Why does Highfield hotel unsuccessful in digital marketing strategy?

Discuss about the Highfield hotel location in Sydney hotel.

Highfield hotel is located at ideal location in Sydney, Australia. The hotel provides various facilities to the customers like free wireless internet access, refrigerator, heater, DVD player, color television, room services, etc. Customers can get clean, comfortable and spacious rooms at Highfield hotel. They can enjoy delicious food at the place. Faxing facilities, laundry facilities, non-smoking rooms and reception facility are also available in the hotel. Travel facilities are also available nearby hotel so the customers can easily travel to different places (Highfieldhotel, 2017). Prices of rooms are normal as middle class people can easily use the services. The hotel mainly targets singles and married couples. Although the hotel is providing best facilities but it is facing problems in attracting customers. Only limited numbers of the customers come in the hotel. The main reason is the weak online presence of the brand by which the hotel is not getting customers (Buhalis & Kaldis, 2008). The hotel is not using appropriate digital marketing strategies for promoting the brand.

(Source: Highfieldhotel, 2017)

Figure 1: Website of Highfield Hotel

It has been analyzed after carefully examining the digital marketing strategies of Highfield hotel that it is not using appropriate digital marketing methods to attract customers. Highfield hotel is using only some digital marketing methods like some travel companies’ websites like www.travelmagma.com, www.expedia.co.in, www.wotif.com, etc.,  have added hotel name in their directory. Highfield hotel is using only some social media accounts for promotion. The content available on the website is also not attractive. The layout and the design of the website are also not eye-catching (Highfieldhotel, 2017). Social media icons are not available on the hotel’s website. Highfield hotel uses only Facebook and you tube for marketing and on these platforms also the hotel does not post regularly. On Facebook the hotel posted only few images and the images were not creative and on you tube also the hotel has posted few videos and the videos are also not interesting. The hotel is not using content marketing method for promoting the brand but the major competitors of the hotel are using content marking. Highfield hotel is also not using other digital marketing methods like search engine marketing, search engine optimization, email marketing, pay per click advertising and affiliated marketing.

Mainly Highfield hotel is targeting families. In Highfield hotel, room facilities are available for singles, married couples and for tourists. There are so many tourist places available in Sydney.  Sydney is one of the best tourist destinations in Australia. Many international and domestic visitors come in Sydney every year for visiting beautiful places. The local attraction points nearby Highfield hotel are Opera house, Harbour bridge, the rocks, royal botanic garden, Sydney aquarium, Toranga zoo, The Australian Museum, the powerhouse museum, the art gallery of NSW, Coogee beach, Bondi beach, Manly beach, Maroubra beach, Watson bay, paddy’s market, Harbourside shopping centre, Westfield shopping centres, Queen victoria building, broadway shopping centre and Duty free shop galleries. Tourists stay at Highfield hotel to visit these places. Rooms are available in lower cost so customers do not have to spend much money (Highfieldhotel, 2017).

Target customers of Highfield hotel

Highfield hotel is unable to meet needs and expectations of target customers digitally. In the current digital world customers like to connect with the company through digital medium. Customers like to see information about the company and its services on social networking sites and on other digital platforms. Highfield hotel did not give emphasis on digital marketing so the hotel failed in attracting customers. In the modern world people use digital mediums to search information related to their needs like before trying services of any company, customers do research about the company on digital mediums (Chang, Wang & Yang, 2009). For example before selecting any hotel people check reviews of other customers on social media sites and on hotel’s website. Attractive website of company also helps to create its positive image in customer’s mind but the website of Highfield hotel is very normal. If a new person checks the website of the hotel then he or she will definitely find it unappealing because the layout and the design of the website are unattractive (Cristobal, Flavián & Guinaliu, 2007). On good keywords such as best hotel in Sydney, the website is not appearing in the top pages of search engines. Digitally the Highfield private hotel is sending bad brand messages to customers.

Facebook is one of most used and popular social networking sites. From the social media statistics Australia of June, 2017 it has been analyzed that there are around 17,000,000 monthly Facebook users in Australia. In different countries the figure is different. Numbers of Facebook users are increasing rapidly because people like to share information and they can easily get interesting information on Facebook. Many Companies use Facebook to give their message to target customers. For Facebook marketing the HighField private hotel has to do many things.

• First the hotel has to design an interactive Facebook page for brand promotion.
• Attractive images of the hotel should be added in photo gallery.
• Beautiful cover image should be chosen and the hotel should add its logo on the cover image.
• For Facebook marketing first the hotel has to set goals. Goals help to formulate strategies. The hotel can set goals such as gather leads, get sales and increase brand awareness, etc (Smithson, Devece & Lapiedra, 2011.
• Highfield hotel can learn about the behavior of the customers by examining various Facebook analytical tools. By Facebook analytical tools the hotel can know demographic characteristics of customers.
• The hotel should also watch its competitors’ activities to check how competitors are attracting customers.
• The hotel can post photos, videos and content on the Facebook page. Hotel can also take help of sponsored ads to make the efforts effective. The hotel can easily create attractive ads through Facebook Ads manager.
• The hotel should do its SWOT analysis to identify its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Highfield hotel can get more opportunity by doing competitors’ analysis (Ramanathan & Ramanathan, 2011).
• On Facebook one person’s action is mainly dependent on other person’s action. If one person shows positive response then there is probability that other person will also show positive reaction. Like if one person posts positive comment or review on Facebook then there are more chances that many persons will be influenced by the comment (Bai, Law & Wen, 2008).
• The hotel can increase likes and share on Facebook by posting attractive images of the services.

Nowadays companies are also using Instagram for marketing. On Intragram Highfield private hotel can promote it’s by using following tips.

• Highfield hotel does not have account on Instagram so first the hotel should create its instagram account.
• The hotel can post attractive pictures on instagram.
• Million users are using Instagram account. It is an effective social network that can help Highfield private hotel to reach potential customers present in different areas of the world (O’Connor, 2010).
• The hotel can take benefits of free Instagram tools.
• The hotel can post updates on different social networking sites and invite the customers to follow Instagram profile.
• The hotel should post regularly on Instagram account to maintain interest of customers.
• The hotel can make connectivity by maintaining interactivity with customers through posting comments. Highfield hotel should respond to the comments on all posts.
• Integrative Hash tags can also be used in the posts. The hotel can use brand specific hash tags, general hash tags and trending hash tags.
• Creative posts can help Highfield private hotel to connect with customers.
• The hotel should share brand story and videos on Instragram.
• For marketing on Instagram, Highfield hotel can use relationship marketing theory. In relationship marketing the company focuses to make long term relationship with customers. Better customer relationship management provides various benefits to the company (Jung, Ineson & Green, 2013).

Many people use twitter nowadays because through twitter, people can get information quickly and easily. Twitter is a small message communication social networking site in which a person can post update within 140 characters (Garau Vadell & Orfila-Sintes, 2007). Highfield hotel can increase brand awareness by using Twitter account. The hotel has to following activities on twitter account

• First the Highfield hotel has make account on Twitter and the hotel has to set its goals.
• On twitter the hotel can post images, videos, text and can also post link of other posts.
• Highfield hotel can invite others to follow. First the hotel has to start following people.
• Hotel can check activities of competitors by analyzing their twitter account.
• Highfield hotel has to design short and effective posts because in twitter there is word limits.
• Highfield hotel should add all the social media icons on its website so that visitors can directly go to social media accounts through website.
• Relationship marketing theory can be used in twitter marketing as the hotel should post messages to make connectivity with the customers (Buhalis & Zoge, 2007).

Conclusion

In the given report Information about hotel Highfield private hotel is given. Some are reasons are explained for ineffectiveness of this brand. Mainly the report gives emphasis on digital marketing strategy which Highfield private hotel should use. Facebook marketing strategy, Instagram marketing strategy and twitter marketing strategy are shown in the report. The hotel can attract more customers and can fulfill expectations of customers easily by using digital marketing techniques.

References

Bai, B., Law, R. and Wen, I., 2008. ‘The impact of website quality on customer satisfaction and purchase intentions: Evidence from Chinese online visitors’, International Journal Of Hospitality Management, 27(3), pp.391-402.

Buhalis, D. and Kaldis, K., 2008. ‘eEnabled internet distribution for small and medium sized hotels: the case of Athens’, Tourism Recreation Research, 33(1), pp.67-81.

Buhalis, D. and Zoge, M., 2007. ‘The strategic impact of the Internet on the tourism industry’, Information and communication technologies in tourism, pp.481-492.

Chang, H.H., Wang, Y.H. and Yang, W.Y., 2009. ‘The impact of e-service quality, customer satisfaction and loyalty on e-marketing: Moderating effect of perceived value’, Total Quality Management, 20(4), pp.423-443.

Cristobal, E., Flavián, C. and Guinaliu, M., 2007. ‘Perceived e-service quality (PeSQ) Measurement validation and effects on consumer satisfaction and web site loyalty’, Managing Service Quality: An International Journal, 17(3), pp.317-340.

Garau Vadell, J.B. and Orfila-Sintes, F., 2007. ‘Internet innovation for external relations in the Balearic hotel industry’, Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, 23(1), pp.70-80.

Highfieldhotel, 2017. About Us, viewed on 5 August, 2017 from https://www.highfieldhotel.com.au/about.php.

Highfieldhotel, 2017. Location, viewed on 5 August, 2017 from https://www.highfieldhotel.com.au/room.php.

Jung, T.H., Ineson, E.M. and Green, E., 2013. ‘Online social networking: Relationship marketing in UK hotels’, Journal of Marketing Management, 29(3-4), pp.393-420.

O’Connor, P., 2010. ‘Managing a hotel’s image on TripAdvisor’. Journal of Hospitality Marketing & Management, 19(7), pp.754-772.

Ramanathan, U. and Ramanathan, R., 2011. ‘Guests’ perceptions on factors influencing customer loyalty: An analysis for UK hotels’, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 23(1), pp.7-25.

Smithson, S., Devece, C.A. and Lapiedra, R., 2011. ‘Online visibility as a source of competitive advantage for small-and medium-sized tourism accommodation enterprises’, The Service Industries Journal, 31(10), pp.1573-1587.