DECODING THE MARKETING MIX

With digital mediums emerging as dominant marketing platforms, hotels put out a plethora of content that leverages storytelling to entice guests

- NISHA SHUKLA

Once, hotel marketing teams saw the promotion of key talking points and new offerings as the selling point, which were evenly distributed among an array of platforms including events, print and social media.

The COVID pandemic has further skewed the use of social media to promote a hotel’s marketing strategies. The travel and hospitality industries are highly visual-driven. Most travellers now use online and social media content to find inspiration about destinations they want to travel to and plan every aspect of their travel.

Recently, STR and Tourism Economics made a special forecast, which predicted a significant decline across demand, occupancy, ADR, and revenue per available room (RevPAR in 2020. However, the market is expected to recover in the latter part of the year or early next year.

Given the forecast, hoteliers across the globe are implementing short-term cost-saving measures to keep their businesses afloat. They have also begun to reevaluate and refocus their marketing communication and strategies to garner guest confidence and recover business.

We spoke to some of the leading lights from the industry to better understand how COVID has influenced their marketing communication and what strategies they are adopting to navigate through these tough times.

Digital marketing takes centre-stage

The past couple of months of the lockdown period have seen people increase the time spent on their mobile phones in a bid to consume digital content.

Datareportal recently released a report studying the key changes in the social media usage pattern during the COVID-19 lockdown phase. As per the report, being cooped up at home resulted in a monumental increase in online and digital activities.