawna Grover, Head of Content at Goibibo and Dolly Bhasin, MD, SPH Consultancy & Eservices Pvt. Ltd. They gave insights on how content can be leveraged to promote brand name in the travel sector.

1-The art of storytelling

From a traveller’s perspective, everything comes down to destination. If the destination is worth it, he would undergo umpteen amounts of discomfort to get there. Similarly, if the content narrates the reality; the stark truth, so much so that if the experience gathered by just reading the content is enough an inspiration to pack your bags, then the mission has been accomplished.

Trying to sell the product isn’t the way to go. Curated content is a destination for the traveller. If they don’t relate to the brand, they would not opt it out. Selling dreams, experiences and adventures should be the core focus of the travel brands. And only good deliverable content could make it happen.

2-Attention of the consumer is all you have

Content marketing is a growth hack in this age. Travel brands should experiment and go beyond the usual marketing strategy. Platforms like Facebook and Twitter are huge and chaotic. Driving the right content and the traction that it should attract seems like an uphill task on these social media platforms. However, if one captures the attention of the consumer, some hope of getting that content through him looks certain.

Share-worthy content is the prime key rather than consumable content in driving campaigns forward. Real-time engagement with contextual content can easily grab the eyeballs of users on social media and do wonders for brands. Brands need to keep on experimenting with the tonality, theme and format of the content to connect with their consumers. Though in some instances like with videos, the ratio of failures would be on a higher side, with only 2 out of 10 videos getting valuable returns to a travel brand.

3-The power of user generated content

The content shouldn’t be hammered. Let users be the end provider of the content because that’s where we want the impact to happen. And by this travel brands can deliver engaging content that creates likeability and brand image. The visual content drives maximum amount of traction in the hospitality sector.

Images are very powerful sources to draw attention. The contributed images play a major role here because that’s how the reality is perceived. Hence, meta search engines like Tripadvisor and GoIbibo let users contribute visually curated content. The way forward is to get the community to participate.

4-The emerging trends on new platforms

The right kind of content gets the right kind of traction on a right platform. That being said, the social media has expanded its reach to the millennial. Platforms like Facebook and Twitter are not the sole propagating areas and travel brands should go beyond just them. The new emerging platforms that are unheard of as means to expand the brands reach could include Wikipedia and TED.

TED is a rather interactive platform where innovation meets expansion. A particular product or a campaign could draw n-number of views on TED given its marketing strategy focuses on the innovation and experience.

5-Popular formats to be applied

The marketers talked about how not just purist content should be the only focus in driving traveller’s imagination. They talked how infographics, GIFs and vine videos could provide engaging content as they drew the attention of the viewer. Thumbnail image in a video plays a great role in catching the attention of a user. Square video formats have to be propelled forward in an m-commerce platform dominated space if the brands want the content to go viral. Being said this; the attention span in a chaotic space is very less which lays emphasis on streaming captivating content in first 2-3 seconds. Else, the marketer loses the viewer.

We will be coming up with updates of interesting discussions that took place at FICCI Conclave. Stay tuned!

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This space age has been taken by content storm. Content has evolved over the years bringing about a huge metamorphosis in the way we sell and promote brands. Travel industry spiked a decade ago scaling new heights and content has leveraged it into an avenue yet to be explored. After the huge success of content marketing panel discussion at OTM Mumbai, this sure will reckon some new takeaways.

We bring you content mojos where they will share insights for potential innovators on how to use content to carve their brand image. The panel will feature Sesh Seshadri; Director at Lonely Planet India, Aashish Chopra; Head Content Marketing at ixigo, Bhawna Grover; Head of Content at Goibibo and Dolly Bhasin; Gold medallist Electronics and Communication engineer.

Sesh Seshadri

Sesh Seshadri is a big name in publishing sector and his association with Lonely Planet India as a Director makes him an effluent speaker to gain insights on the travel industry. His career of four decades spans across publishing and consulting. His pivotal role to carve a niche market for Lonely Planet in India is laudable. The brand emerged out to be a huge success and launched 37 titles under his leadership. His current role is to create a sustained and successful presence for Lonely Planet in India adding value to their future developments. His long term association with Oxford University Press has placed him as a ‘ninja’ in the publishing sector. He then went ahead to work for Dorling Kindersley India as Executive Director. Furthermore, he was the Founder Director at Textech that specializes in providing academic solutions in the form of books and ebooks.

Aashish Chopra

Aashish Chopra heads Content Marketing at ixigo. From ideation to execution he has been instrumental in making video marketing a growth hack for ixigo. He is a celebrated and an award-winning video marketer who believes in creating compelling content or not creating any at all. He is the mega mind behind one of the most talked about video marketing campaign (Campaign Asia) that went viral and got shared as branded Facebook post. His early work comprised of visual content marketing, with several Infographics going viral on Slideshare. Aashish started a web services company in Canada and learnt in early days the skill set it takes to be an entrepreneur. As early as grade 8, he was designing websites and helping others with new tools and technology and continues to do the same.

Bhawna Grover Bagai

Bhawna Grover Bagai is the Head of Content at Goibibo, where she is responsible for driving company’s content strategy across its mobile and web platforms. Bhawna’s works on setting processes and policies for sustainable and quality content while marketing it through the right media channels across travel domain. The most interesting part of her work at Goibibo is using technology to solve SEO and dynamic content problems while getting more user generated content – both textual and visual. Bhawna has more than 10 years of experience in the media and content industries. Prior to working with Goibibo, she has worked with brands like MakeMyTrip, Times Group and Praxis Technologies. While starting out, she worked as a journalist for Times of India. Bhawna is a postgraduate in Journalism and Mass Media and also holds a Master of Arts in English (Literature).

Dolly Bhasin

Dolly Bhasin is a veteran in travel space and extends her expertise as a consultant in Hospitality and Tourism industry. She is a Gold Medallist Electronics and Communications Engineer with a 3-decade experience in Information and Communication Technology. She handled ICT operations for leading hotel groups including Le Meridian, Welcome group and Sarovar etc. She pursued specialisation in Business Administration of Travel & Tourism and subsequently Nottingham University scholarship. She created the first digital magazine INDIAN HOSPITALITY in 1999 and was a consultant to one of the first travel show MANZILE ANJANEE in the same year. Her notable works include destination promotion for Chamba, Kota, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand and projects including ANANDA SPA. She mainly focused on developing software and networking strategies pan hospitality sector.

We hope to hear from them some interesting insights at this session powered by FICCI.

The post TravHQ puts together a panel of Content Marketers to stir discussion at FICCI Travel and Hospitality Tech Conclave 2016 appeared first on TravHQ.

Day 1 of OTM Mumbai kicked off with an interesting panel discussion on ‘Leveraging content to inspire travellers’. The panel featured Sesh Seshadri, Director of Lonely Planet India, Lata Subramanian, Ex-CMO, Sterling, Prashanth Rao Aroor, CEO, IntelliStay Hotels Private Limited and Hanisha Lalwani, Multi-property Communications and Marketing Manager, Marriot International and was moderated by Daksh Sharma, Founding Partner at TravHQ.

Content plays a very important role in inspiring the travellers and promoting travel brands. The panelists shared their learnings and observations on the content marketing trends and here are the key takeaways from the discussion:

Stop selling through content

One thing you will notice about any ad or campaign that goes viral is that it isn’t focused on selling. The objective should be to inspire the travellers and if you have done it right, they will come back to you to buy. Instead of trying to sell directly, brands should focus on informing, educating and entertaining their audience. Sharing her opinion on the same, Lata Subramanian said that the brand needs to impress the travellers with their knowledge about the destination which will make the travellers prefer them over any other brand.

Format plays a major role

Opinions vary when it comes to the best format for sharing content shared by brand. While videos are a great way to send the message across, low internet speeds in India could pose a challenge with this media. It is important to choose the right format for the message that a brand wants to send across and according to Hanisha, they should keep experimenting with new form like gif animations and cinemagraphs.

Personalised content works wonders

Personalisation goes a long way in leaving a deep impact on the audience. It is important to ensure that your communication doesn’t target very wide audience and you should try to narrow it down to specific segment. During the discussion, Prashanth shared how the hotel engaged with the audience by inviting them to pick the uniform for Mango staff and how the brand plans to put the customer in centre for the future campaigns as well.

Audience can spot sponsored content

Some experts share the opinion that travel blogging is heading towards saturation. While it is a good idea for businesses to sponsor good content creators, the audience can differentiate between editorial and sponsored stories. According to Sesh Seshadri, brands should choose quality of content over the quantity of followers of the influencer they are associating with.

Our team will be hosting another panel discussion tomorrow (Feb 20, 2016) on “Leveraging online influencer relationships in travel & tourism”. Join us at OTM Mumbai tomorrow at 1300 hours. You can find details about the speakers here.

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The upcoming B2B travel trade show, OTM Mumbai will not only offer great opportunities for exhibitors but also allow the travel trade visitors to be a part of interesting discussions at TechForum@OTM. Contributing to that, TravHQ will be hosting two panel discussions that will offer insights for travel marketers.

The first panel will feature Lata Subramanian, Ex-CMO of Sterling, Sesh Seshadri from Lonely Planet India, Prashanth Rao Aroor from IntelliStay Hotels and Hanisha Lalwani from Marriott International. The topic of discussion will be “Leveraging Content to Inspire Travellers”. The panel will discuss about the right content strategies for tourism brands, utilising different forms of content for promotion and some successful content marketing campaigns in travel. The session will start at 1300 hours on Feb 18, 2016 at the event venue Bombay Exhibition Centre.

The topic of second panel discussion will be “Leveraging Online Influencer Relationships in Travel & Tourism”. The panel will feature Siddharth Joshi, leading travel blogger, Vineet Rajan from Indiblogger, Kavitha Gnanamurthy from Skyscanner India and Shelly Singh from Thursday Premiere. They will discuss about how brands should work with travel influencers, how to measure success while working with influencers and whether blogger fam trips are fruitful for the brands. The session will start at 13:00 hours on Feb 20, 2016 at the event venue.

Along with these sessions, the finalists of Travel Startup Knockdown will also pitch in front of the judges on Feb 19, 2016. The entries are open till Feb 7, 2016 so you still have a chance to take the stage to present your idea. You can find the full details here.

Keep watching this space for more updates on the event.

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