This document is a quarterly hotel marketing benchmark report compiled by Sebastien Felix and Martin Soler. It provides opinions, news, inspiration and technology trends in the hotel marketing industry. The report discusses recent advances like Facebook Workplace and new retargeting options on Pinterest. It also provides predictions about the future of travel planning through artificial intelligence and a potential shift from direct bookings versus online travel agencies. The report aims to keep people in the hotel marketing industry informed about important developments.

1. Q4 2016
HOTEL
MARKETING
BENCHMARK
Compiled by Sebastien Felix @fleexit & Martin Soler @martinsoler

2. It’s been a while, but the industry has been busy.
We’re back with our collection of opinions, news, inspiration
and tech for the hotel marketing industry.
We quite think this is the best edition of the Hotel Marketing
Benchmark yet. Dozens of great and innovative tech and news
that are changing the industry. The big shift in hotel marketing
was undoubtedly the shift to online. But a big if not bigger shift
is about to happen with the shift to artificial intelligence.
But we’ll let you read about that in the pages to come. Enjoy.
Sebastien Felix
Founder and CEO of Buzz&Go - buzzandgo.com
Martin Soler
Hotel and Tech Marketer - martinsoler.com
HOTEL MARKETING BENCHMARK Sebastien Felix @fleexit • Martin Soler @martinsolerQ4 2016 Page 2
INTRODUCTION

3. RECENT
ADVANCES
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4. It is finally here: Facebook Workplace. After 18 months of beta (codename Facebook at Work), the
service was just launched early october. The familiar Facebook interface but now for work. Can it help
distributed teams, internal communications or reduce lengthy meetings? The jury is out on that. But it
certainly could assist, not needing to teach teams to use other tools.
FACEBOOK WORKPLACE#work
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5. Pinterest launched the Pin Collective, a platform to reach out with influencers on Pinterest and have
them create your publicity campaign for you. A novel way to give publicity a much more authentic feel
and without the grey-zone of “sponsored influencers” that forgot to say they got paid a hefty check to
post that picture. Honest publicity is the best publicity there it. And while we never advise to chase
shiny object in marketing - being in the loop of those shiny objects is a good thing.
OUTSOURCING PUBLICITY?#publicity
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6. COMMUNICATION APPS#tech
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The facility with which guests can communicate has never been greater. Not just to each other, to hotels
as well. They can log-on to a hotel’s Facebook page and instant message to the hotel, they can use
WhatsApp to send a message instantly to a hotel and they can message through Twitter buttons on a
hotel’s website. Even Google recently launched a similar service of their own. The question remains, are
hotels listening? Is there someone to pick up all those instant messages? Do guests believe someone is
listening? With tools like these, hotels have a unique opportunity to service guests and eventually
remedy anything that isn’t going right, before, during and after the stay. So, no more excuses for bad
reviews?

7. NEW RETARGETING CHANNELS#advertising
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Pinterest recently launched a retargeting program and it is good news for hotel groups, boutique and
luxury hotels. The ability to retarget visitors who haven’t booked, either with an alternative hotel or
remind them to stay with the hotel they just visited. Retargeting isn’t the new news but the fact that
Pinterest offers it is. Pinterest is a great platform for travel inspiration and inspiration is the one part of
travel advertising that still needs work. Retargeting isn’t the solution since it happens after inspiration
but being able to get back there if a traveler may have forgotten is worth it.

8. OPINIONS
& PREDICTIONS
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9. Trip Planning, AI and APIs#artificialintelligence
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Google Trips has the possibility of becoming the most intelligent online travel planner, with deep access
to email for reservation data, pictures for all the moments that matter most (and this could be a huge
factor in travel suggestions), location and history, coupled with some smart predictive algorithms.
Google Trips’ potential for inspiration and online reservation is a force to be reckoned with and one that
very few, aside from maybe Apple or Microsoft could compete with. The alternative of course would be
that all providers create open APIs from which data could be shared, which wouldn’t be bad either.

10. DIRECT vs OTAs#directbooking
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Direct Bookings finally became a big deal in 2015. A big deal not because nobody was doing it before
but because the media started reporting on it. The important point with direct bookings is what is in it
for the guest. That OTAs take a commission isn’t much concern for guests and the facility to have a
single place to check all hotels is a convenience that direct booking doesn’t have. It is no secret that
OTAs aren’t too happy and some reports of penalized rankings are cropping up. Someone said rather
than bickering over rate parity issues, if hotels really want to make a statement to OTAs all they’d had to
do was end availability for a single day. Guests would book, but not through OTAs...

11. POST COST-PER-CLICK ERA#metasearch
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Meta-search platforms are continuing their shift from clicks based advertising to commission based
models, blurring the lines between meta-search and OTAs. Two of the largest platforms have pretty
much completed their shift (Google and TripAdvisor), Several others are bound to follow. Commission
based models would be good for the industry once every platform has shifted. As discussed in a
previous article on attribution models, travelers go through multiple sites before booking and hotels are
liable to pay for clicks on each step for the way, whereas if they were all commission based - hotels
would only pay for the one that brought the reservation.

12. BRANDS TO TECH CO.#tech
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In a previous edition we touched upon how hotel companies, the big brands, are turning into hotel tech
companies. There is a huge opportunity for the industry there, if they can successfully merge between
being a procedures company to a procedures, know-how and tech company they can bring great new
opportunities for hotel owners. Most recently The Standard launched it’s own “last minute” booking
app and opened it to boutique hotels. AccorHotels launched their booking platform and Marriott Hotels
started their travel incubator/accelerator. Is this the future of hotel brands? It certainly has the
potential of becoming that. [Image by Skift]

13. Google Assistant, Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri and Microsoft’s Cortana are the big ones. Lola, Facebook
M and many others are being created through Chatbot platforms. The fact is the future of travel search
is going to shift into a more narrative and artificially intelligent model. Fewer choices but more relevant
choices. The platforms will shift, of course those who have availability, rates and inventory data (ARI)
will be pushing through those platforms, but there will only be one spot available. Which is both good
and bad for the consumer - faster reservations but the risk of less competition on commissions and
distribution. So while OTA vs Direct is being “battled” don’t forget the whole system is about to change.
ASSISTANTS & BOTS#tech
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14. If you’re into Hotel Marketing (and we assume you are), The Definitive History of Online Travel by
Dennis Schaal from Skift is a must read. Whilst we have passed the era of converting travel from offline
to online, there are still many, many things that can be made better in travel. What will the next big
shift in travel be? For example. could we use technology to change the industry from being the best
“firefighters” to being able to predict trouble and errors before guests even notice them?
MODERN HOTEL MARKETING#history
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15. FUTURE
TECH
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16. VR (Virtual Reality) is booming and will be one of the key topics in 2017 and the years to come. With
Samsung and now Google launching their mobile VR headset we can expect to see an explosion of new
travel apps. Ascape.com aims to become the number one travel website dedicated to VR. You can
already download the app on both Android and Apple appstore to start the experience.
ASCAPE#futuretech
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17. BEACONS IN HOTELS#tech
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Beacons, turning guest TVs into communication channel that actually make some sense. Beacon
technology will most definitely help hotels - the larger ones at least - understand guest movement, assist
operations to provide services and people in locations that need it. But what about communicating to
guests things that are most relevant to them. It is nice when a hotel’s TV system knows one’s name. But
that’s about all they know, how about showing the minibar prices when a guest moves there, or the
room-service menu when going to the desk? And those are the easy ones.

18. Changing the business model of hospitality with a subscription model? This startup is trying. It’s only
available on the French market for the moment but we really believe in this startup: Supertripper.
Travellers pay a monthly subscription (starting at 139€/m) and have unlimited travel within the
portfolio of hotels. Could this be the future for hotels?
UNLIMITED HOTEL STAY#businessmodel
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19. FRESH
INSPIRATION
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20. Scandic-to-go, taking a part of a hotel to places around the world so guests can keep staying at the hotel,
a brilliant brand awareness campaign by Scandic.
See more here:
https://www.scandichotels.com/landing-pages/scandic-to-go
YOUR ROOM, EVERYWHERE#inspiration
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21. Don’t go to Paris, or Tokyo, or New York - Live there. Brilliant and simple ad by Airbnb.
Watch the video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNCJh9WwU6w
DON’T TRAVEL!#inspiration
HOTEL MARKETING BENCHMARK Sebastien Felix @fleexit • Martin Soler @martinsolerQ4 2016 Page 21

22. A history of advertising for the French train system SNCF (in French). The love/hate relationship between the
French and their (rather large) train system has gone on forever. Even their first commercial right after WW2 is
about someone complaining. Some great, some corny but all interesting ads. (12 minutes)
Watch the video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkEvnrNPPps
LOVE/HATE FOR FRENCH TRAINS#inspiration
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23. This almost deserves a spot on Adobe’s Stock Photo T-Shirts, perma-smiles that won't wash off for a
concept we still don’t quite understand (a stand-in for birth?!) but it is worth the watch just for the
weirdness of it all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbpunPd8PIw
WEIRD BUT WORTH IT#inspiration
HOTEL MARKETING BENCHMARK Sebastien Felix @fleexit • Martin Soler @martinsolerQ4 2016 Page 23

26. About us
Martin Soler
A passionate marketing guy with
experience in the hotel and travel
tech sector, having brought to
market multiple hotel technology
products to market in record time.
I work as an advisor and
marketing agent to hotels and
hotel technology companies
around the world. Reach out on
martinsoler.com
Sebastien Felix
Formerly head of online
marketing for a luxury hotel
group, I co-founded Buzz&Go the
first influencer marketing
platform for hospitality.
Currently building what will be
the new generation of storytelling
and content for travel brands.
Reach out to me on my
About.me/sebastien-felix page.
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