Hospitality Social Media – 9 Reasons You Should Use it

Learn how to use Hospitality Social Media for Your Business: discover all the tips and detailed strategies to grow your Brand!

If your hospitality business lacks a social media presence or doesn’t post frequently enough, you’re missing out.

What hospitality social media strategies should you follow?

To build your hospitality social media presence, you should post valuable content that increases trustworthiness and authority while establishing your brand. You should also focus on responding to comments to build relationships. Below are 9 reasons to utilize social media for your hospitality brand.

  1. Improve brand awareness
  2. Get social proof
  3. Build relationships
  4. Increase inbound traffic
  5. Manage reputation
  6. Improve SEO
  7. Strengthen trust
  8. Increase leads
  9. Meet customer expectations

This guide will provide useful tips and strategies, including more details on the methods mentioned above.

Why Is Social Media Marketing Important to Hospitality Brands?

Hospitality is all about serving the customer, so hospitality social media content is merely an extension of that. You can use your social media accounts not only as a place to educate and even entertain your audience, but to accommodate them as well.

How? Here are some methods for your social media strategy.

Post Your Contact Information at the Top of Your Profile

Sure, if you have a completed Google Business Profile, your customers, or would-be customers, can always find your info there. For those who’d rather skip the Google search and are already on social media though, posting your contact information there makes your hospitality business easier to connect with.

Those who visit your social media page will see your website and other social links right at the top of your profile. You can even include a phone number or call-to-action button to message your account so a prospective customer or current customer can contact you. 

Respond to Comments as They Come In

As your social media presence grows, so too will the number of comments you get on each of your posts. While you’ll likely never be able to respond to every single comment, you should do your best to reply to as many as you can. 

If you’re having a hard time determining which comments to reply to, prioritize the ones from customers who are asking questions about your hospitality service as well as any complaints you receive. 

Should an exchange become overwhelmingly negative, you should know when to move it to more personal channels instead. Those can include direct messages or DMs, but might also be a customer service hotline or email address.

The hotel manager is responding to his customers' messages on social networks

Reply to Direct Messages

Speaking of DMs, you must also take the time to address those as they come in. Some customers or prospective customers feel more comfortable sending private messages than they do leaving a comment or writing on your wall.

Once you reply to all your outstanding DMs, you’ll have to refresh periodically to check whether any new messages came in. After all, according to HootSuite, on Twitter, 59 percent of brands tweet a reply to users in 15 minutes or less. Don’t leave customers hanging for too long! 

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Track Business Mentions

Here’s another important facet: reviewing your business mentions.

Users on platforms such as Twitter or Facebook might not @ you directly, but they could still talk about you to their friends, family, and colleagues.

By searching and reviewing business mentions, you get an unfiltered view into what your audience thinks of you, good or bad. Your hospitality company can take the bad posts and use them as a launching pad to improve your customer service even further.  

9 Reasons to Utilize Hospitality Social Media

If you’re still not totally convinced that social media is right for your business, here are 9 reasons that social media use is so integral in this industry. 

1. Improve Brand Awareness

What is your hospitality brand? Maybe those in your city or town are aware, and perhaps you’re even known statewide. If you hope to grow to household name status someday, that includes growing your brand so it rolls off the tip of the tongue.

Social media can be a huge vehicle to increase your hospitality brand awareness. Perhaps you partner with an influencer and increase your brand that way.

You can also take the slow-and-steady approach, posting consistently good content that gets people talking and–more importantly–sharing among their own social circles. 

As you begin posting on social media, your hospitality business must establish its brand identity if you haven’t already. That identity includes the usage of a logo, your color scheme, and your tone. 

As a hospitality business, you want a warm and inviting tone that comforts users and makes them feel cared for. Remember that the tone should be easily replicated, as multiple people might handle writing posts and responding to comments and DMs. 

2. Get Social Proof

Social media is a great place to generate social proof for your hospitality brand.

Social proof can influence the actions of others based on what the majority has done. Using the example from the last section, as part of your hospitality social media marketing, let’s say you do work with an influencer.

If that influencer tells everyone to stay at your hotel or visit your restaurant, what do you think will happen? Not every single one of the influencer’s audience members will do it, but enough will that you should see a significant uptick in business.

When customers have a great experience and leave reviews on your social media accounts, these reviews become part of your social proof that can inspire other customers to try your business. 

The hotel owner is building new relationships through social media

3. Build Relationships

Hospitality is all about relationships, more so than many other industries. We already talked in the last section about how you can use hospitality social media as a customer service vehicle. 

Many of those points we touched on are used for building relationships with current and prospective customers alike. When you reply to comments and answer DMs, you’re establishing a connection with your audience. 

Even rectifying poor customer service can patch up a relationship with a customer enough that they might be willing to give your hospitality business a second chance. 

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4. Increase Inbound Traffic

You might recall how we said you can post a link to your website on your social media profiles, right? That’s one way of several that you can boost inbound traffic to your site.

Your social media profile will include a bio, but since these are often character-restricted, you might not be able to get the full point across in that short bio. If a customer or prospective customer wants to learn more, they can click on your website.

Here’s another way to generate more inbound website traffic from your hospitality social media accounts: cross-post content between your social media and your website, especially your blog. 

If you know what your social media audience likes and you believe they’d appreciate a blog post, then you can share a link to that post on your social media accounts. Your post might display a preview of the blog article, but to read the whole thing, users would have to click on your website.

Once they arrive on your hospitality website, you can use lead magnets to encourage sign-ups to your mailing list. 

5. Manage Reputation

A hospitality business wants as sterling of a reputation as possible, and through social media, that may be doable. 

As we’ve discussed, on some social media platforms such as Facebook, users can leave reviews of your hospitality services. These reviews are independent of your Google Business Profile reviews as well as reviews of your services that might exist elsewhere on the Internet such as on Yelp.

Reviews are either turned on or off on Facebook, so you can’t cherry-pick them. If you’re happy with the level of positive reviews your hospitality business has garnered, then you might choose to display the reviews. 

You can also manage your reputation by addressing negative comments and DMs as they popup, which we’ve touched on. If a customer sees a negative comment and then your quick response where you try to fix the issue, they might feel more confident that if they had an issue too, you’d offer the same level of customer service. 

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10 Website Mistakes Luxury Brands Should Avoid

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6. Improve SEO

Social media and SEO might not have an obvious connection, but through social media, you can indirectly influence your SEO

How so? In several ways, such as increasing your brand reputation and recognition. You’re also generating more organic traffic, which Google pays attention to. Your posts might have a longer lifespan when you share them across social media, which can also positively affect your SEO efforts.  

7. Strengthen Trust

Trust is everything in a relationship, and that includes professional relationships as well. If your hospitality business is looking to build more trust among your customer base, use social media. 

Increasing your customer service through social media (and other means) remains the best way to encourage trust among your audience. Posting testimonials and reviews is another way to generate more trust.

Sharing high-authority content that’s backed up by research and data can increase trust in your hospitality business as well. 

The hotel has obtained new leads thanks to the correct use of social media

8. Increase Leads

Every business wants more leads, including hospitality. Through your hospitality social media campaign, you might see an influx of leads come through. 

According to a 2019 survey done by eMarketer, 82 percent of respondents said Facebook is their top social media platform for lead gen. That’s followed by LinkedIn at 48 percent, Instagram at 43 percent, and Twitter at 15 percent.

Here are some social media lead gen tips to try:

  • Optimize your social media profiles so they are 100 percent complete. Every six months, double-check that all the info is current as well.
  • Host a contest or giveaway, ensuring your prize is one your audience is interested in.
  • Cross-post blog content to your social media accounts.
  • Use paid social media advertising. 

9. Meet Customer Expectations

The last reason to use social media is to meet the expectations of your customers.

According to comment management resource Status Brew, most customers are willing to wait about an hour for DM replies from a brand on social media. 

That’s not the only expectation your customers have of you. They also expect you to be on social media. More than having a blank profile though, your customers want you to maintain a healthy social media presence. 

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Conclusion

Hospitality social media campaigns are a valuable way of building trust, strengthening customer relationships, generating leads, earning more website traffic, and improving your customer service – both organic and paid efforts. 

If you’re struggling with your social media marketing, Mediaboom can help. Our digital marketing experts can grow your leads, brand awareness, and website traffic as well as help with any other goal you’re trying to fulfill through social media. Contact us today to find out how we can help take your brand to the next level through a free, 30-minute online consultation.

SEO for Luxury Brands – How to Grow Traffic Organically

As a luxury brand, you’re likely used to inbound marketing tactics that bring customers to you. Inbound marketing is beneficial because, when done right, you get a great payoff for your efforts. If this sounds appealing to you, there’s one thing you must capitalize on: SEO for luxury brands. 

What is SEO for Luxury Brands? 

SEO for luxury brands is the process of luxury and high-end brands optimizing their websites and content to maximize their online search potential. When a luxury brand executes on its SEO strategy successfully, quality online leads who are looking for the goods or services the brand provides will find their way to the brand’s website. It’s a valuable inbound strategy that drives growth and increases conversions. 

A SEO expert is teaching how can organic traffic help a luxury brand.

How Can Organic Traffic Help Your Luxury Brand? 

First, let’s define organic traffic. Organic traffic is traffic that comes to your site naturally. If someone searches for something online and they go to your website to find what they’re looking for, that’s an organic lead. You didn’t have to pay to have them come to your website. 

There are multiple ways organic traffic can help your luxury brand. Let’s walk through some of the key ways and how they can tie to your credibility and bottom line. 

Organic Traffic Yields Long-Term Growth

Many businesses like pay-per-click (PPC) advertising because it tends to get quick results. While PPC is one part of your overall digital marketing strategy, you shouldn’t put all your eggs in that basket. PPC is great for short-term growth, but if you want sustainable, long-term natural growth, you’ll need organic traffic to come to your site

Statistics show that organic search on Google is responsible for more than 59% of the world’s web traffic. The more your luxury brand gets a piece of that percentage, the better. 

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Organic Traffic Builds Credibility 

One of the most important aspects of ranking well on Google is having a trustworthy website. The more people go to your website for the trustworthy and quality content you produce, the better your shot is at ranking on the first SERP (search engine results page). 

One of the most effective ways to get organic traffic and build credibility is to create content on your luxury website, which we’ll discuss in just a bit. 

Organic Traffic is Budget-Friendly 

PPC advertising can get expensive, and if you aren’t sure how to run it, you risk losing money. Investing in organic traffic and growing your website via SEO is a more budget-friendly option. Granted, you’ll still have to factor in costs for aspects like content creation and promotion. It also takes time to create a content plan rooted in organic growth. 

Organic Traffic Creates Brand Awareness 

When your luxury brand invests in SEO and increases its organic traffic, your brand awareness also increases. Think about it: more organic traffic means more people are visiting your website. The more people are visiting your website, the more they’re seeing and experiencing your brand. That’s why it’s crucial to look at what’s on your website from the user experience perspective. 

Now that you know a few key ways organic traffic can help your luxury brand, let’s discuss some pillars of your SEO strategy and how they’ll help you grow your brand. 

The SEO director is optimizing the ON-site SEO of his client's website.

Pillar 1: Onsite SEO

Onsite SEO is just as it sounds; it’s when you optimize your website for search engines to find and rank. Statistics show that 75% of people who search online never click past the first page of results, and if you want your website on the first SERP, you need to prioritize onsite SEO. There are numerous elements to onsite SEO, but the ones listed below are some of the most crucial to utilize. 

Keyword Optimization

Keyword optimization is the process of researching keywords that people type into search engines and using your research to optimize your website and content to rank for that keyword. One example of a keyword is “best luxury SUV”. 

If you wanted to rank on the first Google SERP for that keyword, you should do an initial SERP analysis to see what kind of content is on the SERP. Pay attention to things like: 

  • The type of content—are they videos, articles, podcast episodes, or a mix?
  • The websites on the first SERP—are they your competitors? 
  • The information within the content—what kind of information does the content include and how is it presented? Is it visual, interactive, include a lot of details, etc.? These are all things to note, as they helped that content get on the first SERP. 

There are plenty of tools you can use to do keyword research, and some even provide free versions for you to use. Keep in mind, though, that the free versions tend to be limited and only provide a fraction of the information you need to fully take advantage of keyword optimization. 

Utilizing Title Tags, Meta Descriptions, and Alt Tags

Don’t let things like title tags, meta descriptions, and alt tags slip through the cracks. These elements are vital parts of onsite SEO that, when filled in properly, can boost your ranking. First, let’s talk about what exactly these elements are. 

  • Title tag—This is an HTML element that allows you to tell search engines what the title of your page is. This is the title of the page that shows up on the SERP. 
  • Meta description—This is an HTML element that summarizes what your content is about. The meta description is the little blurb that shows up under the title tag on the first SERP. 
  • Alt tag—This is an HTML element that provides a description of an image. 

Utilizing all these elements are important because it gives Google a better idea of what your website and content is about. These elements also help create a more user-friendly experience on your website. The title tag and meta description give people a clear and accurate idea of what your web page is about. The alt tag comes in handy if an image doesn’t render; instead of there just being a blank space, there will be a description of what the image is. 

When these elements are properly optimized, they can make SEO for luxury brand strategy perform better and, therefore, give it a better shot at ranking higher

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Compressing Images and Video Files

While having images and videos on your website can help you online, images and videos that have large file sizes can hinder your ranking. This is because your website’s speed plays an important part in how Google chooses to rank you online. 

People are used to getting instant gratification online, so if your website takes a long time to load, chances are they aren’t going to stick around. In fact, statistics show that website conversion rates drop by an average of 2.11% with each additional second of load time (between 0 and 9 seconds). If people are consistently leaving your website because something isn’t loading, your bounce rate increases, which could signal to Google to not rank your page on the first SERP

Compressing your images and video files can help increase your website’s site speed without sacrificing visual quality. The key is to find the right format and compression ratio that still leaves you with a good quality visual element. 

A user finds a broken link in the website and comes back to the home page.

Fix Broken Links and Build High Quality Ones

Linking is another important part of your overall SEO strategy. Think of links as highly valuable roads on your website that lead to other relevant and useful content. The more valuable roads you have that lead to good content, the more it signals to Google that your website is worth ranking on the first SERP. 

If you have a broken link on your site, it’s like having a broken road on your online map. The user was on a great journey until it was suddenly disrupted, which is not good at all. Broken links are bad for user experience, and they’re also bad in the eyes of Google. When Google crawls your web pages, they use links to go to each web page and evaluate its data. If a link is broken, it essentially stops the linking equity in its tracks – decreasing the SEO for luxury brands.

Fix any broken internal links and external links you find to avoid this issue and keep your links in good shape. It’s also important to build high quality links, meaning you create valuable content that other websites want to link to. Google looks at your backlink portfolio and factors it in when ranking your content, so the better links you build that other websites link to, the higher your chances are of ranking well on Google. 

Create EAT Content

As a luxury brand, you have some expertise in your space. Use that expertise to your advantage by creating EAT content. EAT stands for Expertise, Authority, and Trust. Google uses different indicators to determine how trustworthy and valuable your content is, which greatly factors how it ranks online

Here are some tips for writing EAT content:

  • Produce content you have expertise in. You’ve made a name for yourself as a luxury brand for a reason; use some of that expertise and share it with the world to gain trust and authority within your space. 
  • Make sure the content matches the intent of the keyword you’re targeting. People are searching for that keyword for a reason, so help them find what they’re looking for. 
  • Create high-quality content. Every single piece of content your luxury brand produces has your brand name on it. Make it the best it can be so it benefits your brand and your online audience. 
  • Use statistics, facts, studies, and other types of research in your content where it’s relevant. You can even do your own research and cite it. 

The more trustworthy and useful your content is, the better chance it has for ranking well online

A luxury brand owner is looking at the results that her website achieved in traffic terms by improving her OFF-site SEO.

Pillar 2: Offsite SEO

Offsite SEO, in addition to onsite SEO, is important for your overall SEO strategy. Offsite SEO is the process of having external sites link to your site. As a luxury brand, you have multiple options for maximizing your offsite SEO strategy. 

Set Up Google My Business

Google Business Profile is a free tool businesses can use to organize their information online. It serves as a central place where people can go to find things like your website, phone number, and hours of operation. Having a Google My Business account can help more people find you faster and drive traffic back to your website

Create a Business Listing

Similar to a Google Business Profile, creating a business listing online can help people find your business information in one set place. List your luxury brand on a website that makes the most sense for your industry and watch the traffic come in. 

Encourage Reviews 

Reviews also play a factor in how Google ranks your luxury brand’s website. The more reviews and positive remarks you have online, the better your website’s chances are of ranking well online. Encourage customers to leave reviews online as part of the sales or follow-up process to boost your online review numbers. 

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Pillar 3: Technical SEO

When talking about SEO for luxury brands, we can’t forget to touch on technical SEO. Technical SEO is the part of your SEO strategy that focuses on optimizing the technical aspects of your website. Here are some key technical SEO aspects you need to optimize. 

Sitemap Creation

Think of a sitemap as a master plan for your website that Google uses to determine which pages are important. It lays out the structure and organization of your website and details how the pages are related to one another. 

Properly Developed Website

Good website design is arguably the most essential part of technical SEO. A properly developed website should be user friendly, engaging, and a good reflection of your luxury brand. Without a properly developed and designed website, your SEO efforts may be wasted

how the User Experience impacts seo for luxury brands

Another crucial aspect of technical SEO is focusing on user experience (UX). User experience is the process of looking at your website and evaluating how users interact with it. The goal is to have the best user experience possible, meaning you make it easy for users to navigate your website. The easier it is to navigate your website, the longer users will stay on your website. This will show Google that your website is worth visiting and, as such, should rank higher on SERPs. 

The content marketing director is looking for a new content ideas for his luxury SEO.

Content Marketing for Luxury SEO

Content marketing is the process of creating and promoting content through various channels, including social media and paid advertising. It is essential for any brand, but it’s especially important for luxury brands. Connecting with high-end audiences is a top goal for any luxury marketing plan, and content marketing can help you connect with those audiences and make them come to you organically. 

Make sure you address these key pillars in your content marketing strategy

  • Content creation: Who is going to create this content? What kind of content will you create? 
  • Content distribution: What channels will you use to distribute this content? Social media, newsletter, paid advertising? 
  • Type of Content: Will you be writing blog posts, creating videos, infographics, or all of the above? 

Discussing these key pillars is a great first step in planning a comprehensive content marketing strategy that increases your luxury brand’s awareness while drawing in organic traffic. The better your content marketing strategy is, the better SEO results you’ll see. 

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Final Thoughts

SEO for luxury brands is a must if a brand wishes to flourish in the digital world. Combining onsite, offsite, and technical SEO strategies will help you gain more organic traffic and increase your rankings online, meaning more people will find your website faster. Take the time to plan a comprehensive SEO strategy that benefits both your brand and your audience, and you’ll be on the fast track to tremendous online growth. 

Contact now Mediaboom and boost your Luxury SEO.