Meet Kim Gibbons, Sales and Marketing Manager at Kishin and Rao Hospitality.  Kim is responsible for marketing the company’s properties, including the Best Western Evans hotel in Grovetown, Georgia. With approximately 20 years of experience in the hotel industry, she has risen to the top in hotel marketing.  She does an incredible job of setting [...]

Visuals play an increasingly critical role in a hotel marketer’s digital marketing mix. Travelers rely on hotel visuals as they research and evaluate their options online. Research by Google reveals that online video prompts business travelers to book 72% of the time. In addition, 89% of leisure travelers watch video online as well. Because of [...]

Visually merchandising to create interest and a striking impression in the minds of online travel shoppers can inspire them to choose your hotel over others. ‘A picture is worth a thousand words.’ You’ve heard this cliché many, many times before. However, with the growth of visual communication in digital marketing; this cliché takes on a [...]

Due to the competitive nature of the hotel market, it is critical that you take every opportunity to set your property apart from others online. A great way to do this is by telling your hotel’s story though video. As you know, video is a powerful way to tell a story. If it weren’t powerful, film wouldn’t be the [...]

Word of mouth marketing is even more critical in today’s marketing world than ever before.  Now you can tell hundreds of people about an experience you had with a brand in a matter of seconds and from anywhere in the world. We live in a world where people tweet what they ate for lunch and where [...]

Mobile has changed the way we travel – from the moment we start thinking about taking a trip to after we’ve shared our experiences with our social networks.  In response to this, hotels need to change the way they market to today’s always-connected travelers. Like internet use overall, ecommerce is growing slowing in terms of [...]

There are many industries (like retail eCommerce) that hoteliers can look to for ideas on how to develop successful marketing strategies. You may find it surprising, but educational institutions are a great place for hoteliers to look for content and visual storytelling strategies. There is one particular similarity between marketing universities and colleges and marketing [...]

Mobile is a hot topic and an incredibly important channel this year. I recently read an interesting article, Speed is Key for Retaining Mobile Site Users, Says Google, on travelweekly.co.uk. The article discusses the importance of speed on mobile sites. “Customers now have a greater expectation that sites will load fast, and have less patience with those [...]

A picture is worth 1000 words, so what better way to show you why visual storytelling is critical to business travelers than though an infographic? Highlights include: -  Online videos prompt business travelers to book 72% of the time -  Business travelers intend on using mobile to view travel videos 58% of the time – [...]

As a result of new and evolving factors, industry experts are predicting that 2013 will bring positive growth and probably outperform 2012’s results. The shifting trends in social, mobile and video, among others are great news for hoteliers. Now, the challenge is to prepare a plan that use these factors to your hotel’s advantage and [...]