In today’s marketing world, presence on social media should not be considered an extra but a necessity.

In this video we are going to look at the largest social media platforms and how your Hospitality Property can benefit by using.


We are going to look at Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram and Google +.

We will also “The Complete Guide to Operating an Independent Hotel or Bed & Breakfast “Training Course.

The “The Complete Guide to Operating an Independent Hotel or Bed & Breakfast” Training Course, will include in-depth step-by-step videos, ebooks and checklists on setting up an organizational strategy, management strategy, outsourcing, employee hiring & firing, training, communication, techniques, customer service, handling complaints, upselling, marketing, branding, email strategy, social media, property improvements, trends plus much, much more.

As a member of the “How to Improve your Independent Hotel or Bed & Breakfasts Success” group we would like to present to you a special offer.

The last few months I have spent many hours on my computer visiting many websites of Independent Hotels and Bed & Breakfasts. The purpose was to see what sites were working and which were not.

During this research, I was surprised with something I noticed. How many hospitality properties do not have a social media presence and I don’t just mean on their website but no Twitter, Facebook or YouTube accounts at all.

I was also surprised to see how many hospitality properties do not have a way to collect email addresses on their websites or were mobile phone friendly.
I have asked a couple of hospitality property owners about this and was given a number of reasons such as, “I don’t know how they work”, “ I don’t have the time to spend online”, and one actually said “If people what to stay here, they can find me”.

If the sale of room nights is not a problem, than there is no reason to worry about social media but if you want to improve your sales and increase return business, then social media is crucial.
The will be extra work but as I said in an earlier post “short term pain for long-term gain”.

Let me share some statistics with you. I have gathered these from statisticbrain.com which is used by such organizations such as Forbes, CNN, ABC, The Huffington Post as a research tool, from socialmediadd.com and youtube.com/statistics. (http://www.youtube.com/yt/press/stati...)
These statistics are from mid-June, 2013

Internet travel booking revenue has grown by more than 73% over the past five years.

Many people will check out booking engines on the internet before booking a hotel and then visit the properties website for more information.

Annual online travel sales have increased from $93.8 billion in 2007 to $162.4 billion in 2012.

Number of travel bookings made on the internet each year 148.3 million

Percent of all travel reservations made on the internet 57 %

Percent of same day hotel reservations made from a smartphone 65 %

Facebook has some 1.11 billion monthly active users, as of March 2013. The number is up 23 % from last year.

Facebook has 751 million users checking the social network from their mobiles, as of March 2013. The number of users have increased 54%, from one year earlier.

Currently, on an average, people like 4.5 billion items daily on Facebook, up 67% from August last year.

People are sharing more and more on Facebook. On an average, some 4.75 billion pieces of content are shared daily on the social network, up 94% from 2.45 billion in August 2012.

There were 8 million local business pages on Facebook in June 2012. Fast forward a year, and the number is 16 million currently; a 100% jump.

Twitter has 500 million users with 200 million active

Over 460k new accounts created every day, 177 million tweets sent per day, + 182% in mobile Twitter users in the past year.

And then there is YouTube.
Some of you might be saying, YouTube, I don’t have a cute kitten, why would I use YouTube?

YouTube is the second largest search engine on the internet with 1 billion users and 4 billion uses per day

¨ More than 1 billion unique users visit YouTube each month

¨ Over 6 billion hours of video are watched each month on

YouTube—that's almost an hour for every person on Earth, and 50% more than last year

Should you upload videos for your property – Absolutely!

I have given you some amazing statistics which should urge you to consider more social media but you might be asking – How? How do I begin and benefit fully from social media. We look further into this in future episodes.

“The first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency.”
Bill Gates

In the meantime if you have any interesting stories about social media and would like to share, or have any questions or feedback you can leave them in the comments section of the show notes.

They are visual-sharing social networking sites where you can upload photos and images for other people to see. What is the difference between Pinterest & Instagram?

Welcome to another edition of hospitality property school.

I’m your instructor Gerry MacPherson and today we are going to talk about Pinterest and Instagram and which is the better platform to use to market your hospitality property.

The first thing we should do is explain the difference between the Pinterest and Instagram platforms?

They are visual-sharing social networking sites where you can upload photos and images for other people to see. The main distinction lies in the fact that people use them differently.
Instagram is about sharing your own photos, Pinterest is about curation.

Let’s look at some facts & figures about Pinterest

Pinterest Company Statistics
Total number of Pinterest users 73,500,000
Number of daily visitors 1,360,000
Percent of Pinterest visitors that are mobile only 35 %
Number of Pinterest business accounts 575,000
Monthly Pinterest pageviews 2,500,000,000
Percent of American online adult women that use Pinterest
44 %
Percent of American online adult men that use Pinterest 28 %


The images or pins as they are known can be placed on thematic “boards” that can be customised by the user for any topic. Pinterest is all about selecting, organising, and looking for images.

Now, let’s look at some facts & figures about Instagram

Instagram Company Statistics

Total number of Instagram users 500,235,000

Total number of photos shared on Instagram 34,700,000,000

Average number of photos uploaded each day to Instagram 52,000,000

Average number of likes per day 1,650,000,000
Percent of Instagram users located outside the US 60 %

Total videos uploaded to Instagram in the first 24 hours of the video addition 5,000,000


Men and women are more evenly represented with 50 percent of the active users outside the US. Two-thirds are between the ages of 18 and 34 and popularity noticeably drops with the older demographic.

Small independent hospitality properties can benefit from a Facebook presence. It’s a great opportunity to drive visitors to your website & increase bookings.

Welcome to another edition of hospitality property school.

Today we are going to talk about the benefits of Facebook for business.

Facebook Statistics

Total number of monthly active Facebook users 1,721,000,000

Total number of mobile Facebook users 1,104,000,000

Increase in Facebook users from 2014 to 2015 12 %

Total £ of minutes spent on Facebook each month 640,000,000

% of all Facebook users who log on on any given day 48 %

Average time spent on Facebook per visit 18 minutes

Total number of Facebook pages 74,200,000


12 More Benefits of a Facebook Business Presence

1. Increased Exposure to Potential Customers
It has over 1.19 Billion users.

2. You can share information about your business
You can publicise your properties name, address and contact details, talk about your history, describe your property and services or any other aspect of your business as well as upload pictures and videos from your business.

This can be a powerful way to communicate with your current customers and potential customers.

3. Gather More Leads
You have the ability to gather leads in the form of email addresses. They can be added to your mailing lists and contact outside of Facebook.

4. Lower Your Marketing Expenses
Starting a Facebook business page can costs you $0.
Simply using photographs you take of your business will work -- and in some cases that are better than a creative image from a designer.

5. Reach a Targeted Audience
With Facebook ads, if you target correctly, you can reach your desired audience.

6. Use Facebook Insights
Using Facebook insights you can see:
• How many pages Likes you have
• The reach of my posts & page
• Engagement of the page
• Post-Performance... and more

Create a Successful Blog for Your Property, build trust with your audience, and increase your customer base & profit.

Today we are going to talk about how to create a successful blog and spend a couple minutes explaining a few things for you to get started and share with you some of the initial mistakes bloggers make.

You have to decide the reason you want to write a blog.

Take a moment to ask yourself these questions:
• Why is your property blog worthy?
• What story supports this property?
• Who would share your passion?
• Are your employees aligned with this passion?

After you have answered these, start brainstorming:

Who are your target guests?

Once you know who your ideal customer is, do a little research into their behaviour and then you can adapt your blog accordingly.

Some places you can start this type of research include:

• Q & A forums ie. Quora, & Yahoo! Answers
• Social media ie. Groups of social media sites
• Tools for getting content for your potential customers ie. BuzzSumo.com & Topsy.com
• Blog comments on other blogs your potential customers might read. What type of content are they already engaging with on other blogs?

Your Competition

Compile a list of 5-10 of your closest or the same type of competitors with blogs, audit their content and see what is working.

Targeting Keywords

Create a list of 5-10 keyword groups you want to rank for and with them the associated long-tail keywords you can include in blog content.

If you are new to this go to google support for more info on keywords and keyword planning.

https://support.google.com/adwords/an...
Google's algorithm is constantly changing and is becoming more and more natural.

For your hospitality property to be competitive, social media and an online presence are imperative.

Welcome to another edition of hospitality property school.


I’m your host Gerry MacPherson and today we are going to talk about why social media is important to your business.


The last few months I have spent many hours on my computer visiting many websites of Independent Hotels and Bed & Breakfasts. The purpose was to see what sites were working and which were not.


During this research, I was surprised with something I noticed.


How many hospitality properties do not have a social media presence and I don’t just mean on their website but no Twitter, Facebook or YouTube accounts at all.


I was also surprised to see how many hospitality properties do not have a way to collect email addresses on their websites or were mobile phone friendly.


I have asked a couple of hospitality property owners about this and was given a number of reasons such as,

How do I use social media to generate hotel business?

Which social media platforms are the best for my hotel business?

In our last podcast I put out a call to find out what you would be interested in hearing more about.

I had mentioned that, Keystone HDC has produced 34 hospitality property podcasts with information, tips, and hopefully lots of food for thought for you but these were themes based on problems we had seen in different hospitality properties.

The call out in the last podcast was to give you a chance to ask specifics questions and something that came out loud and clear is that more time should be spend on marketing; specifically, social media.

In episode #8 I talked a little about social media and gave statistics on couple of different platforms. I had also mentioned in the past how we as customers in our everyday lives, rely more and more on our computers and smartphones to gather information.

I firmly believe that a hospitality property having a social media presence should not be something to consider down the road but is a must in your current marketing plan.
So I know some of you might be thinking “I have no idea where to start.”

I thought we would take some time to look at the current major platforms available.

Facebook
Facebook is the most common among all the social media marketing tools and through Facebook Advertising you can be very specific on who you target with your marketing.
But don’t think that throwing money Facebook Advertising is all you have to do. This is a platform where you have to build trust. People aren't going to automatically trust you when all they see is advertising and promotions coming from you. You need to build that trust by doing things like sharing valuable content, news about your property, and information about what is going on in your region. By developing a rapport, people will begin to see you as an expert in your field, on your region and in the hospitality industry and then will be more interested in spending money with you.

Twitter
Twitter is quick, frequent and tends to have an intelligent audience ready to make quick decisions. With over 645 million registered users, twitter is a sea of information waiting to be read, followed, and re-tweeted which is great for grabbing people's attention quickly, driving more people to your web page.
While it's a great way to share quick thoughts and generate traffic to your website and offers, building relationships with followers is nearly impossible to do. With Twitter people will follow you because they like what you have to say.

LinkedIn
LinkedIn is definitely different from the rest of the social media outlets out there when it comes to business. Instead of just connecting with individuals themselves such as clients or customers, you can connect with other business as a whole. This can be very beneficial if you wish to target business clientele.

There is not much in the way of conversation on LinkedIn as on other social media marketing sites, but you do have the ability to join groups or communities where you can ask questions and engage in conversations.

Those are the 3 platforms we will look at today, next week we will check out YouTube, Pinterest, instagram and Google +.

"The Internet has turned what used to be a controlled, one-way message into a real-time dialogue with millions." - @daniellesacks

Here at Keystone HDC we would like to know more about your hospitality Property and how we could be of further assistance. Take a quick 2 minutes to fill out this short survey and rate the importance of different aspects of running a property.

Everyone who takes the survey will get immediate access to the Keystone HDC Free Hospitality Property 'Cheat Sheet'.

Design your website to tell your story & if guests feel like they are part of that story, they will help build your brand into a big name.


Design your website to tell your story & if guests feel like they are part of that story, they will help build your brand into a big name.
Welcome to another edition of hospitality property school.

I’m your host Gerry MacPherson and today we are going to talk about creating an effective website

In this age of the Internet and social media, having a website is essential to developing your properties brand. It's fine to present your business in the flesh and traditional media, but if you don't at least have a website, you'll be seen as old-fashioned and unapproachable.

The look of your website will influence guests on the type of property you are. If your website looks dull and boring, potential guests will think your property is dull and boring; if your website is vibrant and fun, guests will think your property is vibrant and fun.

Let’s start with your domain name.

Your domain name should be your website name. Now, this might seem obvious to some of you, but you would be surprised at how many hospitality properties I have seen that has a domain name that is not the same or does not reflect the name of their property.

When marketing your property, the first thing you want is people to think of your properties name and almost 100% of the time when searching your property online people will use that name.

What are better long or short domain names?

Domain names should never be longer than 67 characters and I would include spaces in that length.

Choosing your web host

When choosing a web host you have many options. Companies such as hostgator.com or godaddy.com are popular and full service but it is worth the time to ask and shop around for the host that will best serve your needs.

There is free web host out there but most have advertising that could take away from your site's design or contain hidden text on its pages without your knowledge. This could lead to your website being penalised by the search engines through no fault of your own. I would stay clear of free sites.

Once you have settled your domain name and web host, the next step is to design the website itself.


Your options include:

If your hands on or have an employee that is comfortable with program coding you can use a responsive web design program to build a site such as Adobe’s Dreamweaver or a free version called Kompzer.

Use WordPress. It is an open source website publishing platform with a wide variety of both free and fee themes that will meet almost everyone’s design wish.


Another option is to hire a professional website designer.

The first thing you should do is put your thoughts on paper, look at what other successful sites look like.

Use the KISS formula- Keep It Simply Simple.


While you are sketching ask yourself these questions.

There are four key components you should consider when you want to improve your visual branding for social media success.

Welcome to another edition of hospitality property school.

I’m your host Gerry MacPherson and in our last session talked about choosing your visual branding. Today, we are going to continue our discussion about choosing your visual branding.

In the last session, I had mentioned that there are four key components you should consider when you want to improve your visual branding for social media success.

The first two were,

• consistent colours
• fonts

In today’s session, I’ll talk about the next two components you need to consider. They are

• imagery
• layouts


Imagery

When using images make sure you stick to a consistent theme and by that, I mean the same type of look. You don’t want some images blurry for effect and then others with a red tinge. Some companies might use fuzzy edges all are images or a sun filter to give their pictures a summery feel. I’m not going to say one is better than the other, but whatever you choose, stay with it. Even if you’re using your own photos, stay consistent with your theme.

I do highly encourage you to use images of your property as often as possible, but I understand that it might not be possible every time you post. If you’re going to mention attractions or things to see in your region, use those images.

If you’re going to be customising or working on your own images, the program we use is Adobe’s Photoshop. This course is perfect if you want to turn your images into a professional photographer quality.


Social media layouts

The world of marketing is increasingly visual, & with sites like Pinterest and Instagram growing fast, choosing your visual branding is imperative.

Welcome to another edition of hospitality property school.

I’m your instructor Gerry MacPherson and today we are going to talk about choosing your hospitality properties visual branding.

The new world of marketing is increasingly visual, so it is no surprise that social network sites like Pinterest and Instagram are growing fast.

So, how can you, as a hospitality property owner influence an increasingly visual social atmosphere?

By applying a strong visual branding strategy for your property on social media.

Visual branding on social media refers to what your content looks like; images of your property, your profile picture, and your cover photo. Excellent visuals on social media platforms are important because the human brain is wired to read and understand images better and faster than words and visual content increases social interaction.

According to a Socialbakers study, images on Facebook constitute 93% of the most engaging posts compared with status updates and links?

So what do we have to do?

There are four key components to help improve your visual branding social media success. In this video, we will look at the first two.

• consistent colours
• fonts

I’ll talk about these components and you’ll see some examples.

Consistent colours

Take a look at any well-known company brand and you’ll see them use the same colours in all their marketing; in their logo, text and images. It is OK for you to use the same techniques.

When deciding on your visual branding, take 2 to 4 colours and use them for all your social media and marketing. By using the same colours over and over again, customers will become familiar with your properties brand.

Colour plays a huge role in influencing what we do and purchase because we are visual creatures so the colours you pick should reflect your properties brand.

Once you pick your colours, you should know their colour code or “hex code”.

If you are not sure what it is, visit http://html-color-codes.info/, find your colour on the “HTML colour picker” and your hex code will show the hash mark symbol.

By knowing your hex codes and using them in all your marketing and social media, you will be able to use the same colours over and over again.

Pick fonts that match your properties personality

Why you should create a LinkedIn page, attract followers, post your hospitality properties updates including what makes your business unique to drive bookings.

Welcome to another edition of hospitality property school.

Today we are going to talk about LinkedIn and your business.

Many hospitality property owners and managers, (hotels, inns, resorts and bed & breakfast) I have spoken with, feel that LinkedIn is a platform they do not need to be on.

So why should you as a hospitality property owner/manager consider using LinkedIn as a social media platform. If you want to attract other businesses. For example

• Business travellers
• Meeting room rentals
• Company parties
• Suppliers
• Looking for quality employees
Just to name a few

Check out these stats…

LinkedIn Company Profile
Total number of LinkedIn users 313,000,000
Number of monthly unique visitors to LinkedIn 187,000,000
Number of people who received an interview 122,070,000
Number of people who have been hired 35,522,000
Number of new LinkedIn members per second 2
Percent of LinkedIn users that use the free version 90.9 %
Percent of users that have a complete profile 50.5 %
Percent of users who check LinkedIn daily 39 %


What are some of the other benefits of a LinkedIn Company Page?
Here are 7

1) A LinkedIn company page provides your business with the opportunity to tell your hospitality properties story, engage with followers, share career opportunities, and scale your word of mouth marketing. It is also an equally effective tool for generating new business leads and nurturing referral relationships.

2) Creating quality, shareable content that benefits your readers your viewers become engaged advocates of your company and expand your global reach and influence.

To be successful, a hospitality property owner needs a blogging strategy that allows time to create high-quality content that shows them as an expert & leader.

Today we are going to talk about how to create a successful blog.

Let me give you 16 more reasons why you should blog.

1. You learn new things, about yourself and your region

When you’re blogging you are sharing what you know and see, and want the world to know and see.

You might have the most amazing things to offer your guests but unless you tell them about it, they might never find out. It’s like having a priceless artefact in a dark room unless you say something – no one will know.


2. Blogging helps you focus

It helps you grow your thinking muscles and you will learn to reflect more deeply.


3. It helps you write better

It will be challenging, especially in the beginning but making time to write consistently helps you become a better writer. I this age of blast emails and texting, good writing seems to become a lost art so many of your readers will appreciate the effort.


4. It helps you break out of your shell

Blogging will help you build confidence. You learn to recognise and build your strength, and also admit and improve on your weaknesses.


5. It challenges you??

The hospitality industry can be very challenging but sometimes you can get lost in the day to day operation and lose focus.

Blogging can be a release that will allow you to step back, refocus and let you see your day to day issues more clearly.


6. It is an inexpensive way to market

Anyone can start a blog for free and even self-host which is affordable for almost anyone.


7. It helps you build a client base

People are attracted towards things and places they get value from. When you start a blog and start creating value and building an audience, that audience could soon become paying guests.


8. It disciplines you

Blogging helps you cultivate discipline. I have to admit that making time to sit down and write can be a pain, but once I sit at my desk and shut out all distractions, I get into a zone and the time and words fly.

I’m thankful for it because it’s made me more organised.

In our last podcast I talked a little bit about social media platforms, specifically, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. This week I will continue with four more major social media platforms.

Follow link to get started with YouTube

http://keystonehospitalitydevelopment...



Here at Keystone HDC we would like to know more about your hospitality Property and how we could be of further assistance. Take a quick 2 minutes to fill out this short survey and rate the importance of different aspects of running a property.

Everyone who takes the survey will get immediate access to the Keystone HDC Free Hospitality Property 'Cheat Sheet'.


http://app.getresponse.com/survey.htm...


Music for this podcasts is can be found at danosong.com.
If you have any interesting stories about social media and would like to share or have any questions or feedback you can leave them in the comments section of the show notes.


A pdf of each episode can be found in the show notes:

http://keystonehospitalitydevelopment...

Let’s continue to work together to put heads in your beds.

Until next time, have a fun day.

Keystone HDC
keystonehospitalitydevelopment.com

Understand the range of benefits YouTube can bring business is why you need this video platform to promote your Hospitality Property.

Welcome to another edition of hospitality property school.

Today we are going to talk about Marketing on YouTube

As an independent hospitality property owner, you should understand the importance of marketing and are constantly thinking of ways to get your properties name in front of as many people as possible, without going broke.

Using YouTube for your business can be an economical way to grow if used frequently as part of your marketing strategy.

Some of the benefits include:

Take advantage of the YouTube masses

YouTube has now reached 4 billion video views per day. If you use YouTube for your business, you can target and reach your audience, by creating videos and advertising on other videos that complement your property.

YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine in the world and the 3rd most visited website worldwide, behind only Google and Facebook.

Video-streaming platforms like YouTube have become so vital to marketing, as long as you educate, entertain and provide solutions to your potential guest’s problems, you’re guaranteed to find a group of people who will become your fans and customers.

Using YouTube Will Help You Get Found On Google

Other ways to benefit from YouTube
1. Share your videos

Get other website owners to embed your videos on their websites by cross-promoting with them.

Every time someone embeds your video on their website, Google gives more credibility to your websites.

2. Create a YouTube channel for your brand

When you create a channel for your videos, you are telling YouTube that you are the official representation of your brand on YouTube.

This makes it easier to find you when someone is searching your brand or related terms.


3. Share your videos on other platforms
And encourage others to share. Social media metrics are a factor taken into consideration by Google when ranking pages. If they are high-quality videos, others will share, and this will tell Google that you are producing content that is valuable to your target audience.


4. Give your audience options
Include text, video illustrations and activate closed caption (once you learn how to do this, make sure you check the text to make sure it is accurate). This will increase the overall engagement.

Twitter is a powerful tool that can greatly benefit your hospitality properties brand by reaching out to your followers & providing enormous public relations.

Welcome to another edition of hospitality property school.

Today we are going to talk about how Market Successfully on Twitter.

So with many social media options available why should you consider Twitter as a marketing option?

The key to being successful on Twitter is sharing the right information, whether it’s your links or other content.

If you are considering Twitter as a part of your marketing strategy, here are a few interesting facts.

Twitter Company Statistics

Total number of registered Twitter users 695,750,000
Total number of active Twitter users 342,000,000
Number of new Twitter users signing up every day 135,000
Number of unique Twitter site visitors every month 195 million
Average number of tweets per day 58 million
Number of Twitter search engine queries every day 2.1 billion
Percent of Twitter users who use their phone to tweet 43 %
Percent of tweets that come from third-party applicants 60%
Number of active Twitter users every month 115 million
Percent of Twitters who don’t tweet but watch 40%
Number of days it takes for 1 billion tweets 5 days
Number of tweets that happen every second 9,100

What are some of the other reasons you should consider using Twitter as a marketing tool?

• Communication
Twitter is an easy way to keep your followers up to date with current information about your hospitality property. It also lets followers communicate with you.

• Generating Leads
Tweeting about special offers or events can encourage your followers to find out more, potentially leading to bookings.

• Showing your brand's personality
Twitter is a chance to liven up your properties image.

• Researching trends
Searching or following tweets can give you an idea of trends and topics that Twitter users are interested in.

• Seeking feedback
Many hospitality properties use Twitter, to invite online feedback, reviews or comments.

• Providing customer service
For Twitter-savvy customers, asking questions and getting services via Twitter is very convenient.


Some things to think about when tweeting