Archive for the ‘Media’ Category
The Value of Travel Professionals
Posted by Tracy Stottler | Filed under Hospitality News, Media, Travel
The total number of Travel Professionals may be lower than it was years ago, but the travel industry is in a constant state of transformation, and the number of agency locations continues to grow by nearly 6% every year. Travel Professionals have become even more valuable as travel-related businesses undergo new openings (or closings) and agents are positioned to find the best price or deliver a trusted product to their customers.
Travel agencies reportedly account for $130 billion in gross travel sales in the U.S., as well as more than half of the $247 billion travel market and 30% of all hotel bookings (as reported by PhoCusWright). Travel Weekly’s 2010 Consumer Trends report also indicated that comparatively, younger Echo-Boomer travelers, who prefer to be waited on and have others do for them, tend to seek out Travel Professionals more than older Gen Xers, who are real do-it-yourselfers. This younger generation represents 20% of leisure travelers who use traditional travel agents. Because the web is “old hat” to them, they are not as entranced by what they can find online, and actually, they are pushing back from information overload by allowing an expert to do it for them.
Several years ago, one of our clients, Starwood Hotels & Resorts, recognized that travelers were increasingly turning to Travel Professionals for valuable personal relationships and a trusted source of information. Created by professionals and for professionals, StarwoodPro.com was established to provide a sophisticated, user-friendly interface between Starwood and Travel Professionals. StarwoodPro.com delivers easily accessible content on deals, rates, products, commissions and sales contacts, plus comprehensive hotel and brand information, along with benefits from a rich loyalty program.
In 2010, Sheraton and Westin hotels, which are both Starwood brands, wanted to leverage the relationships established within this segment by introducing specific Travel Professional promotions designed to generate interest, gain trust and sway their powerful influence. These campaigns drew participation from 8,400 and 15,000 participants, respectively—and doubled the size of Starwood’s Travel Professional database within one week. Explosive campaign results, in addition to general performance indicators within the industry, show that Travel Professionals continue to have value and are a critical target audience to be included in any marketing plan.
Who can really speak for your brand?
Posted by Chris Rak | Filed under Advertising, Interactive, Media, Social Media, Tips and Trends Series
I recently attended the PR News Online Digital PR Summit in New York City. A discussion of topic arose, and it centered on who is participating on behalf of brands across the various social media platforms. In other words, who is managing a brand’s voice?
In one case, Pizza Hut announced in April of 2009 the position of “Twittern,” an internship opportunity with the sole responsibility of posting on Pizza Hut’s social networks. This raises the question: Who has the authority to speak for your brand?
Executives who lack a greater understanding of social media often assign the task of social participation to associates with an already full plate of responsibilities or pass them off to a junior-level associate who may or may not possess the skill set needed to properly represent your brand.
It basically comes down to this: Would you have this same individual write the content for your corporate website? The answer is probably no. In effect, this individual is creating the presence for your brand in the social media world. After all, a Google search on your brand name will likely produce the corporate website along with social media results such as Twitter postings and Facebook status updates. This content is being given more and more credibility in shaping one’s opinion about your brand.
Messaging, style and content should be consistently represented across all channels to maintain brand integrity. Although social media is the distribution means via which these messages are delivered, there is need for having a structure in place—one that is similar to any communications plan.
At Dana, we understand that our clients’ individual responsibilities have grown and that they are being asked to do more under the same job title. We offer a full suite of social media services, including robust implementation packages and ongoing support models, with proven track records.
Not sure where to begin? Dana can help you get started with social media or simply help you get more out of your current efforts. To find out more, contact bprewitt@danacommunications.com.
Is it really Brand Awareness versus ROI?
Posted by Mark D’Amico | Filed under Advertising, Media, Tips and Trends Series
In the last two years, as the financial crisis escalated and our economy struggled, clients focused like a laser on their return on investment (ROI). This makes complete sense, as marketing budgets have come under increasing pressure and scrutiny, resulting in the need to measure and evaluate the effect of every marketing dollar spent. And to be honest, this should really be standard practice regardless of the economic environment.
But in tough times, ROI-speak is ubiquitous. And if taken too far, this kind of thinking can promulgate the idea that brands must choose between generating brand awareness or producing ROI. Often, the decision is, “I don’t need awareness. I want ROI!”
In our view, this kind of thinking is backwards. Because in reality, brand awareness is never at odds with ROI. On the contrary, awareness is actually a primary driver of ROI. Consider the following data from an example hotel’s analytics:
This data shows the property’s top ten site traffic sources, ranked by revenue for a recent 30-day period. What you see here is typical: the bulk of the measured revenue is attributed to organic search and direct site traffic.
Logically, it makes the most sense to try to increase organic and direct traffic. A 10% increase in those referral sources would do more to improve the bottom line than doubling all the other sources combined. So how is that accomplished?
First, you must understand what those sources of traffic represent. Your organic traffic is, quite simply, what your site is optimized for in Google and other search engines. Assuming that these engines do their job well, the traffic you attain organically should come from keywords that describe your property.
While it’s likely that you are receiving good organic traffic from generic search, i.e., “(your city) hotel,” it’s even more likely that your organic search is dominated by brand terms. After all, no keywords describe you better than your brand keywords.
The next greatest source of revenue—direct traffic—comes from users who have either bookmarked your site or entered your URL directly into their browser. This traffic is very similar in quality and qualification to brand search. These are prospects who know you by name and are seeking you out.
What do I do with this information? Is the answer more brand search?
We do believe in the importance of brand search, yet in this story, it is not the cause of success, but rather the result of it. As illustrated above, a large percentage of all the revenue measured by analytics was a result of brand awareness. Strong brands that invested in their brand for years before the economic crisis were better positioned to reap the benefit of that awareness during the crisis.
How do I know if my marketing activities are generating brand awareness?
Generating greater brand awareness means reaching new, uninitiated prospects. Advertising is a prime source for new visitors. This includes non-brand pay-per-click, email and rich media.
Site-usage statistics are key to determining the effectiveness of advertising in creating brand awareness. If a referral source is generating quality visits, then you can be sure prospects are interested in your property and that you’re creating brand awareness.
But brand awareness and brand advertising are not the same thing, and driving brand awareness does not have to be expensive. For instance, social media is an important key. Facebook and other social networks have real potential for increasing brand exposure. While your fans know you, their network may not. Every person connected to your fan page is also connected to people who don’t know you. Pushing quality content and exclusive offers through social networks is a cost-effective way to gain brand awareness. (Click here to read more on managing social media.)
In the end, those with the most brand awareness win. Get your brand terms onto the keyboards of your best prospects. Contact mdamico@danacommunications.com to learn how the right mix of search, email, rich media and social media can create brand awareness.
Brand Stewardship: Who Are You?
Posted by Lynn Kaniper | Filed under Advertising, Media, Technology
In today’s frenzy to gain business, keep costs low and make owners happy, have you lost who you are?
These days, everyone is heavily concerned with driving ROI and maximizing the bottom line. We’re all looking for more cost-effective ways to spend our dollars. But in doing so, have you lost your brand? Do you still know who you are? Does your audience?
Organizations that want to thrive in today’s marketplace must have greater concern for upholding the higher values that support their brand’s promise and preserving a distinctive relationship with their markets. They must accept responsibility for ensuring that their brand stands for value, service, quality and the other attributes that matter most—over the long term—to the people they serve.
The question is: How should you move forward while staying true to your identity?
Answer: Introduce innovation to stay ahead of the game.
You have tight budgets, so you need to act smart. Have you been putting off your marketing plan or reduced it so much that it’s lost impact? If so, think about utilizing low-cost social media marketing. It has become huge in speaking the voice of a brand, and it can help sell your product while building brand value.
Essentially, it’s all about the brand, and communicating through multiple channels is key. Surround your target audience with online, offline and social media, as well as public relations and word of mouth. If you focus too much on any one area, you may hinder your efforts.
Your goal should be to drive action, not just push readable content. More than simply creating and parking, brands must engage their targets, promote interest, feature great offers and share them across all channels.
And don’t rely solely on social media either. You can form a large fan base on Facebook, but you may be left without pertinent data to collect for your own lists. Build your lists and reinforce what works for you. The aim is to drive action over short periods of time and then integrate it into a fuller program.
It is important to manage and grow a list of go-to people that will help fill need periods and become advocates for your business as well. Without control of such a list, and without the ability to integrate your email outreach into your social media, you will lose a big asset in terms of expanding the effectiveness of your efforts.
Above all, a brand implies a promise. This promise is to remain dedicated to the level of quality people have come to expect. Brand loyalty boosts sales, and maintaining a strong and consistent expression of your company’s brand is critical to fostering credibility, authenticity and loyalty.
This is why the great brands are those whose organizations act as stewards of the brand relationship. This means communicating the vision and what the organization stands for, even at times when you need to promote value or run specials to fill occupancy. Think about how you do that now… At these times, do you stay true to who you are?
If the brand message is not easily conveyed and readily understood, chances are the brand or its strategy is flawed. It may be time to reevaluate your brand stewardship:
- What does your brand promise?
- Does it appeal to your primary audience?
- How does your current identity undervalue or undermine your brand?
- What are you doing well or need to work on in terms of branding?
- How do you position the brand so that it’s more effective?
Finally, a brand must have the depth to adapt and grow with the changing times. The world is unpredictable, and change is constant. To move forward and get ahead, it is essential that you know exactly who you are, that you communicate a consistent image of your brand and that you engage your customers to keep them coming back.
Learn more about partnering with Dana to become a steward for your brand. Contact lkaniper@danacommunications.com.
Gary Vaynerchuk: Do what you love (no excuses!)
Posted by Eric Welsh | Filed under Advertising, Interactive, Media, Technology
“Do what you love (no excuses!)” At Dana, we really think about these things. If you’ve ever met any of our leaders you know that they love what they do. Our Media Director, Mark, is more passionate about SEA than he is about breathing and coffee. Just watch him perform at a new business presentation. Lynn, our Executive Creative Director, is more passionate about the quality of the product that we deliver to our clients and the people in this building, that everyone wants her advise professionally and personally— we are second only to her own family. Jared, our VP of Strategy, will question our methods (to the point of exhaustion) to insure we’re thinking in the clients best interest. But he is ALWAYS willing to go to bat for OUR big idea. And finally, our President, Bob, makes at least 100 calls per day. They all start with, “How’s the family? How’s your game? Great, now let’s make you some money…”.
That is our brand equity. Passion and performance.
Please feel free to watch Gary eloquently explain brand equity. He uses some foul language, but don’t we all from time-to-time?
About this talk
From Ted.com:
At the Web 2.0 Expo, entrepreneur Gary Vaynerchuk gives a shot in the arm to dreamers and up-and-comers who face self-doubt. The Internet has made the formula for success simpler than ever, he argues. So there’s now no excuse not to do what makes you happy.
Now Premiering on Broadway!
Posted by Eric Welsh | Filed under Advertising, Dana News, Hospitality News, Interactive, Media, Uncategorized
From the Golden Gate Bridge to the sweet Carolinas, Dana is all over the map—and we’ve just moved our NY office to its new home in Times Square! We’re now boasting a brand-new address among the bright lights of Broadway.
To Contact our New York Office, call Jared Zech at 646.666.7016, or jzech@danacommunications.com.
Digital Transformation and Social Media: Notes from Boulder Digital Works
Posted by Eric Welsh | Filed under Advertising, Design, Media, Social Media, Uncategorized
This is a really interesting presentation given by Ed Boches, at the Boulder Digital Works conference. The folks at DANA greatly appreciate his willingness to share with the digital community to further our collective understanding. Please scroll through the presentation and feel free to comment!
[slideshare id=3735846&doc=bdwfinalcopy-100415085609-phpapp01&type=d]
Is “Luxury” a Dirty Word?
Posted by Michele Clerici | Filed under Advertising, Media, Tips and Trends Series
lux·u·ry (n.)
1. Something inessential but conducive to pleasure and comfort.
2. Something expensive or hard to obtain.
3. Sumptuous living or surroundings.
Consumers’ pennies and purses are kept under tight lock and key these days—which is why, for the moment, the dictionary definition of “luxury” is unlikely to draw a good consumer response and, therefore, has become somewhat of a “dirty word” in marketing hospitality and travel. But what is the true meaning of luxury, and have we begun to redefine its terms?
Lavish vacations at extravagant resorts are not high on the priority list when people are scrimping just to keep a roof over their heads, put food on the table and gas up their vehicles. In a down economy, consumers are in no state of mind to spend frivolously on things that are not essential to their everyday lives. So what does this mean for the luxury hotel and resort industry?
It means taking a look at people’s redefined values and repositioning the concept of luxury itself. It means evolving the way the industry approaches and sells the idea of a luxury experience. No longer is luxury about glamour, glitz and having expensive “stuff”—now it’s about precious time with family, meaningful experiences, authenticity and genuineness. Luxury is less about materialistic, flashy lifestyles and more about personalization—finding what truly matters to the consumer and providing them with that “luxury.”
The hospitality and travel industries can offer this new concept of luxury in a number of ways, and it begins with strategy.
According to the March 15th release of The Wealth Report, “The onslaught of economic recession and the inevitable changes in customer values and behaviors during 2008 and 2009 caused luxury brands to embrace the concept of customer-centric, data-driven marketing. In 2010, marketing and communication budget dollars are being reallocated to more measurable and highly profitable customer-centric initiatives to deliver short and long-term brand growth and profitability…Luxury brands are now looking to understand their customers and adapt their marketing strategies to best serve their interests.”
“This all means that luxury brands are looking to gain a complete understanding of their customers across all sales channels. This includes key insights on customer profiles and purchase behaviors by channel, value and loyalty, seasonality, gender, product affinities, and cross-sell/up-sell links. With customer data in hand, they are able to implement differentiated communication treatments to identified customer segments, personalize the customer experience and increase revenue.”
Hope is not lost for luxury brands even at the hands of a recession, so long as they remain dedicated to understanding and catering to their audience at all times. For more information on how to position and sell your luxury experience in today’s economy, contact jzech@danacommunications.com.
Magazines Come Alive
Posted by Charisse Gallagher | Filed under Advertising, Hospitality News, Interactive, Media, Technology, Tips and Trends Series, Travel
I recently sat down with a relaxing cup of hot tea and opened up the March 2010 issue of Condé Nast Traveler. I was a few pages in when my eyes stumbled across a 2-D barcode. Hmm. Then I read this intriguing line: “Our March issue comes alive on your smartphone.”
Ok—hold the phone (no pun intended)—I just had to know what this was all about!
I grabbed my iPhone and within a few minutes, I had downloaded Microsoft’s Tag Reader app and was on my way to a scanning frenzy! I aimed the little cross-hair target at the barcode in the magazine. As I got close enough, it recognized the code and instantly whisked me away to a landing page with expanded information from the magazine issue, no actual photo required. There I discovered a behind-the-scenes look at the cover shoot, plus multiple videos, a guide of things to do in Shanghai & Hong Kong and much more.
I then began a treasure hunt throughout the entire issue, finding and scanning all of these little barcodes to see where they might take me. I enjoyed watching the video of the gorgeous red Bottega Veneta dress on as it flowed down the runway—something you can’t really get from a still photograph. I also liked how some of the tags acted as instant links. No more writing down that URL to look up later—just scan and go!
I love this new mix of mediums working together and can only imagine where this type of technological thinking will take us in the future. Perhaps we will be able to see a destination photo we like in a magazine, scan it and instantly book a trip. Who knows—the possibilities are endless!
Battle of the Big Three
Posted by Lynn Kaniper | Filed under Advertising, Design, Interactive, Media, Tips and Trends Series
Which of these three mediums is the best strategy in today’s marketing world: traditional media, digital media or social media?
If your answer is any single one of these choices, you’ve definitely missed the mark—because a strong and successful marketing strategy must integrate all three.
Since the rise of the digital and social networking age, there has been much discussion about which type of agency can ascertain the most effective results for clients. Digital agencies might argue that traditional agencies are outdated and unable to adapt to today’s market. Traditional agencies might argue that digital agencies aren’t focused enough on the solid creative imagery and messaging that grab people’s attention. And social media agencies may dismiss both by asserting that neither quite understands the power of word-of-mouth.
But ultimately, integration is the key to survival in the marketing world. Let’s face it, marketing mediums are ever changing, and so are your individual needs. Good strategy means staying in the know and up to date on every channel of marketing, so you can apply a multi-faceted plan to each campaign. That is why working with one shop–one that is capable of utilizing all the available channels of communication–is more apt to carry out your vision in the long run than dispersing your jobs piecemeal to agencies that focus on one specialty alone.
Dana has always believed in integration, which is why our team comprises a plethora of talented professionals in multiple areas of marketing expertise. Often, various mediums can overlap one another and work in tandem to form a consistent, solid campaign that reaches the target audience with the largest number of impressions in many different forms. Our animated model of marketing capabilities shows how all the strategic avenues (traditional, digital and social) work together to cultivate a strong brand. Click here to see for yourself.
Think of your marketing strategy in terms of a jigsaw puzzle. You need all the pieces to fit together so your consumers can see the full picture of your brand. If you separate the pieces for different groups to assemble individually, they may be able to fit their own together, but they’ll still be disconnected from the rest. Your brand image will lack cohesiveness and your consumers may mistake the pieces for the whole.
Don’t limit your marketing reach by relying on disconnected pieces of the puzzle. Learn more about integrating your marketing strategy to garner the best results; contact jzech@danacommunications.com.
