#Travel, Tourism Companies promoting their brands on Instagram

We have all heard about Instagram, followers, hashtags and so on.

Today, the social network is approaching tourism companies, as the latter can use it to communicate, promote their brands and target new customers.

Indeed, the largest sharing photo platform, launched in 2010, has reached a total number of 600 million monthly active users, and half of them are even considered as daily active!

More than 40 billion photos have been shared on the platform since its creation; and 75% of the most famous brands already use it, on a basis of almost 5 posts a week. Tourism brands use this network even more than other brands, and are for this reason, considered as the best Instagram presence at the moment.

But everyone can wonder, why tourism brands should communicate via this specific network?

Society has evolved; people and travellers want to be inspired and inspire others. They changed their way of discovering, consuming and sharing experiences. Indeed, 35% of Instagramers use the platform to discover new places and 48% to choose their travel destination. Statistics are even higher for Millennials who, for 89% of them, plan their travel activities according to fellow travellers’ content. 

Before booking any trip, travellers have the need to look at online reviews but also get “real” feedbacks. Millennials are aware of this new trend, as 97% share content of their travels.

Figures show that 75% of Instagramers act after seeing a post of a brand. They visit the website, research the brand’s products or even purchase it. They engage 10 times more than with Facebook! And the fact of having an active online presence, increase the brand perception up to 20%.

All in all, what tourism brands have to do, is:

• Create a brand identity and build positive brand awareness, by showing followers they are valued.
• Engage with users: communicate with them in real-time, encourage interactions, react to their complaints, and create significant relationships. It will humanize the brand, which will then be more appreciated and visible. 
• Use the network to build databases of consumers and keep widening it.

How to use Instagram?

• Be consistent: use high resolution images, and keep the same design (style or color). The objective is to create recognizable posts to represent the brand’s value and ideas; but also favor a long-term strategy by sharing posts frequently. (1/day or 5/week). Cross post pictures with other social media networks and marketing channels to drive people to the company’s Instagram page.
• Keep sharing relevant content: be informed about the latest news, but do not use clichés or fads.
• Think about Followers first: encourage interaction with them (comments), value followers generated content (pictures submission, photo contests), use influencers to boost the volume of users and enhance the brand (with the same values as the brand’s). Brands’ goal is to create a close relationship with its followers. All in all, tourists will become the brand’s promoters.

We can finally agree that this method is successful, as #Travel counts up to 162 million posts, so the market does exist.

Good examples of this success are: the official Tourism New Zealand account which has one of the biggest databases with more than 581K followers; but also, Fjord Norway, which succeeded in bringing the Natural Wonder Trolltunga to the world stage with Instagram.

Hurry up! Create your account and start positioning your brand! :)

References:

https://www.instagram.com

https://venngage.com/blog/instagram-for-business/

http://www.adweek.com/digital/four-ways-to-maximize-your-brand-presence-on-instagram-report/

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/286408

http://www.bandt.com.au/marketing/social-influencers-grow-hospitality-tourism-audiences-tenfold-hootsuite-research

http://www.travelmarketreport.com/articles/Leveraging-Influencers-Can-Enhance-Travel-Agency-Brands

https://www.trekksoft.com/en/blog/best-tourism-boards-on-instagram

https://www.omnicoreagency.com/instagram-statistics/

The “Digital Detox”- The rise of tech-free holidays

Technologies combined with travel, are a great match. Technologies have enhanced the tourism industry. They have, for instance, improved channels of communication but also enabled new channels of distribution to reach more customers. Hotels have also increasingly integrated technologies in their facilities, to satisfy their guest.

However, does the hotel guest really want to be surrounded by all this technology?

In the past, the boundary between the time at the office and the time at home was clear. It is not the case anymore because of the huge progress in technologies, transforming, for instance, big devices to smaller ones, and more convenient to carry. The progress in technology has also made it relatively inexpensive to stay connected 24/7, either at home, at work or even while traveling. To follow this trend, most of the hotels allows their guests to reach the hotel free Wifi. However, it cannot be denied that another increasing part of travelers are feeling overwhelmed when they turn their device during leisure holidays, feeling stress and anxiety that prevent them to fully enjoy the present moment. These go against all the principles of a successful holiday experience.

The hospitality industry has started to respond to this new need of guest to “unplug” during holidays by redesign their hotel experience value proposition. Four Seasons Resort Costa Rica at Peninsula Papagayo challenges guests to leave their smartphone at the front desk and in exchange of it, they receive a list of 24 tech-free things to do at the destination. As reward to have accepted to leave their devices, they can retrieve their smartphone 24h later with a new custom cover of one of the resort’s scenic view (Levine, 2015).  

This is not the only example of resorts encouraging to unplug and unwind from technologies: JW Marriott Cancun Resort and Spa has created a “tech-free zone” near the pool where the guest can enjoy a good book or conversation without being annoyed by phone calls. Even some resorts such as Nayara Springs in Costa Rica or some islands from St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) ban technologies, upon request, from bedrooms.

SVG even created a video to promote the digital detox in their islands and the main benefits:

source: YouTube: Digital Detox in SVG

Even more than hotelier complex, some destinations advocate the digital detox concept. To illustrate this idea, we can take the striking example of Scotland and its very bad mobile receptions in vast areas. Indeed, the Scotland Tourism Board (VisitScotland) is actually turning this inconvenience in a virtue: it starts marketing itself as a “digital detox” destination in an effort to appeal tourists tired of being always switched on to the virtual world (Brown, 2014). This lack of connectivity could be a powerful marketing tool for off-grid locations and some providers have identified a niche market for those who want to escape digital life, according to Visit Scotland.

The increase of “wellness” holidays that also feature a digital detox extends beyond Scotland. Indeed, the trend was identified in 2012 by the travel writer Pico Iyer in a New York Times article entitled “The Joy of Quiet”, which identified a growing backlash against the information age (Brown, 2014).

However, the prospect of promoting destinations or hotelier complex as an area of digital detox is also criticized. Marc Crothall, head of Scottish Tourism, said: “For 25 per cent of the country not to have proper mobile phone access is just not good enough for the modern day”. He also insists on the fact that they really “need to have full coverage across the whole country as soon as possible” (Brown, 2014).

Nevertheless, VisitScotland’s most recent survey showed that just 66 per cent of visitors were happy with mobile phone access during their trip. And the availability of Wi-fi and broadband scored even lower, with only 54 per cent of visitors expressing satisfaction with the level of access. Besides, health and wellbeing tourism has excelled in recent years (Ferguson, 2014).

We can here suppose that the Digital Detox will be successful in the next few years. However, in our ultra-connected world, we may wonder if this new concept of digital detox is only a marketing principle or a real motivation from hotel to make their guests happier in their life, and maybe a real travellers’ need to become less connected (and stressed) during their holidays?

Louise and Clothilde


Sources:

Brown, J. (2014) 'Digital detox' destinations: Scottish tourist board makes virtue of the country’s lack of Wi-Fi connectivity. The independent. Retrieved from: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/digital-detox-destinations-scottish-tourist-board-makes-virtue-of-the-countrys-lack-of-wifi-connectivity-9208892.html

Ferguson, B. (2014) Digital detox Scot tourism plan criticised. The Scotsman. Retrieved from: http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/travel/digital-detox-scots-tourism-plan-criticised-1-3341988

Levin, I. S. (2015) Digital Detox: 8 places to unplug and undwind. Nextavenue. Retrieved from: http://www.nextavenue.org/article/2015-04/digital-detox-8-places-unplug-and-unwind

Will Virtual Reality Offer Future Tourism Marketing Potential?

25th February 2015

What do you think of when you hear the words virtual reality (VR)? As for me (do not laugh too muchJ), before reading this article it was some kind of a clunky helmet attached to a computer with a thick cable. Moreover I did imagine Neo and Morpheus traipsing about the Matrix!)) Yes, yes, a bit silly, but fortunately I have found out that it is a simulated, three-dimensional world which we can manipulate and explore using computer technology while feeling as if he were in that world. Surprisingly but it was first demonstrated in a practical sense in the 1960s. And since that time it has been predicted that we would experience VR operating in everyday life on a regular basis. Let’s have look at nowadays reality.

Today Facebook, Sony, Microsoft are conducting billion dollars acquisition of virtual reality projects and we are expected to see the fruits of these efforts sometime in the next year or so.

There are some already successfully launched technologies of “another world”. For instance, the Google Street View software - travel application with additional reality technology Google Glass which can be used in order to showcase travel-related destinations such as hotels.

Another example of virtual reality has recently presented by the DMO of British Columbia in order to promote the destination through a campaign called “The Wild within”. At the time being, the system Oculus Rift (an upcoming virtual reality head-mounted display) is only accessible and used by trade professionals and travel Media. Yet, one can imagine that it will be available for travellers.

To benefit from an incredible 360-degree experience, British Columbia proposes to users to wear the Oculus Rift with headphones. The “Wild within experience” offers two virtual realities:

-                                  = A boat ride

-                                  =  A mountain hike.

Microsoft would also like to launch VR project during 2015. We don’t know yet if the device will be available publicly or just used as a prototype.

HoloLens device developed by Microsoft would allow traveller to visit place they’ve never been before and enjoy popular tourists’ attractions at home.

Australia’s Qantas, an Australian airline, in cooperation with Samsung, will propose a virtual reality technology in Sydney and Melbourne lounges as well as inflight for its first class passengers. Customers will have access to a 3D and 360 degree viewing experience.

Image source: http://skift.com/2015/01/30/qantas-just-made-virtual-reality-in-flight-entertainment-a-reality/#1

These travel related companies shows that VR can be largely used to promote and market a destination.  

However, today there is no guarantee that it will reach public in the foreseeable future. Even famous Google Glass has completely failed to reach a mainstream audience at this point in time. Let’s wait and see if virtual reality devices will integrate in our daily life and change our world. In any case it remains a niche which is able to deliver absorbing content through simulated, three-dimensional world.

More information you can find here http://thinkdigital.travel/opinion/virtual-reality-offers-future-tourism-marketing-potential

And of course you can always contact us: 

Fanny fanny.picarle@skema.edu &

Anastassiya anastassiya.shikhovtseva@skema.edu

And remember: 

"Don’t be afraid of the space between your dreams and reality.

If you can drem it, you can make it". 

Ralph Waldo Emerson