BY BRAND
ITC HOTELS , GURGAON , INDIA DESCRIPTION : ITC Hotels has a real-time recording mechanism and four levels of criticality to classify each guest comment to ensure the most important ones are addressed first . Each ITC hotel is notified of these customer comments in real time to either respond on the review site directly or to provide the central social media team with an appropriate response that addresses the comment , and on-property staff are notified . ITC also constantly identifies , based on certain evaluation criteria , bloggers to host at its hotels to blog and tweet about their experiences . RESULTS : Over the past year , ITC saw its ratio of positive to negative TripAdvisor reviews improve from 1,032:221 to 1,530:295 . On Twitter , 43 negative tweets were resolved into positive tweets from guests .
BY PROPERTY
ROYAL WING SUITES & SPA , PATTAYA , THAILAND DESCRIPTION : The hotel ’ s Internet marketing team monitors reviews with software , summarizes the results and reports them to the hotel ’ s senior managers , sorting online comments from guests for the department responsible . The hotel ’ s general manager is responsible for responding to each reviewer — both on the online platform where the review occurred and via a direct email within 24 hours in the original language used .
BY BRAND
DOUBLETREE BY HILTON
SPECIAL REPORT : SOCIAL HOTEL AWARDS
BEST REPUTATION MANAGEMENT : SOCIAL MEDIA
BY BRAND
ITC HOTELS , GURGAON , INDIA DESCRIPTION : ITC Hotels has a real-time recording mechanism and four levels of criticality to classify each guest comment to ensure the most important ones are addressed first . Each ITC hotel is notified of these customer comments in real time to either respond on the review site directly or to provide the central social media team with an appropriate response that addresses the comment , and on-property staff are notified . ITC also constantly identifies , based on certain evaluation criteria , bloggers to host at its hotels to blog and tweet about their experiences . RESULTS : Over the past year , ITC saw its ratio of positive to negative TripAdvisor reviews improve from 1,032:221 to 1,530:295 . On Twitter , 43 negative tweets were resolved into positive tweets from guests .
ITC ’ s outreach to bloggers produced nearly 200 blog posts by more than 150 Indian and international bloggers between April 2012 and March 2013 . RUNNER-UP : Library Hotel Collection , New York City
JUDGES ’ COMMENTS :
“ This reputation management program is extremely well organized and operated . They set up a clear operational path for dealing with online engagement and stressed the importance of response on a daily basis . The results clearly show the work was successful .”
BY PROPERTY
ROYAL WING SUITES & SPA , PATTAYA , THAILAND DESCRIPTION : The hotel ’ s Internet marketing team monitors reviews with software , summarizes the results and reports them to the hotel ’ s senior managers , sorting online comments from guests for the department responsible . The hotel ’ s general manager is responsible for responding to each reviewer — both on the online platform where the review occurred and via a direct email within 24 hours in the original language used .
The hotel also holds weekly meetings to go over any negative comments , and the department heads relevant to the subject of the complaint are
JUDGES ’ COMMENTS :
“ Very strong program in place here — to document issues and create specific written action plans shows commitment . I also love that there is a true 360-degree response to guest comments .” required to attend . The social media monitoring and response is conducted entirely in-house . RESULTS : The hotel consistently places in the top three hotels in Pattaya in TripAdvisor ’ s rankings and receives roughly 30 new bookings per month referred from TripAdvisor . It has won the TripAdvisor Traveler ’ s Choice award two years in a row . The hotel ’ s percentage of return guests is 65 %. RUNNER-UP : W Taipei , Taiwan
BEST INTEGRATED DIGITAL CAMPAIGN
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DOUBLETREE BY HILTON
DESCRIPTION : The Little Things Project Tour and supporting social media campaign revolved around the message , “ At DoubleTree by Hilton , the little things mean everything .” From May 2012 to November 2012 the campaign bridged the digital and physical world with the Swarm Car that asked travelers to send requests to DoubleTree ’ s Twitter account with the hashtag # LittleThings . There also was a traveling pop-up event marked by the “ Tell Me Tree .” Bloggers and consumers were targeted for outreach via frequent Twitter and Facebook updates . The campaign included local deals , free Wi-Fi , device charging stations , instant-win cards promoting the Facebook sweepstakes and free chocolate chip cookies to drive enrollment in
Hilton Worldwide ’ s HHonors loyalty program . RESULTS : DoubleTree by Hilton said it exceeded by a multiple of three its goal for new Twitter followers , by 2.5 its goal for Facebook followers , by tenfold its goal for sweepstakes entrants and by three times its goal for HHonors enrollments . Three thousand “ little things ” requests were distributed at each of the markets the campaign visited , and the campaign was extensively covered by U . S . consumer media . RUNNER-UP : Hilton Hotels & Resorts
JUDGES ’ COMMENTS :
“ This is what an integrated campaign should look like . They seamlessly blended the online and offline world while integrating public relations , social media and charitable awareness .”
22 HOTELS October 2013 www . hotelsmag . com