20 Social Media Best Practice Tips for the Hospitality Business - HostelWorld.com Conference

So, You Want To Be Social? Krishna De www.BizGrowthNews.com

This is a summary of the key points of a presentation given by Krishna De at the HostelWorld.com conference in January 2010. In the presentation, Krishna covered 20 social media marketing and communication best practice tips and explored case studies from Ireland and across the globe. BEFORE you develop your social media marketing programme remember to: 1. Evaluate which social media channel could support you in achieving those goals – it’s more effective to have a great presence on one or two channels rather than be mediocre on many 2. Establish your key performance indicators and what success will look like for your hostel – while social media may be inexpensive it is time intensive so track your return on investment 3. Test, test, test – be unique, model others but never copy them and discover what is effective for your community – so you turn followers into friends and fans into profits

1. BECOME THE GO TO PERSON: While your overall goal may be room occupancy rates, when using social media channels don’t just pitch your business - become the authority for information about ‘what’s happening’ in your part of town 2. BE SMART: Take the time to establish your goals against which you will measure your success – that could be search engine visibility, managing your reputation, increasing referrals, and of course more sales. Make sure your goals are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Rewarding and Trackable 3. LET GOOGLE HELP YOU: Add your profile to Google.com/Local to take advantage of the local search results – you can share information about your hostel location, opening times, contact details and include photos, videos - and it’s free! 4. START WITH LISTENING: You don’t need to actively participate in the social scene to benefit from it - even if you never plan to write a blog post, publish a Tweet, record a video or create a Facebook page, you can uncover great opportunities by listening to the conversations taking place

5. SHARE YOUR BACK STORY: Platforms like Flickr.com enable you to share information about your business, bringing your brand to life and importantly start to help you start to build relationships with customers and clients 6. CROWD SOURCE CONTENT: Encourage guests to share their experiences of staying at your hostel – host competitions to encourage them to share their great experiences of staying with you (e.g. video’s, photos, comments) – social proof speaks volumes 7. HAVE A STRONG VISUAL IDENTITY: Express your brand online ensuring that it is consistent with your brand identity e.g. customise your Twitter page, use a distinctive avatar on Facebook, brand your YouTube channel 8. CUSTOMISE YOUR FACEBOOK PAGE: Extend your visual identity to your Facebook page using the FBML application – create a WOW landing page explaining the reasons they will love being your ‘fan’ – and tie it into your overall visual identity

9. DEVELOP A COMMUNITY ON FACEBOOK: Tap into over 350 million members of Facebook by creating a Facebook Group or a Facebook Page for your hostel - provide your community with a reason to join you through offering unique, relevant content and an opportunity to engage directly with you 10. RESPOND QUICKLY: If you decide to use social media platforms, assign accountability and train a member of your team in the role of ‘Community Manager’ so they can monitor the conversations and respond as required to issues and questions being raised – consider it a way of enhancing your customer service 11. SHARE YOUR OFFLINE PROMOTIONS: Make sure you let your community on your business blog, Facebook, Twitter or other social network know about the offers and promotions you are making offline in the ‘real world’ 12. BUILD TRAFFIC BACK TO YOUR WEBSITE: Link back to your main website so people can find out more about your hostel and how to book to stay with you e.g. add a link in your bio on Twitter, a link in your profile on YouTube or Flickr, a subscription to your newsletter on your Facebook Page

13. HAVE A COMPELLING CALL TO ACTION: For example on Twitter your messages have to be 140 characters or less, so have a clear call to action to encourage people to click on the link you share in your Tweets (of course this also applies for any marketing copy) 14. CREATE ANTICIPATION: Use multimedia from photo’s to video’s to build anticipation of booking to stay with you or join events you are hosting - invite your community share their opinion and participate in research when developing new offerings 15. REWARD YOUR COMMUNITY: When offering discounts and offers to your community, find ways to track the success of your promotions using reference codes (Note: check the promotional guidelines relevant to the social media platform you are using to ensure your competition or promotion is allowed under their terms of reference) 16. BRING YOUR STORY TO LIFE: Use the power of online video to say more with less - create video’s on how to get to your hostel, do a virtual tour of your hostel, share tips on where to go and what to see when staying with you

17. SHOW YOUR ARE SOCIAL: Add big bold buttons to your main web site to show your website visitors that you have a presence on social media platforms and encourage them to join you there 18. ENCOURAGE SHARING OF YOUR CONTENT: Even if you do not plan to actively participate or publish content in social media channels, take the opportunity to get your web master to add code to your website to encourage your visitors to share your content (articles, online videos and promotions) with their friends e.g. by email, on Twitter or to their friends on Facebook 19. BE EFFICIENT: Use tools such as Hootsuite, Seesmic or Tweetdeck to allow you to post content to multiple channels, follow and respond to specific conversations and even programme your postings for a future date and time 20. EVALUATE YOUR RESULTS: Ensure that you put in place tools to measure the impact of your social media programme – from website stats, to how many followed your links and ultimately how many bookings you take

Join Krishna’s Marketing Mentor Page on Facebook and access 5 free marketing tutorials www.facebook.com/marketingmentor Read the latest scoop on marketing and social media trends for businesses at www.bizgrowthnews.com Find Krishna at LinkedIn www.krishnaonlinkedin.com Follow Krishna on Twitter www.krishnaontwitter.com Watch marketing and social media tips video’s on YouTube www.krishnaonyoutube.com Discover Irish social media case studies www.socialmediaireland.com Contact Krishna for details of how to join her monthly Marketing Mastermind connect@bizgrowthnews.com

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20 Social Media Best Practice Tips for the Hospitality Business - HostelWorld.com Conference

by Krishna De on Jan 24, 2010

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20 Social Media Best Practice Tips for the Hospitality Business - HostelWorld.com Conference — Presentation Transcript