Social Media Marketing for Hospitality

There are roughly 4.2-billion active social media users around the world. This makes hospitality social media marketing an important aspect of any successful hotel business.

If you’re new to the world of social media marketing, we can help. Follow this guide to learn more about current trends in hospitality social media marketing and tips for getting ahead.

As you begin your journey with social media, one of the best things you can do in any industry is familiarizing yourself with the various platforms. Not every platform is the same, and some provide a better space for individual industries.

A fine example of choosing the right social media platform occurs with professional services. Law firms, medical practices, and dental clinics are rarely active on platforms like Tik Tok or Instagram. LinkedIn and Facebook Business Pages tend to reflect the core values of these companies better.

In hospitality, you have the best of both worlds, with professional and leisure guest stays. You can use a variety of social media platforms, including:

As you post to these accounts, consider the types of consumers following you. You may need to post different content to your Facebook account than you do your Instagram page, based on customer demographics, interest, and engagement.

Most social media business pages allow for reviews and ratings. This is a useful tool in creating greater customer loyalty and brand recognition. Reviews are highly effective and research suggests that 72% of people will engage with a business after seeing a single positive review online.

To make your reviews more attractive to new customers, remember to engage with a response. Replying to all reviews, good or bad, ensures you appear unbiased and friendly. Consumers respond well to businesses that humanize themselves by engaging personally with customers.

As the name suggests, user-generated content, or UGC, is content that has been shared by your followers and other social media users. It is a trendy option in hospitality social media marketing right now and has a strong influence on consumers. In fact, according to Hub Spot, 79% of consumers are influenced by UGC.

Examples of UGC include:

UGC has many benefits for hospitality businesses, such as being:

Be sure to tag the original poster of any UGC you post. This helps you avoid accusations of plagiarism, and encourages guest engagement.

Depending on the size of your hotel, or hotel chain, you may have an advantage over small businesses when it comes to influencers. Influencer marketing is highly lucrative in social media.

Influencers fall into several categories, including:

When hotels partner with influencers for optimized hospitality social media marketing, it makes your brand more attractive. Not only will your social media followers be impressed, but followers of that influencer will notice your brand as well.

Live video feeds are risky but worthwhile. There’s been a recent increase in social media video streams over the last year. These are a great resource to connect with guests and engage on your social media channel.

To get the best results from your live feed:

Being live leaves you open to making a mistake on air. This is fine unless that mistake reflects badly on your brand. Staying organized and practicing first will help you minimize the risk of potential errors.

Plan to speak to your guest followers and reply to comments made during the filming. Have a quick response for any negative comments that might come your way and keep things positive.

Finally, the best way to get ahead in social media marketing is to connect with an expert. A digital marketing agency offers access to the latest trends and helps manage your social media content for higher-quality posts.