12 Luxury Hotel Brands a Social Media Presence Overview

12 Luxury Hotel Brands A Social Media Presence Overview

@ Let‘s start!

@ Social Media Allstars

@ Brand performance.

@ Property performance.

@ Performance on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

We don‘t have a choice on @ Platforms in Discussion “whether we DO social media, the @ Know your platform. @ Correlation between account question is how well we DO it. choice and followers.

@ Brand account importance.

@ Brand account consistency. - Erik Qualman | Author, Keynote Speaker, Professor “ @ Social Media Platforms @ Platforms worth the effort.

@ Platforms worth the effort?

@ Time to make a difference!

@ What‘s left!

@ This is us!

ocial media is all around us. The individual properties, the corresponding digital age is growing faster number of followers, as well as further and quicker than many have findings gathered from the eight most expected. It has begun to reach common social media platforms. In the an ever-more important stage hospitality industry, these are: Facebook, Sin both our private and professional lives. Twitter, Instagram, Google+, LinkedIn, In that, it has become a must for service Flickr, and Pinterest. The twelve hotel industries, including hospitality, to join brands investigated have an international this movement. Customer awareness and presence, both physically and digitally, customer loyalty, being two of the most and are categorized as 5 star luxury hotel imporant sales-criteria in the hospitality brands. The hotel brands chosen include: business, can successfully be achieved Aman Resorts, The Dorchester Collection, and transformed into leads, as only 14% Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts, Kempinski of internet users still trust traditional Hotels, Mandarin Oriental, Oberoi Hotels advertisement and more than 90% trust & Resorts, Park Hyatt, The Peninsula online peer recommendations. Nurturing Hotels, The Ritz-Carlton, St. Regis Hotels & your online community therefore was Resorts, Waldorf Astoria Hotels & Resorts, never more essential. and W Hotels.

On the hunt for the best and most effective Now that we have gotten the technicalities examples of social media presences in the out of the way, let‘s start into this report luxury hotel industry, L.I.K.E. Hospitality that features close to 1900 social media Consulting conducted an independent accounts of more than 500 properties study, to demonstrate the potential that from 12 brands in 84 countries. social media platforms are baring for hotels. Since the initial data-collection kick-off See you on the other side – stay curious! period in June 2016, L.I.K.E. has discovered valuable insights of selected brands, their

@ Branded hotel properties have an average of 3.7 Social Media accounts. @ Portrayal of consistent social media strategy is essential and increases sales up to 15% per property. @ Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter are the most performant platforms for generating social media presence in hospitality.

he three brands that reach the presence as a brand by some distance. most followers per property For the Ritz-Carlton brand, Facebook and on average across the chosen surprisingly Google+ are the most active social media platforms all show and most followed platforms. The Four exceptional performances Seasons Hotels & Resorts reach a total Tin terms of engagement and followers. of 1,2m followers, mainly due to their The Ritz-Carlton Especially The Dorchester Collection, widespread presence on Facebook and even though only consisting of 10 hotels, LinkedIn. Last but certainly not least, St. demonstrates impressive social media Regis Hotels & Resorts follows, with 410k Four Seasons activities. The Collection’s individual followers on their brand accounts, most Hotels & Resorts St. Regis properties connect to a total of almost of them originating from Facebook and Hotels & Resorts 614k organic followers, with an average of Instagram. Overall, the twelve luxury hotel 61k followers per property, excluding the brands reach a total of 7.2m followers, with Figure 1 - Most followers / brand account brand page – out of the brands reviewed an average of 106k followers per social  @ Best global social media presence across all eight in this study, this is the highest score. The media account. researched platforms. Peninsula Hotels, equally with only 10 properties, also show active Social Media work, with a total of 532k followers and an average of 53k followers per property. Starwood‘s lifestyle brand W Hotels, a hotel brand that reaches more than 2m social media followers in total within their 49 properties, accumulates an average of The Dorchester 42k followers per property, leaving them in Collection third place for most average followers per property on all channels of the included brands. The Brand accounts and pages are the faces of Peninsula Hotels W Hotels companies, and the following three deserve appraisal for their global brand social media presence. The Ritz-Carlton’s social media Figure 2 - Most average followers / property brand accounts reach a total of more than @ Highest average followers per property across  3m followers, thereby showing the most all eight social media channels. numerous and extensive social media

ndiviual property performances and their social media presence have been evaluated in terms of their total amount of followers across all platforms.

IHere, Cairo at The First Residence, a Four Seasons property, with a total amount of more than 200k followers, earns the gold medal. Especially its efficient Facebook strategy and constructive Cairo at development of cross-promotion amongst their accounts are an important The First influence for their social media presence.

Residence The Bora Bora Resort, also a Four Seasons hotel, comes in 2nd with 193k followers mainly due to its active presence on Instagram.

Bora Bora Resort George V The George V Paris, also part of Four Seasons, completes the top three Paris properties for total social media presence, by reaching 182k followers and being closely Figure 3 - Most overall followers behind the first two.  @ The most dominant individual property accounts on all eight social media platforms with an average reach of 193k followers.

hese properties attract the most followers on Facebook: Cairo at The First Residence, Four Seasons (193k), Cairo at Nile Plaza, Four Seasons Cairo at T(147k), Ritz-Carlton Dubai (144k), Ritz-Carl- The First ton Seoul (141k), and W Taipei (134k). Residence On Instagram, extraordinary locations are Cairo at followed the most: The Nile Plaza Ritz-Carlton, Four Seasons Bora Bora (112k), Four Sea- Dubai sons Paris (80k), Four Seasons Maldives (77k), W Maldives (54k), and Plaza Athénée, Figure 4 - Most followers on Facebook Dorchester Collection (53.6k). @ The most performant players with an average reach of 160k followers. Twitter works the best for business and city hotels: The Dorchester, Dorchester Collection (42k), Four Seasons Hong Kong (40k), Mandarin Oriental Las Vegas (37k), Four Seasons Paris (29k), and the Beverly Hills Hotel, Dorches- ter Collection (28k).

Bora Bora Resort, The Dorchester Four Seasons

George V Paris, Hong Kong, Las Vegas, Four Seasons Maldives Resort, Four Seasons Four Seasons Mandarin Oriental

Figure 5 - Most followers on Instagram Figure 6 - Most followers on Twitter @ Extraordinary places, like above, @ These properties in big cities reach an average of 89k followers. reach about 39k followers.

Facebook Brand account distribution Property account distribution property manages an average per platform per platform Twitter of 2 to 6 different social 2,1% 4,7% Instagram media accounts. Screening the Pinterest properties, it quickly becomes 14,1% 12,9% 6% Google+ clear that there are preferences 7,1% 24,5% LinkedIn Aof using some social media platforms over 14,1% 21,6% Flickr others. Facebook is the most frequented 11,8% platform of the 503 individual properties 16,2% YouTube 12,9% that are part of this study, with 90% having 14,1% 5,6% 19,4% their own Facebook page. Google+ and 12,9% Instagram are frequented at 80% and 72%, closely followed Twitter. The remaining four social media platforms show neither relevance, nor large amounts of property Brand account followers Property account followers pages. per platform per platform For both properties and brands, Facebook 1,1% 0,002% 0,0002% 0,6% 3,3% 0,04% is the most important network of the 0,3% hospitality industry. In total, 24.5% of all

0,4% 16,5% accounts registered in this study were 1,6% 17,7% found on Facebook, however the accounts

46,9% on Facebook are able to capture a total

66,6% of 66.6% followers across all platforms. 19,9% 11% As a comparison, Google+ represents 21,7% of the accounts of this study, while 14,1% only capturing 3.3% of all followers. In all cases, Twitter and Instagram have a fair ratio of presence vs. followers, both on global brand and property level. Pinterest, Flickr and LinkedIn together represent less @ Facebook is the most common platform for both, brands and individual properties. than 30% of used accounts by properties, @ The number of accounts per individual property does not result in an increase of followers. showing little relevance. For global brand @ Google+ is used by many properties, but does not account for a good reach. accounts, however, the repartition between @ The presence of brands and individual properties is similar for Twitter and Instagram. platforms is more fair.

he top 3 brands in terms of number of accounts per platform, excluding brand accounts, are The Dorchester Collection, Ø total accounts per property Waldorf Astoria and W Hotels. TAlthough small in actual quantity of pro- Brand Total accounts Total properties Ø total accounts / property perties, they are present with an average of 5 accounts per property. Similar findings The Dorchester Collection 57 10 5.7 were made with the average amount of Waldorf Astoria 132 26 5.1 followers per property per brand, excluding brand accounts: as seen earlier, the Dor- W Hotels 247 49 5.0 chester Collection and W Hotels are again among the top scorers, with Peninsula Ho- tels completing the top 3.

The findings suggest a correlation between the average number of accounts per brand Ø followers per property (excluding brand account) and the average number of followers they Total number of followers Ø followers / property can attract through different social media Brand Total properties (excl. brand account) (excl. brand account) platforms, even though most followers continue to connect through Facebook, Twitter The Dorchester Collection 613879 10 61388 and Instagram. This suggests an argument Peninsula Hotels 532120 10 53212 for the fact that cross-promotion amongst social media platforms is an active measure W Hotels 2079161 49 42432 of marketing that will continue to develop further. Additionally, the findings show that it is most important to be present and active on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, de- pending on the property‘s location, size and its target market: city hotels are putting a @ Properties have an average of 3.7 accounts across all brands. higher focus on Twitter to attract business @ Facebook is the top scorer for social media presence. travelers, while extraordinary locations are @ The amount of properties does not correlate with an increase of average followers. more likely to be present on Instagram, due @ The right choice and amount of accounts result in good reach and increased followers. to their outstanding visual appearance.

Brand Total Total hile a property account properties followers is important for a more Ritz-Carlton 90 3,299m personalized contact with potential and cur- Four Seasons 94 1,217m rent guests, brand ac- Wcounts gather all users with interest in a W Hotels 49 531k brand, naturally suggesting a large potenti- Mandarin al for brand loyalty. Figures show that the 29 512k Oriental Total accounts / brand brand accounts of all 12 investigated brands reach more than a third of the cumulated St. Regis 37 412k 8 followers connected to this study. These brand accounts showcase their brand image Waldorf 6 26 291k through daily updates and promotional Astoria campaigns, whilst supporting the individual 4 property pages. Brands need to ensure glo- Kempinski 70 219k bal brand presences on all important social 2 Oberoi 20 210k media channels in order to increase brand

Number of accounts 0 visibility and actively engage with their Park Hyatt 38 180k users.

Peninsula Aman 10 137k Oberoi The data shows that brands manage bet-

Hotels Regis St. W Hotels

Kempinski ween 2 to 8 accounts. The more platforms Park Hyatt Park

Ritz-Carlton a brand is present on, the more beneficial Dorchester Seasons Four 10 111k Collection Astoria Waldorf the efforts become, as both visibility and Peninsula Hotels Peninsula Mandarin Oriental engagement are increased across all media Aman 30 108k Dorchester Collection Dorchester platforms. The number of properties plays a role in attracting visitors to the brand page, TOTAL 503 7,227m therefore, especially brands with more than 50 properties, have few excuses for @ Average followers / brand account = 85k followers. a slowly developing social media presence. @ Average followers / properties = 7.7k followers. @ 33% of cumulated followers are reached with brand accounts. @ Brand pages showcase brand visibility and property promotion. @ To reach a maximum number of followers, brands need to be present on all platforms.

Social Media Presence: Percentage of Hotels per Brand on each platform n today‘s digitalised world, a corporate E-Commerce strategy must include con- Brand Facebook Twitter Instagram Pinterest Google+ LinkedIn Flickr YouTube sistent social media efforts, in order to ease the search for a prospect on social Aman * 63 % 13 % 50 % 3 % 90 % 10 % 0 % 0 % media. A coherent brand appearance is Dorchester Collection 100 % 100 % 100 % 100 % 90 % 80 % 0 % 0 % Iessential – not just on brand accounts, but also across property level to obtain a high Four Seasons 100 % 93 % 94 % 3 % 84 % 1 % 5 % 0 % average number of followers.

Kempinski * 80 % 51 % 76 % 19 % 57 % 31 % 13 % 26 % The Dorchester Collection properties all fol- Mandarin Oriental 100 % 83 % 100 % 24 % 86 % 0 % 24 % 21 % low the same strategy with equal number of accounts across all social media plat- Oberoi * 100 % 45 % 35 % 5 % 75 % 15 % 0 % 0 % forms. This high consistency is reflected by the highest average number of follo- Park Hyatt 97 % 71 % 92 % 50 % 82 % 45 % 16 % 21 % wers within this study, as demonstrated Peninsula Hotels 80 % 60 % 80 % 30 % 100 % 50 % 20 % 0 % earlier. Despite the fact that the brand is not actively present on Flickr and YouTu- Ritz-Carlton * 81 % 4 % 12 % 6 % 87 % 4 % 2 % 0 % be, they remain highly consistent on other social media platforms with a 95% rate of * St. Regis 97 % 73 % 92 % 27 % 70 % 49 % 8 % 59 % account presence per platform and delibe- W Hotels 100 % 94 % 100 % 33 % 90 % 33 % 6 % 49 % rately choose to not be present on others.

Waldorf Astoria 100 % 85 % 88 % 65 % 77 % 58 % 4 % 31 % On the contrary, companies without a vi- sible social media strategy, like Kempinski, * Brands, with less than 80% of their properties present on at least 3 platforms, are considered as inconsistent in terms of social media presence. Oberoi or Aman, are not yet able to attract a consistent number of followers. While some flagship properties are able to achieve high numbers of followers, less known properties fail to maintain or adapt to a si- miliar level. @ Flickr and YouTube are barely used by properties and companies alike. @ LinkedIn and Pinterest are only consistent for The Dorchester Collection. @ Consistency plays an important role in order to increase the amount of average followers. @ Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Google+ are used the most frequently.

he findings of the report clarify, which platforms to use, in order to achieve the highest number of potential followers. The dominant platforms are found to Tbe Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Here, properties and brands with a consistent so- Ø Followers / platform cial media strategy, maintain a good number of followers per account in return. Close to 95% of all followers of properties are Facebook found on the discussed three platforms. However Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter Instagram only make up 60% of all channels used by individual properties. Hence, there is still Twitter a huge opportunity to potentially increa- LinkedIn se the number of followers per individual property. Facebook alone, as the leader of Google+ social networks, reaches a total of 9m followers of all studied 503 properties, which Pinterest shows the significance of maintaining a Fa- YouTube cebook account for each individual property. Contrary to properties, the 3 discussed Flickr platforms are less significant in the social Ø Follower media appearance of brand accounts: only 0 5625 11250 16875 22500 57% of all brand followers are active on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter with a brand presence of 41%.

oogle+ is one of the most used Twitter. Having said that, LinkedIn, and its platforms across all brands. Ran- main mission of connecting job-opportuni- king 2nd in terms of number of ties with job-seekers, naturally atrracts a accounts, whilst only taking 8th different type of follower than traditional place when it comes to aver- social media platform, such as the previ- Gage number of followers. While accounts ously mentioned. are often created, they are frequently not managed well by properties, leading to a li- Lastly, YouTube bares great potential of mited reach and low number of followers engagement for hoteliers. Not only is the compared to their high account presence. In network the second largest search engine general, Google+ is not a follower-genera- in the world, but also counts more than one ting social network compared to Facebook billion users globally. However, the surveyed and Instagram, with only a few prominent companies have yet to take full advantage exceptions such as the St. Regis in Mumbai of the potentially interesting platform. The or the brand account of Ritz-Carlton. main reason for the lack of interest of companies in YouTube currently lies in the he- Pinterest and Flickr are not commonly used avy investment of resources, such as time by the studied brands, and those using the- and money to create videos and other rele- se platforms do not perform well in terms vant content. Using experienced “vloggers“ of reach or engagement. This finding is sup- or other experts as brand ambassadors can ported by the low number of followers on lead to an increase in reach and thus create these platforms across all accounts. Hence, new opportunities. the surveyed brands focus on the social media platforms that convert reach into eventual prospects of followers and future customers.

LinkedIn is mostly used by brands in order to promote and represent their companies on the job market. While LinkedIn represents only 6% of all used accounts within the different platforms and only 1% of the followers across all properties, it gathers more average followers than Google+ and ranks 4th behind Facebook, Instagram, and

he findings suggest that it If you are already well-aware of the com- is time to make a difference mon social media platforms why not try in the social media approach something new? of hotel brands. To increase the reach per property and Snapchat has been popular with Generation Tbrand account, it is essential to focus on Y and Millennials for a while. Brands can give a maximum of 4 social media platforms, followers share behind the scenes-content with the bare minimum being Facebook. with a more authentic approach. A great example of a successful strategy is W Hotels Properties are advised to include nothing with their use of personalized filters. Also, more than Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, brands should not shy away from YouTube, and LinkedIn for the ultimate reach of their as the amount of people on this platform is target audience, which includes all stake- fairly underrated when considering the le- holders such as customers, staff and any vel of brand awareness. Bloggers could be further individuals related to their business. used as brand ambassadors, as a mean to Overall, properties, just like brands, need to do a show-around the hotel or spend a day be approachable for followers and custo- vlogging about their hotel stay. mers on these platforms. A good way to get started is by showing updates about WhatsApp is another very personalized the property, its surroundings and feature medium to interact with guests throug- future events to maintain curiosity. Howe- hout their customer journey. It could either ver, properties should avoid spending time be used as a booking assistant, concierge on Google+, Flickr or Pinterest, as they are service, while the guest is present, or as a not frequented well enough to generate follow-up for feedback after departure. any noticable returns. Good news: it is not too late to get started! As brands represent the face of the com- There are more than enough innovative pany, they require a different approach, and and digital ways to not only interact with thus it is recommended, to use as many your guests, but also to learn their desires of the studied social networks as feasib- and wants and create improved customer le. Brand accounts can be used to promote experiences. So what are you waiting for? newly opened properties, updates or their Luck, doesn’t have to be part of your port- loyalty programs. Just keep in mind that ne- folio – all the best for your journey through ither the brand, nor property size matters, the social media world! but rather the follower engagement!

s this report comes to an end, @ Several brands and properties make use allow us to point out one of paid advertisement campaigns, to in- or two things before you go. crease their reach and followers in an “un- Firstly, thank you for stopping natural” manner, which may have falsified by and reading all the way to the numbers of some properties registered Athe end – it is highly appreciated. Be sure for this study. that we will be back with more insights on the digital hospitality world and how you @ Geographic limitations demonstra- can benefit from it all, soon. ted that not all social media platforms are equally used and appreciated by users The data of this report was accumulated around the globe. Reasons may vary from over a period of 4 months, during which the national governmental regulations, to alter- following limitations were encountered. native regional social networks being more popular in a given country – the most pro- @ 12 luxury hotel brands were considered minent example being WeChat and Weibo for this report, whilst being aware that se- in China. veral more exist. The choice of these 12 was purely subjective and based on recent digi- L.I.K.E. Hospitality Consulting declines all tal relevance. responsibility for the accuracy of the numbers and suggestions of this report, while @ Erratic numbers were discovered during confirming that the report was carried out the process of the research. For each num- in all conscience. This study was conducted ber an individual decision was taken, if it on an independent basis and does not pre- was to be removed to avoid falsifying the fer any property, brand or social media plat- results of the study. In the end, only 2 num- form. Analysis and conclusions were drawn bers were excluded from this report, namely purely on the data that was collected in The St. Regis Mumbai, showing an unusual the process of assembling this report. amount of 500k followers on their Google+ account and, likewise, the Google+ brand Get your hands on the full report now! account of Ritz-Carlton with 2m followers.

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