Abstract
This essay investigates the notion of spending significantly on social media promotion for the hotel sector. It considers both the associated costs and risks and the numerous advantages of such an investment, including improved customer relations and brand awareness. The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) is used in the essay to analyze how hospitality organizations perceive the benefits and usability of social media marketing and how this influences their willingness to spend money on it. Additionally, it covers trend marketing and the significance of staying current with consumer trends. The essay concludes that, while enterprises should be mindful of the possible hazards, social media marketing can be a smart investment for hospitality organizations.
Introduction
The use of social media to sell goods and services has grown quickly in the hospitality industry. With the use of social media, hotels, restaurants, and other hospitality businesses may now more affordably contact their target audience. Social media offers a platform for hospitality firms to interact with clients, forge connections, and advertise their goods and services.
Moreover, it works well for gathering customer feedback, which can be used to enhance goods and services. Social media presents chances to interact with clients, provide marketing materials, and build a following of devoted clients. It is understandable why so many businesses in the hospitality industry are allocating significant funds to social media advertising given its enormous potential to reach a diverse range of clients.
Topic: Social media marketing is a crucial investment for hotels, as it fosters customer relationships, drives sales, and raises brand awareness.
Issue: Is it worthwhile to make significant investments in digital marketing on social platforms for the hospitality industry?
Counter-Argument: Social media marketing can greatly benefit the hospitality business, but some costs and hazards should be considered. Measuring the gains achieved in an organization through social media is also difficult and costly.
Main Idea Statement
Spending a lot of money on social media marketing for the hotel sector is worthwhile since it may boost brand recognition, affect consumer behavior and purchases, and build a personal connection with customers. Brand recognition and awareness are measured by brand visibility. It serves as a gauge of how well-known and recognized the brand is among the general population. By enabling a company to connect with a bigger audience, have dialogues with potential clients, and establish a solid reputation, investing in social media marketing can enhance brand visibility. Establishing a strong presence across platforms and developing a distinctive business identity are both possible benefits of social media marketing.
Businesses may develop relationships, project a great brand image, and motivate customers to make wise purchasing decisions by being active on social media and interacting with customers. Engaging with clients more personally is necessary to forge personal connections through social media marketing. This can involve answering messages and comments, delivering customer support, and giving guidance.
Literature Review
The core ideas surrounding social media marketing include investment, hospitality, and social media marketing. Social media is employed in various ways in the hospitality industry to promote its products. The relationship between the aforementioned ideas can be understood using the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). According to the TAM theory, people highly evaluate their need and ability to utilise technology before adopting it, especially for the older generation (El Archi & Benbba, 2023; Singh & Srivastava, 2019).
The TAM is utilized to understand the ease of social media use among people to maximize the reach of potential clients. The fundamental elements that make social media marketing an effective investment must be taken into account in the hospitality industry. The essential factors to utilise social media marketing are building brand recognition, increasing company sales, and maintaining customer loyalty (El Archi & Benbba, 2023; Singh & Srivastava, 2019).
The hospitality industry may connect with clients through social media by interacting with them frequently and attending to their requirements. The aim is to establish and direct how people view and respond to the services of a certain hospitality company. For instance, a hotel and its services are affected by the ease with which people understand their content on social media (Mehraliyev et al., 2020).
Some of the current theories, including Chaffey’s model and the TAM, are based on the idea that interactions between an organization and its potential buyers on social media platforms highly affect how the customers behave towards the products or services provided by that company. However, some studies that have been conducted have their flaws and drawbacks, which may make them less reliable. For instance, Chu et al. (2020) and Gupta (2019) utilized a small sample of companies to make inferences about all other organizations concerning the issue of the use of social media in their marketing activities. Moreover, Halkiopoulos et al. (2020) suggested that there is a lack of detailed and long-term research that explains the direct effect of social media marketing on the hospitality industry.
Furthermore, some studies by Halkiopoulos et al. (2020) and Mehraliyev et al. (2020) noted a positive correlation between sales and social media marketing, while Casado-Díaz et al. (2020), Gupta (2019), and Theocharidis et al. (2020) found limited connections between these two variables. These disparities, which are well supported by the evidence presented by the various authors, make it challenging to make an informed inference about the extent to which social media aids in marketing.
Further research on the application of social media marketing in the hospitality sector is required as a result of these gaps in the available data. This is a crucial subject because social media marketing is becoming an essential component of marketing plans for companies in the hotel sector (Casado-Díaz et al., 2020; Mehraliyev et al., 2020). It would be feasible to learn more about the effects that social media marketing may have on firms in the hospitality industry and determine the best social media marketing techniques by conducting more thorough and long-term studies.
Brand Visibility
Social media marketing is a crucial tool for boosting brand awareness and cultivating client relationships in the hospitality sector. According to Chaffey’s Theory of Integrated Digital Marketing, effective social media marketing relies on four essential elements: reach, engagement, conversion, and loyalty (Mehraliyev et al., 2020). Reach entails the number of people who see or view an advertisement posted on social media. The information posted must be relevant, short, and engaging to capture the attention of viewers and pass the intended information accurately.
The interactions that occur on social media platforms between customers and the brand are called engagements. These occur in the form of comments on the posts provided by hospitality companies (Halkiopoulos et al., 2020). More questions, conducted surveys, question and answer sessions, and online polls between online customers and the companies indicate a positive impact of social media on marketing.
Moreover, brand visibility is improved whenever people’s online interactions lead to potential customers (Mehraliyev et al., 2020). This can be improved by posting rewards or discounts for people who purchase hospitality services through their websites. This is called conversion and can highly contribute to building customer loyalty, depending on the level of satisfaction among clients.
Trend Marketing
Social media marketing is frequently employed in the hotel sector to promote trend marketing, which is the process of marketing goods and services following consumer trends. Businesses need to be aware of current consumer trends to successfully promote trend products and services. The hospitality business has a great opportunity to boost trend marketing on social media (Chu et al., 2020).
For instance, businesses may use social media to remain on top of consumer trends by keeping an eye on social media conversations and employing analytics tools to examine consumer data. Businesses can use this information to develop marketing campaigns that capitalize on current consumer trends and spot emerging trends. Moreover, companies in the hospitality sector can use social media to advertise their services and products in a way that aligns with current trends (Chu et al., 2020). For instance, firms can employ sponsored content, influencer marketing, and inventive imagery to develop campaigns catering to the target audience’s interests.
Counter Argument
Businesses in the hospitality industry regard social media advertising as cheap and effective, especially because it is the most trending technique to reach a larger audience. However, this might not always be the case as there are enormous expenses required, which might cause tremendous losses if proper planning, organization, and content creation for the target audience are not conducted (Casado-Díaz et al., 2020; Theocharidis et al., 2020).
The biggest problem with social media marketing is that it can be expensive and challenging to calculate the return on investment (ROI). This is because it is hard to determine the specific gains brought by social media advertisements and how much they bring financial gain to a company (Theocharidis et al., 2020). There is limited assurance that marketing through social media will always be effective. Thus, there is a high risk for unforeseen losses, especially due to the high competition, since every company has utilized social media advertising extensively.
Furthermore, firms may experience challenges in managing the content posted online regarding their products and services, making it hard to manage. A company risks receiving unfavorable press attention or making a mistake that costs them clients or hurts their reputation (Casado-Díaz et al., 2020). It is extremely challenging to quantify the effect of bad press or how it can influence future business.
Lastly, social media marketing might take a lot of time. According to Theocharidis et al. (2020), all activities occurring in marketing accounts related to a given company must always be monitored, which requires a lot of time. Companies should also ensure that messages are interesting and pertinent to the intended audience. This can take time, and the company might need more people.
Conclusion
Social media marketing is an efficient and timely tool for companies in the hotel sector to connect with their target clients. Social media marketing can improve brand recognition, impact consumer actions and purchases, and foster close bonds with consumers. The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) states that firms are more inclined to spend money on technology if it is more advantageous and easy to use.
Businesses should prioritize developing a vibrant and educational social media presence through sponsored content, influencer marketing, and innovative visuals. Keeping up with current consumer trends and using analytics tools to gauge the success of ads are also vital. In conclusion, investing in social media marketing can help firms in the hotel sector by giving them a platform to connect with clients and forge bonds.
Furthermore, companies need to be aware of the expenses and dangers of social media marketing, such as the difficulty of gauging the ROI and the possibility of negative press. Despite these dangers, social media marketing is still a wise investment for hospitality businesses because it can help to strengthen customer relations, boost revenue, and increase brand recognition. However, an organization must be careful with whatever it posts online, especially in the hospitality sector. Anything that could harm its reputation could cause significant damage to its brand image, which could scare away clients and destroy customer loyalty. Once such damage is done, it is always difficult for an organization to get people to trust them again.
References
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Chu, S.-C., Deng, T., & Cheng, H. (2020). The role of social media advertising in hospitality, tourism, and travel: A literature review and research agenda. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 32(11), 3419–3438. Web.
El Archi, Y., & Benbba, B. (2023). The applications of Technology Acceptance Models in tourism and hospitality research: A systematic literature review. Journal of Environmental Management and Tourism, 14(2), 379. Web.
Gupta, V. (2019). The influencing role of social media in the consumer’s hotel decision-making process. Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes, 11(4), 378–391. Web.
Halkiopoulos, C., Koumparelis, A., & Konidaris, A. (2020). Data analysis from the printed to digital advertising of hotels and travel agencies in Greece of the twenty-first century. Cultural and Tourism Innovation in the Digital Era, 137–144. Web.
Mehraliyev, F., Choi, Y., & King, B. (2020). Theoretical foundations of social media power in hospitality and tourism: A hierarchical model. Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, 62(2), 215–231. Web.
Singh, S., & Srivastava, P. (2019). Social media for outbound leisure travel: A framework based on technology acceptance model (TAM). Journal of Tourism Futures, 5(1), 43–61. Web.
Theocharidis, A.-I., Argyropoulou, M., Karavasilis, G., Vrana, V., & Kehris, E. (2020). An approach towards investigating factors affecting intention to book a hotel room through social media. Sustainability, 12(21), 8973. Web.