The Hindu Business Line : `CGM ideally suited to the hospitality sector'

Online marketing strategies have been recognised as powerful tools to sell the `experience' associated with hospitality, aviation and tourism brands. While the Indian hospitality sector has used the Net to sell its products for sometime, it needs to review Net-based marketing to extend its interaction with customers and use consumer-generated media (CGM) to strengthen its online marketing effort.

Mansi Bhatnagar is Associate Director at the New Delhi office of global hospitality consultant HVS. She believes CGM such as blogs, discussion boards, review sites and social networks have the ability to de-commoditise the hotel product. Head of the marketing and communication services at the consultancy, she says Web site optimisation should be a focus area for the Indian hotel industry. Excerpts from the interview:

The projected growth in the number of Internet users by 2010 underscores the importance of the Net as a marketing medium. What per cent of marketing in the hospitality sector is carried out online currently?

Though numbers really depend on the market you are addressing, in 2007, about 68 per cent of hoteliers will be shifting their marketing budgets from offline to online marketing activities. According to an American survey, Merrill Lynch suggests that 45 per cent of all hotel booking will be completed online by the end of 2010.

How does online marketing fit into the marketing strategy of the sector?

This depends on the particular segment of the hospitality business you are operating in. There are a number of types: you may have a luxury, non-luxury, franchise and non-franchised operation. The segment will determine to a large extent how and where online marketing fits into the overall marketing strategy.

Generally speaking, from the wide array of online marketing initiatives present in today's scenario, reports say that at an average ROI of 71.9 per cent, Web site optimisation as an online marketing strategy will, in the long run, give the highest returns on investment.

How well evolved is online marketing of hotels in India vis-à-vis the West?

It is still at a nascent stage. Indian hoteliers are for the large part still relying on global distribution systems (GDS) and third party intermediaries (TPIs) and keyword selection to increase the crawl of a Web site.

Most have attractive and informative Web sites but often they are not engineered keeping in mind Web site optimisation tactics which are key to ensuring natural and organic visibility in the major search engines.

In the West, hoteliers are now taking another look at their Web sites to address the growing need for optimisation. There, consumer-generated media (CGM) and press release syndication is now also being incorporated into online marketing strategies.

What would the focus of an online marketing strategy for hotels be? How would it differ with online marketing for other industry segments?

In general terms, the hospitality, travel and aviation are industries that rely heavily on consumer experience to influence the purchasing behaviour of the client. Agreed that the 4Ps of marketing - product, price, place and promotion are important, but in most markets, these are heavily influenced by consumer feedback and experience sharing.

Indian hoteliers now need to involve their customers in their Web sites with feedback, review and recommendation opportunities and in doing so build online relationships with current and prospective clients.

India is witnessing much activity in the mid- and budget hotel segments. Is online marketing relevant here too?

Yes, as mentioned before, online marketing strategies are relevant and now integral to all segments of the Indian hospitality industry. The key really is to understand your market segment and target clientele and then tailor the strategy to address their purchasing behaviour.

How does CGM suit hotel marketing?

CGM is a new and relatively unknown online marketing strategy in India. This strategy can be used not only as a direct Internet marketing activity but can also be a part of your experiential marketing strategy.

One can also monitor blogs on hospitality for unfiltered information on the changing demographics and customer preferences in hospitality. Web sites now should feature a customer feedback page that allows customers to share their experiences and motivate prospective clients to book online.

Building an online relationship with your target market is the underlying goal of CGM and this can be done through corporate-sponsored initiatives, photo sharing and experience reviews. In the hospitality industry where the latest buzz word is experiential marketing, CGM is ideally suited as it is really an online tool that allows the sharing of experiences of services/ products by consumers with prospective consumers.

It needs to be understood and appreciated that an important result of CGM online initiatives is the ability to use guest feedback/ reviews as a tool to enhance the product/ services.

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