Digital Marketing Plan for Hilton Hotels and Resorts
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This report analyzes the digital marketing plan of Hilton Hotels and Resorts, including the use of digital platforms, tools, and channels within the hospitality industry. It also discusses the organization of digital marketing activities and the building of multi-channel capabilities.
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Table of Contents Introduction.................................................................................................................................................3 LO1.............................................................................................................................................................3 Digital Marketing Within the Hospitality Industry..................................................................................3 LO2.............................................................................................................................................................5 Digital Platforms, Tools and Channels used Within the Hospitality Industry..........................................5 LO3.............................................................................................................................................................7 Organising Digital Marketing Activities and Building Multi Channel Capabilities.................................7 LO4.............................................................................................................................................................9 Monitoring and Assessing Techniques used to evaluate Effectiveness of Digital Marketing Strategy....9 Conclusion.................................................................................................................................................11 References.................................................................................................................................................12
Introduction Marketing is the process through which goods and services manufactured are promoted, sold and distributed to the consumers in a market. Digital marketing includes all marketing processes achieved through the use of digital technologies or the internet.Due to the advancement of technology in the late 90’s and the global adoption of internet, marketing through digital technologies provides numerous advantages to marketers and entrepreneurs alike (Chaffey and Ellis-Chadwick, 2019). In this report we will analyse the digital marketing plan of Hilton Hotels and Resorts an international chain of hotels and resorts which is the flagship brand of hospitality giant Hitlon. The business was founded in 1919 as Hilton Hotels and operates currently from its headquarters in Virginia, USA. Having been in operations for over a hundred years, the Hilton Hotels and Resorts has had opportunities to expand its business into international markets. Currently the hotel and resort chain operates around 586 establishments in 85 different countries spanning six continents. LO1 Digital Marketing Within the Hospitality Industry Digital marketing encompasses all marketing processes and channels that are required by marketers in order to advertise and promote goods and services through the use of digital technologies or the internet. The external environment in which digital marketers operate is convoluted and ever evolving. The digital marketing environment consists of a combination of internal and external drivers or factors, all of which can influence the operations, productivity and performance of a business organisation. The main key distinction between digital and traditional marketing approaches is that digital marketing is achieved through the use of digital technologies or through the internet. Due to the global adoption of the internet along with the recent boom in availability of technology around the globe, it has become nigh necessary for marketers to use digital tools to aid them in their operations. Same can be said marketers operating in the hospitality industry. Digital marketing provides various advantages and benefits to marketers that traditional channels just don’t provide such as it allows marketers to advertise, promote goods and services to a wide range of people all around the globe, at very little costs incurred when compared to traditional marketing approaches (Kannan, 2017). Digital marketing also engages and interacts with the
consumers as part of the marketing approach. These are the primary reasons marketers within the hospitality industry opt to implement digital marketing approaches to their marketing strategy. Digital marketers also choose to use digital marketing as a way to increase their brand value and perception in the market amongst their competitors. Though today in the digital age a lot of data about consumer behaviour is available, consumer insight is still of tremendous use to marketers in aiding their attempts to mass market to consumers, as consumers themselves are best sources to gain product information and marketing strategies from. As the internet allows far more freedom to consumers in terms of comparing goods and products online along with their prices and read reviews, this gives the consumers of the digital age far more power as compared to their elder counterparts. This is a major impact of the widespread use of digital marketing and has also affected both hospitality industry andHilton Hotels and Resorts as consumers flock to websites to compare different hotels, their prices, amenities, services provided, accessories included down to whether the hotels even provide personal gyms, swimming pools and parking spaces. This has driven digital marketers of Hilton Hotels and Resort to shift their focus onto the sort of customer experience they provide through their operations and towards building a better and well recognised brand name in the market, which consumers will want to associate themselves with (Kasilingam and Thanuja, 2020). As most interactions between the businesses and consumers on the internet are transparent and out there for everyone to see, for example through online reviews, hospitality businesses nowadays have to be extra careful in their approach to fulfilling the expectations of the consumers they service. Accidental unfriendly interactions between the consumers and businesses on the internet have a tendency to go viral, generate unfavourable headlines while showcasing the business in a negative image and have a massive impact on the brand image of the organisation in the market and its day to day operations. In order for today’s digital marketers to effectively market to the consumers through the internet and gain a competitive advantage for their business over its competitors, marketers need to make use of certain digital marketing tools such as Google Analytics, Hootsuite etc. in order to aid them in their digital marketing operations. These marketing tools track and record various consumer metrics which prove invaluable to marketers in improving their business marketing strategy and gaining a competitive edge over their competitors in the market.
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LO2 Digital Platforms, Tools and Channels used Within the Hospitality Industry. There are various digital platforms, tools and channels available to Hilton Hotels and Resort’s marketers on the internet to facilitate their digital marketing operations. These platforms include online websites, multiple social media platforms, smartphone applications, emails etc. Marketing through these digital platforms also allows marketers to generate additional revenues simply during their marketing process through the use of online paid advertisements and other methods. Digital marketing has such a huge impact on the marketing operations in general that it can also be incorporated into the famous 7Ps of marketing mix strategy. The way digital marketing is incorporated in the traditional marketing mix consisting of 7Ps is as follows: Product:Digital channels of marketing allow hospitality businesses and marketers to showcase a wide range of products and services that they offer to the public on their websites. Consumers can browse through and select chosen goods at their leisure after looking through all the possible available goods. Price:Digital marketing allows hospitality businesses and marketers to implement various distinct pricing strategies for their products in order to maximise their profitability all year round. Through digital marketing, businesses can offer special limited time discounts and offers to customers in order to move stored inventory of particular goods and products (Minculete and Olar, 2018). Digital marketing also allows marketers to introduce bundled packages which combine popular and unpopular products for sale to consumers at a competitive price. Place:Digital Marketing allows marketers to promote and advertise their products to consumers irrespective of their geographical vicinity or location. This is another major advantage of digital marketing as it allows for marketers to mass market to consumers all around the globe effectively and efficiently. People:Digital marketing also places huge emphasis on the kind of service people receive as unfriendly interactions between people and hospitality businesses on the internet have massive impact on the business’s brand value and reputation in the market amongst its competitors. Through digital marketing the rise of power people possess over hospitality businesses on the internet has increased.
Promotion:Digital Marketing also is extremely influential in aiding marketer's efforts to advertise and promote their goods and services. As the internet provides marketers access to millions of consumers to promote their goods and services to via multiple methods such as social media platforms, websites, emails, YouTube etc., the promotion and advertisement operations of marketers are improved. Process:Though in traditional marketing mix the process relates to the delivery operations, in its digital counterpart process encompasses the entire process a consumer has to go through to in order to make a purchase online. Marketers try and improve this User Experience (UX) in order to better service their clients. Physical:The physical evidence is also evident in digital marketing approaches in the form of online reviews and comments which have a massive impact on any hospitality business’s operations and profitability. These physical attributes assure the consumers of the authenticity of goods and services provided online. Hilton Hotels and Resort’s digital marketers can make use of various different digital platforms and channels to aid them in their operations such as emails, social media sites, smartphone applications, online websites etc. Choosing any particular approach depends on the marketing strategy of Hilton Hotels and Resort and the consumer base it is trying to service. Social Media platforms allow for mass marketing to millions of potential consumers over the internet. Through social media platforms digital marketers can directly engage and interact with their customers in order to increase their conversion chances (De Pelsmacker, Van Tilburg and Holthof, 2018). Social media platforms also allow celebrity endorsements which are an effective marketing method. Websites also allow customers to browse through all available goods and products for them to choose from at their leisure and make purchases whenever required. Websites also allow marketers to showcase their products to the public in whichever way they wish and provides more control to the marketers in their marketing approach. Customer technology adoption life cycle is a model that evaluates the acceptance or adoption of innovative and new technologies by people in various distinct groups based on their social, cultural, geographical or psychological similarities:
Innovators (2.5%):Fastest category of consumers to adopt an innovative technology. They are bold in nature taking on big risks head on in hopes of getting bigger rewards. Early Adopters (13.5%):Second fastest section of consumers to adopt an innovation. They are more cautious than innovators. Early Majority (34%):Customers belonging to this section adopt an innovation over varying degree of duration with the duration lasting longer than pervious categories. Late Majority (34%):Customers in this category adopt innovation after a majority of the market has already adopted said technology. They are sceptical and cautious in nature (Hasyati and Suzianti, 2018). Laggards (16%):Last one to adopt innovative technology in a market. These consumers have an aversion to change irrespective of the numerous advantages new innovative technology provides them. Because of the digital revolution of the 2000s and the global widespread adoption of the internet, e-commerce and online booking within the hospitality industry have increased significantly. Global consumers can now check out establishments in detail, avail various online discounts and offers and plan their entire trip on the internet which has massively increased the productivity and profitability of industries in the hospitality market. Reviews and comments on online websites assure the customers of the kind of service they are expected to get in return which further increases the productivity of hospitality industry and Hilton Hotels and Resorts. LO3 Organising Digital Marketing Activities and Building Multi Channel Capabilities Using digital channels of marketing provides the marketers of Hilton Hotels and Resorts multiple opportunities and some difficulties as well. Digital marketing allows marketers to effectively market to large sects of consumers at significantly low input costs through the use of social media platforms and online websites. Digital marketers can then use digital monitoring and tracking software to record various metrics which when analysed provides Hilton marketers with valuable information about their marketing strategy and how they can improve it. On the other hand, digital marketing also presents the Hilton marketers new challenges because of using
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online channels such as the immense risks to Hilton Hotels and Resort’s brand value and reputation in the market amongst its competitors (Chaffey and Smith, 2017). Accidental unfriendly interactions between the business and customers on social media have a tendency to go viral, attract negative headlines from the press and damage Hilton’s brand reputation. As Hilton’s competitors have also switched to implementing digital channels of marketing, this also presents as a challenge to Hiltons marketers to keep creating unique and relevant advertising content to market to consumers. Hilton’s marketers can implement digital tools of marketing tools using two different marketing platform channels named multi-channel platforms and omni channel platforms. Through multi-channel platforms marketers can promote and advertise using multiple different digital channels simultaneously such as social media, smartphone apps, websites etc in order to market to the widest possible range of consumers on the internet. Each individual channel’s marketing strategy is independent from other channels, possess their own goals objectives and functions in isolation from the rest. Contrastingly, through omni channel marketing, marketers focus their marketing efforts to deliver consistent, engaging and interactive promotional content to the consumers via multiple digital channels but the key difference here is that the marketing strategy used in these platforms is integrated to provide customers a streamlined experience. Omni channel provides customers with a seamless experience across multiple platforms (Payne, Peltier and Barger, 2017). An example of this within the hospitality industry is a consumer finding the exact same hotel on his laptop which he discovered on while browsing Facebook. This is possible through the seamless integration of distinct digital platforms within omni channel marketing. Marketing Plan: Aim/Objective:The aim of this marketing plan to implement digital marketing into the marketing operations at Hilton Hotels and Resorts using various digital media channels. Digital Marketing Campaign:The management of Hilton Hotels and Resorts has decided to promote and advertise their services to the public in the market using digital marketing channels through the use of websites and social media platforms.
Website:Hilton Hotels and Resorts has created an official dedicated website on the internet in order to better market to and service customers. Through the website customers are now able to browse through the multiple suites and deluxe rooms, choose and purchase according to their needs. Digital Marketing Channels:There exist multiple digital channels which Hilton marketers can use: Content: Creating and distributing useful, relevant, appropriate, consistent and engaging content is of immense value to marketers in order to effectively market digitally. Social Media Marketing: Use of social media allows Hilton marketers to market to millions potential customers without incurring significant costs. Search engine Optimization: SEOs allow Hilton markets to better attract customers to their websites and ensures interest customers can always find Hilton Hotels and Resorts at a click (Baye, De los Santos and Wildenbeest, 2016). Pay Per Click: PPC ensures Hilton marketer’s promotion efforts through websites yields some revenue through the use of paid advertisements. Understanding Different Marketing Metrics:Hilton marketers can use digital tracking software through which they can monitor their digital marketing efforts, store and analyse the data in order to improve their marketing strategy. Visitors Analytics:Visitor Analytics is a digital software which Hilton marketers can use to record various metrics to aid their approach. Conversion Rates:Conversion rate is a marketing metric which tells us how many customers made a transaction on the website out of total visitors. Revenue per Keyword:This ensures the Hilton marketers marketing content keeps generating revenue. LO4 Monitoring and Assessing Techniques used to evaluate Effectiveness of Digital Marketing Strategy Hilton marketers can use digital software in order to monitor and record data in real time about the performance of their marketing strategy on various digital platforms such as social
media, online websites. There are present multiple digital software such as Google Analytics, Visitors Analytics, Hootsuite etc. which monitor, record and store various marketing traffic, conversion, revenue metrics and key performance indicators (KPI) for marketers to analyse in detail in order to identify the weaknesses of their marketing strategy and implement necessary changes in order to successfully convert consumers in the market. These digital software track Hilton marketers return on investment on their marketing efforts using various digital platforms for their operations (Saura, Palos-Sánchez and Cerdá Suárez, 2017). The main digital marketing conversion metrics which Hilton marketers record and analyse are as follows: Conversion Rate:This metric informs the marketers how many consumers performed a monetary transaction on their websites out of the total number of consumers that visited the website. Cost Per Lead:This metric is the ratio of a marketing campaign’s conversion rate to the respective costs attached through marketing to bring that consumer to make the transaction (Stewart, Blair and Kuse, 2016). It details the marketers if their marketing strategy is profitable or not. Bounce Rate:This metric updates marketers on the number of consumers who upon visiting their website or social media pages immediately left indicating that they didn’t find anything relevant. Average Page View Per Visit:This metric tells the marketers how long a visiting consumer stayed on their website or pages suggesting how engaging and interactive the consumers found promotional and marketing content to be. Average Cost Per Page View:This metric informs the marketers about the costs incurred by their marketing campaign’s multiple process for every page view by an individual customer on online websites or social media platforms. Average Time on Site:This metric details the marketers about the average duration of time individual customers visiting their websites tend to stay indicating how much of the marketing content on the website they found to be engaging and interactive.
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Rate of Returning Visitors:This metric tells the marketers about the number of visiting customers who are returning for a second a consecutive time suggesting how popular their online websites and social media pages are amongst the customers in the market. Revenue Metrics:In the end the failure or success of a digital marketing campaign can be judged by analysing its revenue metrics which informs the marketers whether their entire marketing campaign was profitable or not and how marketers can improve their strategy to achieve better results (Ailawadi and Farris, 2017). Return on Investments (ROI): This metric details the marketers of their total return in terms of customers converted to conducting a transaction from the total number of customers who visited their online website. Cost to Acquire a Customer (CAC): This metric tells marketers about their total marketing costs invested for acquiring each individual paying customer for a specified duration of time. In order to convert a greater amount of incoming traffic into paying customers, Hilton Hotels and Resort’s marketers should make sure they analyse the bounce rate, conversion rate, average page view per visit, average time on site and rate of returning visitors digital conversion metrics. Analysing these conversion metrics would allow Hilton Hotels and Resort’s marketers to identify the areas in their marketing strategy that need to be improved upon and which areas of marketing strategies they are achieving their objectives and goals. Conclusion This report evaluates the opportunities, difficulties and impact of marketing through the digital channels within the hospitality industry. The report identifies various digital platforms, tools and channels that are applied within the hospitality industry. The report also organises various digital marketing activities through a marketing plan and assess ways through which marketers can monitor, record, store and analyse data about their digital marketing operations.
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