Impact of Digital Marketing on Sales Turnover in the Hospitality Industry

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
TOPIC:.............................................................................................................................................3
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................................................................5
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY....................................................................................................9
DATA ANALYSIS.......................................................................................................................13
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................27
RECCOMENADATIONS.............................................................................................................28
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................29
APPENDIX....................................................................................................................................31

TOPIC:
To analyse the impact of digital marketing campaigns on sales turnover in the
hospitality industry of UK. A case study on Marriott Hotels
INTRODUCTION
Background:
In present times, the demand of digital marketing in hospitality industry is witnessing
higher rates due to the increase in social media usage, increase in technology level and other
digital trends (Sajeena, 2020). Digital marketing which is promotion and advertisements using
online channels, has brought remarkable changes in marketing approaches through social media
marketing, search engine optimisation and search engine marketing, making it a major source to
gather markets and attracting customers in the hotels. The source of sales revenue in case of five
start hotels like Marriot hotels and resorts are room sales, food and beverage sales, out door
catering and loyalty programs. The changes in consumer’s journeys in context to online research,
communication and booking have been a reason for inclusion of digital and social media
marketing techniques in Marriott and has let hotel revenue management’s alignment with digital
marketing to increase revenue and promoting higher sales (Ferrone, 2019).This report will aim at
understanding the effects of the marketing approaches in Marriot hotels, understanding
consumer’s perceptions and establishing the relation between sales revenue and new marketing
approaches.
Aim and Objectives:
Aim: To determine the impact of digital marketing campaigns in increasing the sales turnover of
in hospitality industry in UK for Marriot hotels and resorts.
Objectives:
 To evaluate the concept of digital marketing and its emergence.
 To understand the impact that digital marketing strategies have on the movement of sales
in Marriott Hotel.
 To identify the challenges that arise in the implementation of such digital marketing
campaigns.
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 To recommend appropriate strategies based on the challenges identified.
Research questions:
 What can be understood by emergence of digital marketing techniques in present times?
 What is the impact of digital marketing techniques on the revenue generation in Marriot
hotels and resorts?
 What are the challenges and barriers in implementation of digital marketing campaigns in
the hospitality industry?
 Propose some recommendations and appropriate strategies that could further improve the
digital marketing of Marriott hotel by overcoming the challenges.
Rationale:
The issues that hospitality industry is facing in terms of digital marketing are production
of effective referrals, generation of traffic, keeping up with the major web trends and sifting
through various platforms and technologies. The study is essential to determine how investment
in this marketing approach in presence of with above challenges along with changing customer
purchasing behaviour and intense competition can be successful for generation and increasing of
hotel sales turnover. The reason for selection of this study was also the current disruption in the
travel, tourism and hospitality industry and higher customer expectations, guest experience
personalisation and need for sustainability (De Pelsmacker, Van Tilburg and Holthof, 2018). The
marketing and reputation management has become essentially important along with streamlining
of all hotel’s digital processes.
Significance:
This research will prove beneficial for the stakeholders of Marriot and other hotels
operating in the luxury segments. These include marketing department and finance departments,
senior management, employees, government, investors and shareholders who can understand the
importance of digital market’s direct relation with sales turnover.
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LITERATURE REVIEW
Introduction
The literature review section of the dissertation covers the survey of all scholarly sources
of the topic of digital marketing and sales turnover in context to hospitality industry on the basis
of three structured themes. The literature will provide overview of the existing knowledge in the
research topic and will allow the researcher to identify significant methods, theories and
literature gaps in the current research. Relevant findings and studies such as books, journals and
articles from authentic publications will be taken into consideration and will be then critically
analysed (Randolph, 2018). The viewpoints, observations and interpretations of all the authors
will be discussed, argued, counter argued and refuted to reach to essential conclusions and give a
foundation to the data analysis and help the researcher in getting a clear picture of the subject.
Theme 1: Concept of digital marketing and its emergence.
As per Chaffey and Smith, (2017) digital is an umbrella term for the measurables,
targetable and interactive method of marketing of products and services through the usage of
digital technology for reaching and conversion of leads into customers and retain them. The
primary objective of digital marking is promotion of goods and services, shaping preferences and
promoting sales by various techniques. The alternative names of this marketing method are
online marketing and its basic concept is based on inbound or customer centric approaches.
Similarly, Kannan, (2017) has stated that digital or online marketing is a newer method
grown with the change and upgradation in level of technology around the world which helps
companies in garnering new traffic, leads and sales for the business through the use of digital
channels in promotion of goods and services to targeted customers and market segments.
However, Khan and et.al., (2020) explains the emergence of digital market as a
consequence of more interactive consumers and technological advances which entirely took over
the traditional marketing techniques. The people have moved to electronic gadgets like phones,
laptops and tablets and spend more time on them rather than older equipment of print media
viewing, TV advertisements and radio. The term emerged in 1990s with the development of
internet which was then used to search of information, when marketers were still unsure of the
digital platform. In 1993, the digital banner started as a method of advertising and Yahoo was
launched and companies soon started optimising websites for more search engine rankings.
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Microsoft and Google also joined the marketing techniques and a steep surge was seen in 2006
when search engine rankings reached 6.4 billion in a month. As social media sites like Facebook,
Twitter, Instagram started emerging fresh avenues and tactics emerged with concepts like
cookies, pay per click and pop-up ad, Search engine marketing and optimisation accompanied by
monitoring software like Ad-sense and digital analytics.
Theme 2: Impact that digital marketing strategies on sales and revenue
According to Girchenko and Ovsiannikova, (2016) digital marketing strategies and
campaigns have helped many organisations across various sector like retail, IT, hospitality,
automobile etc. in giving access to marketing without high investments in mass media marketing
like print and TV in affordable and more interactive ways. The major advantages of digital
marketing which effectively overpowered traditional marketing strategies are its cost
effectiveness, global reach, marketing though segmentation, targeting and positioning, its
measurability and trackability, openness, more engaging campaigns and improvement in the
conversion rates as it allows purchases and bookings to happen in few clicks. It also allows
personalization as the customer database is linked to the website of the organisation wo can be
shown individual offers and social currency which creates content that can be assed on from user
to user.
On the contrary to this Veleva and Tsvetanova, (2020) state that digital marketing can
never entirely compete with traditional marketing techniques in creating impact on consumer
behaviour, especially when the uniqueness gets totally eliminated. Digital marketing can be
pretty time consuming as creation of marketing content which has to be completely unique and
robust for ensuring return on investment. Now that it is practiced by every size and type of
business the competition has sored hights and global rivalry has emerged. Grabbing attention has
become quite tough as consumers don’t respond to most advertisements on the social media and
online platforms. The market space has become even more transparent and any negative
customer reviews and criticism is will be visible to entire audience, and ineffective response can
damage brand reputation. Apart from that there are various privacy and securities issues such as
rules and regulations regarding data protection which have to be adhered to.
Hudson and Hudson, (2017) state that in the hospitality industry digital marketing has
brough in revolution with search engine optimisation, content marketing, social media
marketing, pay per click, affiliate marketing, inbound marketing, online public relations,
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sponsoring content and email marketing. Most tourists and travellers spend a lot of time
searching places and hotels for visiting and do their bookings online. Content marketing, the
most basic strategy involves creation of photos, videos and blogs that boldly promote the hotel
features and offers. SEO strategies tend to enhance rankings in the search engine results for
generating traffic by searching key words like “best hotel in city”. Other strategies are expansion
of social media and reaching out to users on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram,
LinkedIn etc through captivating videos, pictures, GIFs.
In similar context, Leite and Azevedo, (2017) describe that social media has also help in
celebrity endorsements, hotel reviewers and social media influencers for promotion of the high
end five-star hotels, who would focus on lavish features and luxury facilities that hotel provides.
Email marketing and newsletters is yet another tool that has helped luxury hotels in targeting
consumers who update loyal customers regarding new offers and events that happen in the hotel
premise. Above all the user experience matters a lot and the opportunities to have seamless
operations and approaches while travelling and hotels should aim at reducing bad reviews and
feedback through effective customer service to enhance sales turnover and maintaining a
continuous flow of room bookings.
Ferrone, (2019) elucidates that hospitality marketing target at the journey of the guests
which begins on search engines makes the presence and visibility highly important through paid
organic channels. The later steps involve advertising on meta search engines, interaction on
social media, influencer and database marketing, practicing trends like chat boxes and overall
enhancement of online reputation. Majority of hotels practice all these approached broadly which
tends to increase their leads. After successful conversion of leads the number of rooms that are
booked increases the sales turnover, being the primary sources of revenue. Apart from these
hotel facilities like spas, concerts, in-house food and beverage outlets tend to deliver rest of the
revenue which can be increased through marketing using concepts of value addition. The hotel
has to evaluate their source of revenue and select those digital channels that are most profitable
and invest in them.
Theme 3: Challenges and barriers in digital marketing
According to Grotte, (2018) major challenges that hotels and resorts face in effective
engagement and implementation of their digital marketing campaigns are driving more bookings
and standing out in the competition especially from other distinctive, established and popular
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hotel brands. Problems in guest engagement, acquisition and retention is difficult due to barriers
in digital marketing like lack of model and process, restricted budget, high pressure for short
term gains, lack of resources and management of change.
As per Gustavo, (2019), emergence of third-party booking sites and online travel
agencies also creates barriers for the hotel as people perceive the method dangerous. Also, the
expectations of customers are continuously increasing with needs for personalisation and extra
service as advertised in the digital spaces. The common problems also include removal of travel
friction, drive customization and create loyalty. The targeted hotel customers tend to be highly
qualified and reaching out to them in engaging ways is a major challenge in context to social
media and content marketing.
Keller and et.al., (2016) state that challenges in digital marketing that can affect sales
revenue of luxury is ineffective production of referrals and promotion of their membership and
loyalty programs which is necessary target for retention of high-end consumers for repetitive
visits. Also, generation of traffic in high end consumers is becoming increasingly difficult with
increased competition and a blend of traditional marketing is becoming evident for countering
this. Apart from that the marketing department has to continuously focus upon the new trend and
current affairs that is going on to continuously change their marketing tactics and implement
them across all channels.
Literature summary
In the above literature, the view points of various authors were taken in context to the
three themes and various similar and contrasting views were observed. In the first theme the
concept of digital market was elaborated and defined as the marketing that is done through
various digital channels and historical emergence was described. The second theme critically
evaluated the digital marketing campaigns in service industry by taking various viewpoints and
segregating them into major advantages and disadvantages. Various techniques that hotels use
was elaborated such as search engine optimisation, social media influences, content and email
marketing and the way it impacts the revenue. The third theme evaluated the challenges that
hotels face in generating revenue through digital marketing techniques were described and it was
established that solutions and strategies to deal with them is essential to maintain customer
retention and sales turnover.
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