Suite Spot: A Hotel Marketing Podcast

In this episode of Suite Spot, we examine the growing impact of vacation rentals and private accommodations on today’s hotel industry. Host Ryan Embree is joined by guest Amber Wojcek, Marketing Coordinator at Travel Media Group and author of many of our blogs and white papers. In the What’s News segment, Ryan and Amber react to a recent article from Tnooz reporting the year over year growth of vacation rentals and its overall share of global room bookings. In The Suite Spot, Ryan asks Amber what is driving vacation rental popularity and growth from the modern day traveler. Amber also recognizes the drawbacks to private accommodations and uncovers places where hotels have the advantage. In the Q&A segment, we answer a question from a hotelier on how to better position their hotel to compete with local Airbnbs and other private accommodations. To submit a question for future episodes, call or text (407) 984-7455. Resources we mentioned: https://www.tnooz.com/article/private-accommodation-travel-bookings-to-reach-106-billion-by-2018/ How Hotels Can Compete with Rentals [White Paper] Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.åÊ Ryan Embree: Welcome to the Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending and hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another exciting episode of Suite Spot. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and today it’s my pleasure to introduce Amber Wojcek. Amber is our marketing coordinator at Travel Media Group as well as the author of many of our blogs and white papers. Good morning, Amber. How are you doing today? Amber Wojcek: I’m doing great. Thanks for having me. Ryan Embree: Let’s jump into our What’s News segment. Today we’re going to be looking at a recent article on Tnooz, which forecasts that private accommodations and vacation rentals are expected to hit almost 20 percent of the overall share of global room bookings in 2018. That is significantly higher than previous years. In 2014, that number was 16 percent and in 2016 that grew up to 18 percent. So since private accommodations are taking almost a fifth of the market share, major travel resources like OTAs and TripAdvisor or making space for them on their websites and making them a priority. So Amber, what I want to talk about today is about the recent changes that we’re seeing when it comes specifically to TripAdvisor and vacation rentals. Amber Wojcek: Yeah. I think a big indicator of this trend coming to stay was when Expedia purchased HomeAway back in 2015 and now we’re seeing that TripAdvisor is making some big moves to make it easier to search for private rentals when people are looking for hotels. We’ve learned that now and TripAdvisor, when you search for a hotel, you might also see B and B’s, hostels inns, and other kinds of accommodations in the results along with hotels. We’re seeing this display differently when we tried different searches. So I think they might be testing the ways they want to show this, but I wouldn’t be surprised that they start integrating vacation rentals section even more. Ryan Embree: So you’re saying when a user would go to TripAdvisor and input a city or region, now B and B’s and rentals will appear in the main feed along with hotels. Amber Wojcek: Yes, exactly. So there some filters on the side that change how you search for things, but we’re also seeing them just showing up along with the hotels. And another thing I think is worth considering is that a big barrier that people have had to booking rentals has been that you need to submit a request and wait for an owner to approve it. We’re hearing now that Booking.com is making rentals instantly bookable soon, like a hotel which could have a big impact and I would assume that other OTAs would follow suit. So basically now if you’re a hotel, you’re not only competing for visibility and reservations with all the other hotels, near you, but also with other accommodation types. Ryan Embree: So this article really gets into how competitive hotels are. Now we’re going to have to be against these vacation rentals and with the influx of and, and other rental properties gaining more and more exposure to travelers. There’s a huge potential for significant visibility change for your hotel. And it could be positive or negative with the rise of sites and apps like Airbnb, HomeAway, VRBO, and other vacation rental platforms. Travelers have more options than ever, but unfortunately for hoteliers, that means there’s more competition than ever, which is actually a great segue into today’s Suite Spot topic. Today we’re going to focus on hotels going head to head

In the first episode of Suite Spot, we explore the state of millennial travel. Host Ryan Embree is joined by guest Anne Sandoval, Marketing Director at Travel Media Group and adjunct instructor of Social Media at UCF. In the What’s News segment, Ryan and Anne discuss a report by Travelport which forecasts that millennials will spend more on vacations than other age groups in 2018. In The Suite Spot, Ryan identifies four primary social networks hoteliers use to reach millennials. He also asks Anne to provide insight on how hotel marketers should approach each social network. In the Q&A segment, find out our top suggestions for engaging Facebook posts for hotels. To submit a question for future episodes, call or text (407) 984-7455. •ÈÀ•ÈÀ Resources we mentioned: https://ehotelier.com/global/2018/05/22/u-s-millennials-likely-take-spend-vacations-year/ http://www.pewinternet.org/2018/03/01/social-media-use-in-2018/ http://www.businessinsider.com/pinterest-as-a-brand-platform-2014-11 http://www.travelmediagroup.com/infographic-10-engaging-social-media-topics-for-hotels/ Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio. Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending and hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. I want to welcome everyone to our first ever episode of Suite Spot. I’m super excited that you are listening today and today we’ve got a very special guest and I am personally super excited because we have Anne Sandoval with us. She is our marketing director here at Travel Media Group as well as an instructor at the University of Central Florida where she teaches social media. Good morning, Anne. Anne Sandoval: Good Morning Ryan. I’m so happy to be here and join you on this podcast. Ryan Embree: Absolutely, and we’re super excited to be launching this new Suite Spot podcast. So since it’s our first episode, I’ll go ahead and give a quick rundown of how each episode here at Suite Spot is going to work. First we’re going to go into a segment called what’s news? This is what’s trending in the hospitality industry. Next we’re going to move into our Suite Spot. This is the main subject that we’re going to be focusing on for the majority of the episode. And then lastly, we’re going to follow that up with a Q&A segment where we take questions from hoteliers and listeners like you and answer those live on air. All right, so let’s go ahead and get started. So in today’s, what’s news? We’re gonna be looking at a recent study that was conducted by Travelport and in this study they took a look at different age groups and their traveling trends. And one of the age groups that they found particularly surprising were the millennials. Anne Sandoval: That’s really interesting, you know, a lot of hoteliers may think of millennials as really young folks who aren’t really ready to invest in vacations, but millennials span ages 18 to 34. So it’s not just people who are right out of high school, but it’s also people with young families and people who are young in their careers. Ryan Embree: Absolutely. And what this study also found is not only are they more likely to go on vacation, but they’re also more willing to spend on vacation than any other age group. The Gen Xers and the baby boomers, there are actually 34 percent of millennials plan to spend more than $5,000 on upcoming vacations this summer. Anne Sandoval: You know, that number is really interesting because millennials in this age group, they may not have a lot of extra money to spend, but they’re willing to invest $5,000 a year on vacations, so that means that they must really be prioritizing travel and they’re looking for those experiences. Ryan Embree: So the study really went in depth on some of these traveling trends and found that nearly half of the respondents had traveled for either business or leisure within the last year. But again, the age group that kept coming up was millennials which had traveled to most in the past 12 months. Anne Sandoval: It also found that millennials who have grown up using digital technologies are more likely to use a travel agency to book travel if there’s a mobile app with customized notifications available. Ryan Embree: So when we analyze these studies and we look at it and we say, you know, we ask why is this important for hoteliers to know if hoteliers know what age group is more likely to vacation and travel, then they can really tailor and customize their marketing strategy accordingly and with millennials traveling and spending more, there’s a huge revenue potential there for hoteliers out there. Anne Sandoval: With almost