MingleStick, friend or foe?

Information technology has improved the way conferences and meetings are held, conducted and presented; the Internet being probably the biggest contributor to it by far. Yet, when looking at the networking process of current conferences, it is recognizable that technology has not been adopted. In November of the previous year, during the TEDxMiami, a conference and fair hosted by the non-profit organization called TED, networking has gone through a developing stage.

In the article entitled “ TEDx Miami (TEDxMIA) Provided MingleStick Networking Solution to all Conference Attendees” it is stated how a new business card similar object has been introduced to the participants of the conference. This device, produced by Mingle360 enables attendees to “connect” with one click of a button and pull photos, e-mail address, phone number and even the website of the desired contact. This piece of technology should help the participants in the networking process.

Although this piece of equipment can come in handy, there are a few different aspects that need to be taken into consideration. It is these aspects that need further discussion before calling the MingleStick a useful tool for networking.

On the one side the business card like device can help the flow of information, making it easier for people to get acquainted and keep in touch. Among so many participants at such a gathering it becomes tedious to ask the same questions over and over. Not to mention the amount of business cards gathered, cards that can easily get lost, and in so loosing the much needed business connection with that person. For these cases, the MingleStick is possibly the invention of the century. It’s effective, saves time and you can be sure that you won’t even have to worry about a misplaced card anymore.

Yet on the other hand, this device interferes with basically the last human related aspect of the event industry. Video-conferencing, blow up screens, even holograms are standard items during such an event, yet over the years the human aspect has not been stripped away. With such a handy object, safely tucked away in your pocket, you won’t feel the need to through the conventional portals; you won’t be persuaded to have a simple conversation. The “Hello, my name is x” factor is taken out of the equation and the attendee might as well not even bother to spend that amount of money for a flight, accommodation and participation fee to actually be there.

So in the end the question we have to ask ourselves is, how much does this device help and how much does it cripple us in our networking attempts?

Tourism Australia collaborates with YouTube for new marketing campaign

By Caroline Oudin and Loumpheany Preap

This article entitled “Tourism Australia collaborates with YouTube for new marketing campaign” was written by Mary Jones and it was published on October 15^th 2010 on canadaupdates.com, which is a website that initially informs people about the immigration process in the country. The article deals with a new digital tourism marketing campaign between Tourism Australia and Youtube.

In this article, IT contributes to tourism because it enables the promotion of Australia. Indeed, according to Andrew McEvoy, managing director of Tourism Australia, Youtube is a marketing tool to broadcast a new vision of Australia. Thanks to the video, the sound and creativity, the marketing campaign is more efficient and will have more impact on the web users. Tourism Australia decided to create a new tourism marketing campaign, focused on digital support. This initiative led the DMO to a partnership with Youtube, offering the opportunity to develop social media marketing via videos.

The initial aim of such collaboration is to show Australia as the top exciting destination to visit in the world, focusing on one of the most symbolic structure of the country (Sydney Opera House) as a key point for activities. Also, the DMO is able to show potential consumers the attracting experiences available on site (music, culture, etc.). More significantly, this collaboration with Youtube was useful in order to bring the Youtube Symphony Orchestra 2011 to Australia. Indeed, it not only enabled musicians to audition but it also implied million of views through the social media. This partnership is a clear opportunity for Tourism Australia to expand its online presence, even if a study conducted by travel social network WAYNE revealed that in 2010 Tourism Australia is the most popular national DMO in social media (http://www.newmediatrendwatch.com/news/647-tourism-australia-is-the-most-popular-national-dmo-in-social-media).

The relevancy of this article clearly lays in the fact that it proves, once more, the usefulness of the social media. Youtube, in particular, is one of the top social media innovations, being strategically used by tourism industries such as hotel chains or DMOs. Wondering why companies opt for such a tool, it is to understand this choice. Indeed, broadcasting on Youtube is easy and quicker than other technological devices. A video catches more attention than a simple marketing campaign on the TV. On Youtube, the online user will look for the video by typing on the search bar tool whereas on TV, the marketing campaign won’t have the same effect because other advertisement will be diffused at the same time. Moreover we can guess that the cost of broadcasting on Youtube is cheaper than advertising on TV channels and it reaches more target audiences.

As far as we are concerned, we believe that this is an interesting topic, as the use of social media as a marketing tool is a growing phenomenon.

Source: picture from our personal files

The power of social media: Entertainment on VisitNorway.com became viral

On VisitNorway’s homepage you can play a web game called “Holmenkollen ski jump game“. The DMO promoted it through its Facebook page and on other social medias, which is today a pretty common process. However, as the Tnooz website pinpoints it (http://www.tnooz.com/2010/11/11/news/how-a-tourist-board-got-a-genuine-viral-hit-and-welcomed-hackers/?utm_source=Tnooz+Mailing+List&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=c4967abfd1-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN) the buzz that this game created became incredible and beyond the company’s expectations: players started sharing results on social networks, uploading videos of their winning entries on YouTube. These clips were viewed more than 25,000 times and double the number of views of the VisitNorway YouTube channel! Hackers even managed to get into the system in order to improve their scores.

Today, it is not obvious to find the good way to promote a destination or a brand, and create the buzz. Indeed, everyone wants to achieve a success like this and then it becomes harder to stand out from the crowd. Moreover, the use of social media is a real phenomenon that encourages originality and reactivity. Consequently, the competition is high, and finally the example of Norway shows us that simplicity and fun make a good mix.

The “virality” provoked by the game was unexpected. Benefits from this “fast spread” are apparent (awareness, free promotion), but the buzz remains difficult to control by the company. Moreover, “virality” of social Medias can also have negative impacts. Another article on Tnooz shows seven of the best travel viral videos. “United breaks Guitars” is cited as the more viewed and did not do some good to the company. The major difficulty is to predict whether a hit will be viral or not. The success and the positive impacts of this Holmenkollen game on the DMO’s website were hardly foreseeable.

Yet, DMOs seek this kind of effect because customers have become vehicle for information. Actually, we are more likely to find content created by an internet user than by the brand itself when looking for information about the 20 most well-known brands in the world. DMO wonder what the recipe to create a viral hit may be. They firstly need to know what the most used tools on the web are. For instance, studies have shown that social media are more used than email to recommend links on the web and that the Twitter button is the most displayed on blogs. They also need to think about the effect they are seeking. Do they want to increase their visibility through customer or reinforce engagement through interaction with customer? As Liana Evans underlines “viral isn’t Really Social Media (…) viral aims to quickly create buzz, and social media aims to build engagement opportunities with fans.” In the case of creating a buzz, it has to be a special occasion, in order to take profit of the success encountered. This will make customers talking about the brand and raise awareness but this on a very short period. The success of the game shows that entertainment and simple concepts seduce lots of internet users. But too much “virality” can create confusion and people weariness. Social Medias are good way to promote a company image, or a destination, but remains hard to manage.

The main challenge for DMOs is to find the best ways to succeed with social medias. Is creating a buzz, the best way to promote a destination and are social Medias the best tools to create a buzz?

Do you want to have fun?

Visit http://www.visitnorway.com/holmenkollen/

To see Tnooz selection of best travel viral videos:

http://www.tnooz.com/2010/04/26/news/seven-of-the-best-travel-viral-videos-of-all-time/

Photo retrieved from:

http://agens.no/2010/01/holmenkollen-ski-jump-for-iphone/

Sources:

http://www.reseaux-professionnels.fr/autour-du-web-20/1213-viralite-de-linformation-et-medias-sociaux.html

http://www.christophedasilva.com/blog/2010/04/01/le-bouton-de-partage-de-twitter-est-le-plus-repandu-sur-les-blogs/

http://www.clickz.com/clickz/column/1735566/understanding-that-viral-isnt-really-social-media

Take a look at your Hotel Room Before you Book it

The article 'Take a Frank Look at your Hotel Room Before you Book it" is devoted to the special website TVtrip (ww.tvtrip.com).

There is a website that was designed to offer the real views of the hotel. The benefit of this website that it is independent web site. The goal of this website is to allow visitors to explore hotels before booked them. These films can influences the decision to book hotel or not.They will give to visitors a listing of hotels at the place of visiting. After choosing the interesting hotel you can get a details page with helpful map of the area and description of the hotel and video about the hotel. The video include both overview (exterior, interior) and a look around the different available rooms.

This website will save to the visitors a lot of disappointment. TV Trip helps make an informe choice based on the quality and size of the room, instead of choice based on the hotels own photographs.A good server, high quality of video is necessary attributes of this site. Author recommend check TV Trip before making decision to visit hotel. Author noticed only one problem. This issue is connected with limitation of cities and countries included in website.

The idea of this article is to create a special web-site to show the hotels from the side of
independent customers. This idea is very similar to the ideas of Social Media. There are a lot of different customers who share their informations i.e. video informations through the You-Toube Channel, Twitter account, blogs, video. This special website can give the additional information and can be an additional source for the potential customers to looking for the best choice for them.

To compare with social media, the most important benefit of this website could be the systematic approach to collect and show the information about the hotels of the certain region. This idea is in demand on the part of potential guests of the hotels and from the hotels themselves. We can see that idea of sharing the information about hotel in the internet in any form could help promote hotel in unparallel and efficient way. Hotels can use this site as an efficient marketing tool in terms of developing free targeted traffic to their own website. The development of the web tools created a lot of opportunity for customers and hotels to be close to each other, to get the candid information.

Sources:

http://www.streetdirectory.com/travel_guide/216445/hotels_and_hostels/take_a_frank_look_at_your_hotel_room_before_you_book_it.html

http://www.tvtrip.com

Advergame as an event promotion method

Have you ever played a game called ‘Travel Frenzy’?

Do you know about the concept called ‘advergame’?

Have you thought advergames can be used as a promotion method for your event?

Advergame, a portmanteau of ‘advertising’ and ‘game’, means an advertising method which uses video games. With the growth of Internet, advergames have proliferated, often becoming the most visited aspect of brand websites, then promoting repeated traffic to websites and reinforcing brand recognition. Also advergames would be a good way of word of mouth or viral marketing encouraging gamers to invite their friends to participate (2011, Wikipedia)

‘Travel Frenzy’ was created by viral advergame specialists Koko Digital and launched on 10^th January, 2011 to promote an exhibition. Koko Digital joined a team with Travel Technology Europe exhibition which is one of the UK’s biggest travel exhibitions. Chris Steele, Director of Koko Digital, said: “We were chosen as viral partners for the TTE exhibition because of our success promoting other events over the past few years.” As he said, the company has worked for several events such as E-Commerce Expo North and South 2010, and Technology for Marketing and Advertising events from 2008 to 2010.

If you are interested to experience Travel Frenzy, visit http://travelfrenzy.kokogames.com. During the game, you are in charge of booking travel as your clients want aiming to book as many as possible in the time given. Before and after the game, the logo of TTE exhibition is shown on the screen, and gamers can follow the link and visit the website of the event.

TTE exhibition and Koko Digital are hoping that this game will bring successful promotion result. The most remarkable feature of advergame would be ‘interactive’ aspect. People enter into an interactive relation with a brand through advergame and the brand awareness is hard to be forgotten. According to a study (2011, Wise et al.), not all entertaining will be equally effective in achieving its goal. They say that the game should be product-relevant and that the ad attitude should affect to brand attitude.

Advergame would be a revolutionary advertising channel, only when it is applied in a right way. However the effectiveness and efficiency of this kind of promoting way is not well proven yet in events industry. Now, the next step is to use advergame smartly in Event industry.

Source: http://www.traveldailynews.com/pages/show_page/41059-Viral-game-to-bring-visitors-to-travel-industry-event

http://jiad.org/article107

Image Retrieved from: http://travelfrenzy.kokogames.com

Innovation, Tourism and New Technologies

Hélène Delpy & Elodie Siméoni

The Travel & Tourism Industry is one of the most important for many countries all around the world. We should notice that this business is at last 2,000 years old and began when wealthy citizens of ancient Rome decided to spend their summer holidays away from their own city: they wanted to take trips to the countryside and the coast. Quickly, the travel & accommodation needs of the Romans were taken in consideration in order to offer the best products and services. But, this travel & tourism business ended with the decline of the empire. Then, the Travel & Tourism Industry had continued its expansion and evolution throughout the ages with new challenges, trends and needs for the travellers: for example, in the 18^th century, the needs and motivations for the travellers were the health and the culture. Thanks to the industrialisation in Europe, a middle class with a lot of increasing amount of free time has emerged and allowed entrepreneurs to start to build specific accommodations with specific infrastructures like roads, ferries and carriages. That was the beginning of the Tourism Industry such as an International Industry.

And such as an International Industry, all the Travel & Tourism Companies nowadays have to deal with its complexity. The competition in this sector is really hard and important. The increasing pressure that exists in this sector forces the tourism businesses to continually reinvent themselves to satisfy the continually changing needs and expectations of their demanding consumers. A business, during its life cycle, will always be influenced by trends in consumer demand, the competition on its market, the economic, social and politic changes in the countries it operates and by the technological advancements. We know that innovation and the implementation of new technologies within an existing business can help to solve problems and assist managers in their decisions in order to respond to the actual changing environments. In the Tourism Industry, “Innovation” refers to the development and implementation of ideas or concepts that will enhance the consumer experience to improve the existing services and products or to improve daily comfort. We should notice that “Innovation” is not mainly about creativity but more about ideas to solve a problem, to add-value and to identify efficient ways of delivering services or products.

Nowadays, the information communication technology is used in all the tourism companies for many tasks. The environment in the Tourism Industry has been really influenced by the revolution of Internet and the new forms of the E-commerce. Information Communication Technologies (ICT) are used for many reasons in businesses: for the advertisement, the promotion, the distribution & sales, for the operational efficiency or the consumer management. The most important things to be considerate for the Travel & Tourism Companies that would like to implement ICT in their businesses are:

• Internet is a key tool for a lot of companies for sales & marketing and communication with stakeholders.
• Not all technologies can be appropriate for all the companies: at first, they have to identify their needs and the different technologies in order to choose the best one for their own businesses.
• For a very good success: if a company wants to implement an Information and Communication Technology, the managers should considerate that it can require a very good level of ICT skills.
• To anticipate the possibility of ICT failures seems to be essential for all the companies: that is why it could be useful to elaborate “risk and recovery” plan.
• Tourism Operators should remain up-to-date with other technological systems in addition to the Internet (Such as credit & banking facilitation, E-commerce…)

In the following French article (http://www.karinemiron.com/tourisme-nouvelles-technologies) the author is talking about the importance and the necessity to innovate in the Tourism Industry. In fact, she says that this is a sector where the competition is more and more aggressive and to innovate nowadays is not just an option but an obligation! She is adding that innovation is not just to develop a lot of new technologies: companies can just use or distribute an existing tourism product or service but with a new way to do it, in order to be special.

In this article you can discover the latest innovations (the article has been written on the 5^th of November, 2008). Such as the SAMAP: software that allows the visitors to customize their ways of visits thanks to a computer or a mobile phone. The Visioglobe which is a software in 3D: on its mobile phone, the consumer can visualize in real time the place that he wants to discover or visit.

The author is talking about the virtual visits that exist on a lot of websites and their impacts on the consumer behaviour and their decisions making process.

Actually, the interest of this article, dated from 2008, is that the author was already aware of the fact that new technologies like mobile phones and the internet are essential and have to be taken in account in the marketing strategy of any company. The web developers, new technology companies were already working on new ways of thinking his way of thinking, planning and travelling through applications, 3D and “virtual reality” 3 years ago. Today, we can find articles about those new technologies every day, we talk more and more about mobile technologies but we mustn’t forget that it’s not so new...!

Sources:

http://www.sustainabletourismonline.com/

A Brief History of Tourism

http://www.english-magazine.org/index.php/business-english/483-a-brief-history-of-tourism-julys-business-english-articles.html

by Kevin Watson

Explore the trends in T&T industry

In today’s Travel and Tourism industry, business environment and technologies are changing all the time. In order to stay

competitive, practitioners in the sector should always keep an eye on their development. ITB World Travel Trends Report indicates recently two major focuses on the future development of the industry: Social media and Mobile service.

(http://www.traveldailynews.com/pages/show_page/40841-Facebook-instead-of-postcards)

Social media

We’ve been long discussing the importance of social media in the T&T industry. It enables people to share and exchange opinions and experiences to build more social interactions via user-generated contents. Today, travelers are increasingly turning to their peers as a valued source of information, guidance and recommendation; they now trust reviews and their communities more than they do professionals and agencies.

Over the next few years social networks will become an everyday form of communication. Already 52 per cent of the 152 million adult vacationers in the USA are using social networks in order to discuss their next intended destination with friends, or to obtain direct information from travel companies.

There is no doubt that tourism companies and organizations should be aware of this phenomenon and reactive to its potential marketing impacts. Today, businesses in the industry are starting to embrace social media as a new opportunity to promote themselves. DMOs, hotels, tour operators etc. have been actively engaged in Facebook, Twitter, blogs in order to take advantage of this new interface.

What’s more, social media now serves not only as a communication platform, it gradually begin to have real functions for tourism companies. It will be widely accepted for the purposes of making reservations. By far, this changing trend of tourists’ purchasing behavior will represent big opportunities for tourism businesses to realize deals directly via social networks.

Mobile services

“Mobile devices such as the iPhone are revolutionizing the travel market and are creating new openings for our industry. Now we must endeavor to make best use of this technology and to continue to develop it, because improved information and booking facilities definitely help to increase sales”, states Dr. Martin Buck, Director of the Competence Centre Travel and Logistics of Messe Berlin.

For example, in Japan Smartphones are already being used to make reservations for 20 per cent of domestic flights.

On-line booking now is widely spread, people can finish all the bookings before they start the trip, but people tend to communicate and make decisions or modify them during the trip, they use social media to communicate and search information all through the way. Travelers use their phones on location; they look for attractions, restaurants, activities and try to find recommendations for the place. They can navigate the website with a smartphone, but it’s easier for them to book the resort with a smartphone application. For tour operators, hotels or DMOs, the usage of mobile travel applications and the development of mobile website are indispensable.

Mobile payment methods are another current trend, enabling purchases to be made using one’s own iPhone. However, high roaming charges are a continued obstacle to the use of Smartphones abroad. “The lack of simple and fair regulation of the worldwide use of Smartphones imposes massive obstacles to the use of online services while travelling”, says Dr. Martin

Buck. ”This is one area where viable solutions must be applied as soon as possible.”

Even in European union, roaming charges of mobile phones are very high, for international trips, some facilitators will stop the service and automatically transfer to the local facilitator, this may arise chaos or even cause lost of information. As now this problem is unavoidable in international travel, some traditional booking channels need to be considered as an auxiliary.

Labels: Trend, Social media, Mobile service

Photos retrieved from:

http://www.traveldailynews.com/p

ages/show_page/40841-Facebook-instead-of-postcards

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://s4.hubimg.com/u/3623471_f260.jpg&imgrefurl=http://hubpages.com/hub/How-to-get-a-Hotel-website-on-a-smartphone&usg=__L-3FTA6164qjHlEuxNEJlsam1uU=&h=488&w=260&sz=23&hl=zh-CN&start=18&zoom=1&tbnid=Rx7Qh2qPKZzViM:&tbnh=167&tbnw=89&ei=duVGTZ2INoL78AatktiyAQ&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dsmartphone%2Breservation%26hl%3Dzh-CN%26sa%3DX%26biw%3D1366%26bih%3D675%26tbs%3Disch:10,770&itbs=1&iact=rc&dur=334&oei=YOVGTYTKLcuUOsut2bUB&esq=2&page=2&ndsp=20&ved=1t:429,r:13,s:18&tx=30&ty=114&biw=1366&bih=675

Conference Technology: The Changing Face of Conference Technology

The following article, “Conference Technology: The Changing Face of Conference Technology” by By Phil
Benson posted on 6 September 2010, discusses how technology may directly or indirectly affect the MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conventions and Exhibitions) which has been providing revenues for hotels in the United Kingdom. The author emphasizes on the fact that “technology had fuelled growth in the MICE sector and has become an important point of differentiation, but can hoteliers keep up with the latest trends in conference technology?” (Benson, 2010)
Video Conference Technology, which is a new and trendy innovation, allows business people to meet virtually, providing them with an intelligent picture, perfect visuals, and complete surround system.
The main issues discussed in the article “Conference Technology: The Changing Face of Conference Technology”, are the advantages and disadvantages of the virtual conference technology and how are hotels in the United Kingdom particularly going to cope to this shift in technology.
According to Benson, the use of Video Conference Technology would highly decrease travel costs, by enabling business men to meet but without travelling, and hence people could cut down travel costs. In addition to that, the author states that such technology may be able to replace or even affect the demand on the way international meeting are done. “Video conference technology can provide a cheaper alternative to holding or attending international meetings” (Benson, 2010)
The main answer for such a case remains vague and unclear, since many hoteliers in the United Kingdom consider that Video Conference Technology can never replace face-to-face meetings due to their long term significance; “Despite the obvious financial savings derived from lower travel costs, accommodation and expense claims, some believe that face-to-face networking opportunities can be more productive than virtual ones. Therefore, some hoteliers are now placing an emphasis on facilitating face-to-face meetings, rather than heavily investing in video conferencing technology.” (Benson, 2010)
As a result, hoteliers must invest and keep all facilities and equipment upgraded in order to deal with this threat of technology, but how are hoteliers going to react, the answer is still indefinite.

Latest Trends in Conference Technology
Source: http://www.hotel-industry.co.uk/2010/09/conference-technology/

We believe that it is very definite, in this evolving world where technology is changing the way we do business; Video Conference Technology may be efficient, low cost and easy to, therefore hoteliers must keep on exceeding clients expectations in the MICE industry by investing in new technology and providing the best facilities. Moreover, Video Conference Technology may affect the MICE industry in hotels, but can never eliminate it. There will always be people who prefer face to face business due to integration, increase productivity, and communication.

Reference: Benson, P. (2010, September 06). Conference technology: the changing face of conference technology. Retrieved from http://www.hotel-industry.co.uk/2010/09/conference-technology/

New technologies in the event industry - interactive communication

New technologies in the event industry - interactive communication

Historically event marketing was developed from traditional techniques like PR, sampling.. etc.. Nowadays it is a unique engagement process using others tools to be sustainable and to bring something different to the visitors.

Brands are using events to raise their brand awareness and to improve their image in the consumer’s minds; more and more original, more and more visionary, and especially regarding the competition, they have to be very creative and innovative. That’s the reason why event agencies are now using the interactive communication : Beamvertising, touch wall, façade mapping and interactive tables. The article deals with all these new technologies and calls this trend “the era of the 5th elements”.

First of all, the “beamvertising” is the new generation of the billboard sticking. In order to be more an eye catcher, marketing departments and/or event agencies decided to adapt new technologies to their existing marketing activity. In order to do so, they use retro projection which shows logos or short advertising spots at night on monuments or giant walls.

Furthermore, LG used “Façade mapping”/ “Wall mapping in Berlin to launch a new mobile. It was followed by an old event technique: distribution of goodies. In order to better understand we invite you to go visit the link of the video taken in Berlin of a LG 3D commercial on a building. It is very impressive. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVTga6GmbGw&feature=player_embedded)

Moreover, there are so called “touch walls”, which are interactive giant screens, used to show public images, articles, graphics as well as Twitter posts in real time. This tool enable a interactive communication between the general public and the announcer. An example for this tool was tested by the Canadian DMO that had installed those touch walls in the streets of New York City in order to promote Canada as a destination, showing pictures, articles, Tweets and the real plus is the possibility for people to actually interact and comment on those shown documents in real time.

Another new technology is presented through interactive tables. These tables can be installed in restaurants, where guests can virtually visit the kitchen while they are waiting for their meal. It is also possible to order via these tables or to play games thanks to some apps being installed in the tables. Furthermore, they present information about the city as where to go after dinner etc.

We choose this article because it summarizes very well the capacities of new IT used in the event industry. Especially the event industry depends very strongly on these new applications in order to be able to stay competitive. Moreover, we both think that these technologies are very interesting and mind opening and it is important for everybody to be well informed about the latest technologies. As tourism and events are closely linked, these applications, when installed in a city will benefit for tourists as well for the city as a business attraction where logistics and infrastructure are well organized and easy to understand thanks to these tools. We all know that the IT tools will present our future and that we have to adopt quickly.

Resources: http://www.lesreceptionstendances.com/lancement-de-produit-soiree-de-gala/les-nouvelles-technologies-au-service-de-levenementiel-la-communication-interactive-12/

New software to improve performance in the leading hotels of the world

The Leading Hotels of the World (see http://www.lhw.com) is a luxury hospitality organization which existence is based on the membership of only the most refined hotels of the world. Almost five hundred luxury hotels are members. To join The Leading Hotels of the World as a member, a hotel must match the following criteria: being in the deluxe or luxury category and corresponding to the existing standards of the organization regarding accommodations, service, cuisine, employee behavior and facilities and every other element influencing guest satisfaction. The Leading Hotels of the World's role is to promote, distribute and contribute to the quality of its members' supply. Among other tools for quality enhancement, the organization uses quality-audits made by mystery guests, once a year at least, in order to check the legitimacy of every member to belong to the organization.

To complement that verification measure, The Leading Hotels of the World launched this week a new software program to measure guest satisfaction and improve the performance of its members. Medallia (see http://www.medallia.com), which has already provided 50.000 business units with customer satisfaction measurement solutions, was chosen among many other competing companies to supply the software. There are already 430 members of The Leading Hotels of the World (including Hotel Ritz Paris, Hotel Plaza Athénée in New York and Imperial Hotel in Tokyo) using this tool, provided with no charge by the organization. The program consists of a guest-satisfaction survey that brings hotel managers key information regarding guests' overall satisfaction. The information is immediately broadcast to staff via instantaneous message which makes them able to solve any issue raised by guests. The system also establishes figures and statistics regarding global satisfaction evolution, satisfactory or unsatisfactory elements. On top of that, training needs are identified and highlighted by the software. This means that not only it delivers information about guests needs and points out any problems that require to be solved, but it also proposes recommendations, providing then an effective solution for performance improvement.

Ted Teng, President and CEO of The Leading Hotels of the World justified the purchase of the software in these words: "We chose Medallia for the guest satisfaction program that we provide free of charge to our members because Medallia's customer experience management platform is comprehensive, flexible, and the most effective tool for customer feedback analysis." Such a speech implies the anticipation of a significant change regarding the capacity of a hotel to fulfill customers needs and, by doing so, to gain operational efficiency. Indeed, the program presents three main advantages that allow hoteliers to bet that it will be a successful tool:
- As information is not distorted by interpretation and figures are automatically calculated by the machine, the reality depicted by the program has been proved more reliable than that emerging from anyone's observations.
- The instantaneousity of alert-messages allows the staff to be more reactive to respond to issues than if they had to wait for paper-based or face-to-face feedbacks concerning guest's satisfaction.
- As all the data are collected and centralized in the program, it is easy to quantify satisfaction, obtain rapidly information like trends and statistics about customers needs, and identify precisely what has to be modified in order to meet guests expectations.

Thus, as said Amy Pressman, Medallia President and co-founder, "Medallia will help The Leading Hotels of the World membership maintain its standard of five-star customer experience by continuing to deliver premium guest service that surprises and delights customers and keeps them coming back."

The fact that The Leading Hotels of the World, the most influencing organization in luxury hospitality, decided to invest in such a software shows how the access to information is crucial for a hotel to perform well. An easy and quick access to non-biased information is all the more important as luxury hoteliers tend to provide their guests with excellent product, i.e product that perfectly matches their expectations. Once again, here is a proof that information and communication technologies are inevitably changing the way hotels work.


Sources:
http://www.lhw.com
http://www.medallia.com
http://www.justluxe.com/fine-living/trends/feature-1308747.php
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/the-leading-hotels-of-the-world-selects-medallia-to-run-global-guest-satisfaction-program-114586184.html

Virtual Loyalty

Elsa MELLAC & Laure-Emmanuelle PEYRET

The travel industry recognizes that Internet is a tool which cannot be ignored any more. All companies fight to increase traffic on their websites and to create loyalty. However, a recent survey conducted by the private company Tealeaf (http://www.e-tid.com/getdoc/731a2e48-3d74-485f-9dc6-3fbf5dd9b1d5/Tealeaf-eBookersWhitePaper2010.aspx), shows that “nine out of ten consumers booking their holiday online choose a different provider each time” and “only 12% of respondents saying they book their holiday with the same provider every time”. Consequently, it is important for the companies to choose the best strategy, both for content and functionalities on the website.

People usually choose to book on the Internet for price consideration “62 % of respondents said price was a major consideration when booking a holiday”. Consequently, it is important for the firm to conduct a competitive watch to be sure that the prices provided suit the market.

According to Graham Jones, internet psychologist, “travel websites need to build trust and confidence”. Being a well-known brand is not enough anymore to inspire trustworthiness. E-bookers are looking for a physical address, a telephone number and an email address. In addition, they want real pictures and full descriptions of the product they are thinking of buying.

British travel e-bookers “visit four different travel websites on average when researching a holiday” which shows the volatility of Internet users. We also know that the “Y generation” is used to “zapping” from one page to another more quickly as they are more at ease with internet browsing.

Internet is a fantastic world where all kinds of information are available in one or two clicks: if the website does not satisfy the user, he will just select another one. It is said that less than 1 second is needed to determine if the website matches the user’s expectations. Consequently, the travel website should provide the right information instantly, from the home page. However this action is very difficult because companies do not really know in advance who is going to visit their website. It may be interesting to create different websites adapted to each target with an appropriate distribution process.

The research is done “about two to four months in advance”: the rates should be available at least 6 months in advance to satisfy this request. Plus, “once e-bookers have decided on their holiday, they are likely to visit the website an average of three to four times before finally completing the transaction”: once the travel website has convinced the user, it is important to stay efficient, to update information, to post new pictures and comments, to prove to the final customer that the firm is here, active and efficient. Once on holiday, the consumer should be satisfied that they will not be on their own if a problem occurs.

This content is crucial to increase the competitive advantage of the company and retain clients: the website should be interactive, attractive and build experiences. It should be fun and create a relationship with the online visitor to make the difference.

Moreover, the functionalities present on the website are just as important. It may seem obvious but a website that works consistently well, with no glitches, is a site that inspires confidence for the user who is then more likely to confirm a booking. According to the report, 22% of the respondents claim that the absence of errors or problems on the site contributed to a positive customer experience.

Furthermore, the Tealeaf report highlights that an important point ebookers look for when they decide a website may be interesting for them is a sign that it is trustworthy. For this they do not wait for glitches but expect a sign indicating that the website is secure and that they can safely enter their payment details.

Another aspect that cannot be neglected by companies aiming to sell online is that consumers trust products more if others claim that it is good, that they liked it. This is a sign not only of trust but also of what the report calls “social proof”; proof that the product is acceptable to consumer peers. For this social proof to come across, the website should feature consumer reviews and comments of previous customers of the website.

Tips for an effective online travel website:

1. Complete descriptions – don’t make clients assume anything, give them all the details


2. Complementary pictures – bring clients to imagine their trip


3. Security – reassure the clients


4. Consistency – ensure that there are no technical problems


5. Enable consumer reviews and comments
   

Images from:

http://www.obesitydiseasecenter.com/files/3568414/uploaded/secure-payment(1).jpg

http://www.cartoonstock.com/newscartoons/cartoonists/mfl/lowres/mfln699l.jpg

http://media.photobucket.com/image/generation%20Y%20%25252B%20internet/lowett/84441416.jpg

Shrivel in size, add to value! On the way to paperless meetings

PCMA Convene Magazine and Barbara Palmer, on July’s 2010 issue, introduce another “Innovative Meeting”, “A medical association shrinks its conference content down to the size of an iPod and grows its value”. Presenting the use of iPod as the one and only binder material for the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) 2010 Annual Meeting, we are automatically transferred into a new paperless era in the Conference arena

This example proves a digital revolution in the meetings, opening new possibilities and facilitating event planners’ and attendees’ lives. Technologies more and more integrate into MICE industry what makes very interesting to follow future development. But let’s go back to the AANS meeting itself.

Mr. Marshall said that his major worries did not concern the costs or the technology itself; these are the facts that the organizers can control and test. Most headaches were about the reaction of the attendees to the new technology. We think it was a good idea to inform people about the changes in advance by sending them the newsletters and tutorials for the iPod Touch. That made people more familiar with the device and in combination with all the benefits attendees build a positive opinion about such practice. Most benefits that new technology meeting brings to its users are the possibility to customize the content, ease of networking and a possibility to receive the association related information even after the annual meeting directly to their personal device, not mentioning the fact that delegates’ bags become less heavy for couple of pounds. The main benefits that organizers experience are the automation and facilitation communication process as well as possibility to assess the audience response towards each and every session directly after. It is also advantageous for exhibiting companies, who can use push notifications, banners, product videos and special e-mails. Event organizers know that there still left room for improvements that is why they are already thinking of the possible improvements and additional features. From this example we can see that digital upgraded meetings are very promising and leave space for future development.

Keeping in mind the above, Conference and Meetings Industry is quickly conforming into the new challenges adapting innovative tools for its function.Each delegate, and we are saying that from our own experience, is always so anxious and impatient for his/her “little gift” from the front office of the conference, not to mention what happens when this gift is an iPod! Additionally, the fact that the attendees were able to keep the devices, enables and encourages further commitment and engagement to the conference itself as well as the Association as a whole. It is actually like giving a TV broadcasting only your content! And nowadays, it is all about content… and after event loyalty! Furthermore, concerning the environmental consciousness and public opinion on Greener Business, the reduction of paper use in conferences is more than encouraging regarding not only the source savings but also the money savings from designing and printing all the necessary material.

In conclusion, the use of such a device in “pocket-sizing” the content can be evolved into a powerful marketing and management tool for conference planners, creating and enhancing innovation into their industry!

Photos retrieved from

http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/Business_People_g201-Business_Man_p20236.html

http://www.apple.com/ipodtouch/