GLOBAL UPDATE : MARKETING
LIKE , TWEET ,
BOOK
By Nathan Greenhalgh , associate editor
Three hotel social media innovators share their techniques and strategies .
THE SUBJECTS
KIERAN DONAHUE , vice president of global brand marketing , DoubleTree by Hilton
MICHAEL LEONG , director of corporate digital marketing , Shangri-La International Hotel Management
DIEGO SARTORI , social media manager , CitizenM Hotels
Hotel companies ’ social media outreach is becoming increasingly sophisticated .
CitizenM Hotels gave away 400 rooms ahead of the opening of the CitizenM Glasgow , Scotland , in exchange for feedback . When the hotel fully opened it was already number one on TripAdvisor and trending locally on Twitter .
For Shangri-La Hotels & Resorts ’ 40th anniversary , more than 20,000 fans on Facebook took part in a special on-property offer , generating 60,000 new fans ( a 67 % increase ) and more than US $ 1.4 million in incremental
F & B revenue throughout the group .
Meanwhile , DoubleTree by Hilton ’ s CAREavan Tour garnered 29,261 new Facebook likes — a 125 % increase — and 708 new Twitter followers , a 4 % increase . Most importantly , it added 767 Hilton HHonors enrollments . For this year ’ s Little Things Project , DoubleTree asked guests what little things would make their travel experiences better , and after 5,000 responses it hit the road for a 50-city U . S . tour to share some of the things requested . It even drove around in a “ Swarm Car ” fulfilling requests from travelers on Twitter .
8 HOTELS November 2012 www . hotelsmag . com