Social networks to reach customers

12-Sep-2010

Booking a flight? Go on Facebook. Running late to the hotel? Send a tweet. Hotels, airlines and other segments of the multibillion-dollar travel industry are aggressively tapping into social media, ramping up their use of online sites such as Facebook and Twitter to build loyalty to their brands.

Airlines are maintaining a presence on YouTube and offering deals through social-mapping networks such as Loopt. Hotels are promoting their properties through bloggers, and they’re using social-networking sites to gather feedback, monitor trends and provide concierge services.

Social media are being incorporated at a rapid rate into every part of a journey, from making the reservation to finding out where to eat.

 

Seeking return visitors

A key goal of staking a claim in the social-media space is to build a base of devoted followers who will keep coming back.

Travel businesses are seeking out social-media mavens and bloggers to sing their praises.
Social networking and mobile technology are a new advertising frontier, and it makes sense for the travel industry to jump on board, some say.

Customer relations

Airlines are using the tools and channels to try to ease travel, enabling passengers to book trips and find out if there is a delay without picking up a phone.

Instead of going to Delta.com, where 19 million domestic tickets are booked a year, passengers can make reservations on the airline’s Facebook page. The carrier will also let passengers peruse other websites and still be able to buy tickets by clicking on a Delta banner ad.

A social-media presence has become essential for any company that wants to bond with a younger generation that will hopefully remain loyal for years.

Where are you?

Hotels are seeking ways to take advantage of the latest twist in the social-media sphere: location-based service software which uses the GPS in smartphones to provide hotels information about their customers’ whereabouts.

InterContinental is working with start-up company Topguest. People who sign up at Topguest’s website can walk into any hotel, restaurant or bar operated by InterContinental and receive a small allowance of the hotel company’s loyalty points. To receive the points, they must alert their “friends” on Foursquare or Facebook Places, two of the most popular location-based social-networking tools.
For all the merits of social media, some industry watchers warn that the industry shouldn’t forget about the older generations that aren’t tech savvy and still need to be engaged.