Importance Of E-marketing In The Hotel Industry

E-marketing

Discuss about the E Marketing in Hotel Industry.

In this present study, we will learn the importance of E-marketing for the businesses of today’s era. As we know that there is a great transformation in the business of 20 years back and now. There is a drastic change in the business models and strategies used by the industries. Though, there are many companies who are following the old trend in their business but they are facing a huge amount of competition and unable to survive in this challenging world. Therefore, we can analyze that e-marketing is very important for every business to have a competitive advantage from the competitors.

E-marketing is a simple process by which a company can reach to its potential and existing customers using internet services. There are many methods available by which organizations can establish an effective internet marketing to reach to the global customers. In this study we understand the most common activities related to e marketing of business. We will also discuss about the various tools and technologies that is helping businesses in analysis of e marketing. There is a requirement of online tools like internet. The company must have an online presence either through websites or through e-stores, blogs, or any other method. In this way a company will reach to its potential and existing customers. They should also use the other methods so that they can easily contact and encourage the online visitors and attract them to buy your goods and services.

We will understand the importance of internet marketing for the hospitality industry hotel industries. The other part of the study will introduce the business model of the hotel industry. There are many types of business models that are used by hotel industry but it is not relevant that every model is best suited on every hotels. The last part will let us know about the search marketing of hotel industry. We will learn about the many concepts related to search marketing.

E-marketing refers to any type of marketing that is done by using internet, online, website or any other tool related to internet sources. The other methods are generally free while e-marketing may or may not include a fee or charges depending upon the nature and type of the same. There are a huge variety of e-marketing tools that are available for the users like emails, text messages, messaging, websites, web pages, banners, images, advertisement, blogs, videos, social media like Facebook, twitter, watsapp, instragram, etc, search engines, and much more (Derouiche, 2015).

Search engine marketing (SEM)

The company must have an online presence either through websites or through e-stores, blogs, or any other method. In this way a company will reach to its potential and existing customers. They should also use the other methods so that they can easily contact and encourage the online visitors and attract them to buy your goods and services. E-marketing has helped industries to promote their products and services in not only the domestic nation but also the international markets as it has a global reach. It is very effective in terms of time and money (Kotler & Armstrong, 2012).

The main and most important marketing activities related to internet marketing are newsletters, social media, optimization of search engines, mobile phones, webinars, etc. newsletters is a type of mailing and advertising that is perfect for the clients who may not available on other channels. Social media is related to the apps that provide a platform for companies to inform their customers like twitter, Facebook, etc. Search engines are like google search and other search platforms. By using mobile phones, many companies are getting good results in their businesses. Seminars are used in the process of promotion of goods and services on online platform.

By using all the drivers of e-marketing, hotel industries are converting their local markets to international one. They can now access with international clients with the use of internet services. The process of internet marketing is very effective as it helps hotel industries to reach to their target customers and optimize the use of marketing strategies. The performance of many companies also enhanced due to adoption of internet marketing (Pires, Stanton, & Rita, 2006).

There are many drivers of change related to the internet marketing of goods and services. E-marketing has become very important for hotel industry as it is creating a good impact on the business. As compared to traditional marketing, e marketing has brought incredible changes. A successful a significant e-marketing comprises of a set of actions and activities that will help the hoteliers to reach to their target audience and potential customers. These activities are divided in five points. Firstly, let us discuss about all and then select the most relevant driver of e marketing for hotel industry (Russel, 2008).

The fist driver is social media marketing that includes Facebook, twitter, YouTube, etc. that helps to spread the information on a very fast scale to all the audience. The second driver is mobile advertising that provides fast connectivity to the organizations. Email advertising is one of the old methods of internet marketing. It is also a powerful tool for the promotion of goods and services. Emails and newsletters are one and the same thing. The display advertising is also a traditional method of advertising that has now changed in e marketing as it has now adopted the methods of online methods. Some examples are web banners, text ads, picture ads, etc. (Yoo, Lee, & Bai, 2011).

Features of search engine marketing

In the large majority of people, it is the most used driver by the customers to search for information and data about the hotels, restaurants and travel destinations online. Therefore, it is the most effective driver of marketing by which companies can target their potential customers when they search for hotels or destinations. In the hotel industry, there are two options available for an hotelier with in regards to Search engine marketing. The first engine is search engine optimization (SEO).  It helps hotel industry to optimize the organic of websites that are non-sponsored search ranking in the search enhance results papers (SERPs). It increases the relevance of content to the search items. It includes many types of techniques that help to improve the Search engine marketing (Osterwalder, Pigneur, & Tucci, 2005).

Conversion optimizer is a technique that provides several methods to enhance the rate of websites that will affect the booking of the website visits. It also optimizes the element of HTML that includes website design, keywords, header tags, description, name, etc. the optimization of content will be done through search engine marketing as it match the search content of the guests. It provides a good value to the clients by easy and helps in search also (Wilkie & Moore, 2003).

The most prominent changes that have been observed are that e-marketing is a technique that can be used against the competitors who are using traditional method of marketing in hotel industries. It is also a challenge for the new entrants in the market. As we know that the environment of business is changing every day. To cope up the changes hotel industries are now adopting e-marketing (Baskerville & Myers, 2002).

There are many types of changes that take place after the invention of e-marketing. It is helping in the formation of strategic policies that facilitates the performance of hotels. The management of data, information, and technology is become possible due to it. We can notice that it is divided into three segments; operations, guest services and management of information. Three of them are the major areas where e-marketing is very relevant. It provides flexibility, quality, efficiency, in the working and helps in the process of promotion. E-marketing facilitates the sale and revenue of the hotels though effective promotions held by them. It is a huge platform for the hotel industry and the hoteliers to promote their goods and services by using e-marketing strategies (Cighi, 2009).

The impact of e-marketing on hotel industries

A business model of an organization is and summarize representation of the structure and management of an organization that is conceptual in nature, graphical, textual, interrelated architectural, operations, functional and the financial management and arrangements of all the above. It is designed and developed by the top management of the company to perform the work at the present time and in future to achieve the objectives and goals of the same.  A business model has the caliber to describe the rationale of an organization. It develops the future possibilities for the managers (Enz, Canina, & Walsh, 2001).

The business strategy and the business models are very closely related to each other. They both represent the strategies of the business organization that aims are to satisfy the customers and create value in the market for the organization. There are many industries that not only use business models but also a combination of business strategy and model both at a time. Business strategy leads in a successful competitive advantage for the organization (Choi, & Kimes, 2002).

Stakeholders	Corporate governance	Business planning
Perspective strategies	Mergers & acquisitions/projects	Marketing and sales

Hospitality/hotel industry

Hospitality operational service

Accommodations revenue board

Food and beverage

Entertainment, tours, and other revenue utilities

Hospitality/hotel industry

Support process

Sales and marketing

Finance

HR & administration

Hospitality/hotel industry

Support process out

Procurement of supply chain

Engineering

IT

Hospitality/hotel industry

Cost board

Operator risk and team building

Write off bad debts

Effective security

Hospitality/hotel industry

Corporate process

Owners risk

Assets management

Equipment analysis

Hospitality/hotel industry

Audits

Legal compliance

Manual check

Commercial policy

Direct sales model

In this model, the main strategy is to sell the goods and service by the sales person directly to the client. There is no need of fixed retail shops or stores for doing such type of sales. Instead of this, the sales persons are connected with the parent companies and customers who directly generate the revenue for the firm. It is effective for the hotel industry as they can have direct client relations (Lambert, & Davidson, 2013).

Franchise model

In this model, there is no need to create a new product or service. The only need is to take the franchise from the head company and then deliver the standard products and services to the customers. The owners of the franchise have the right to own a particular amount of revenue from the main company. With fixed amount, there are certain incentives policies set for them according to which they can earn more. It is one of the most famous models in food chain industry like pizza hut, dominos, etc. (Kayaman, & Arasli, 2007)

Freemium model

It is best suited for the companies who want to set up an online business. To enhance the future transactions, the companies do not give sot to the customers. It helps to enhance good relations with the customers. These types of models are adopted by the companies whose aim is to establish good relation with the customers. They also offer many types of advanced and free services to the customers. The cost of acquit ion for such model for the customers is very low like internet services and online access. These models provide high life time value for the customers. For example spotify and Skype (Jiang, Dev, & Rao, 2002).

Business model and strategies

Subscription model

These types of models are used by company who have a high value for their customer and who want to retain their customers for a longer period o time. Many companies who generally operate online create the subscription model in which they require online log in, payment plans, fees for cancellations, etc. They are risk free models (Law & Veen, 2008).

In my opinion, hotel industry must adopt more than one business model in their organization. It is recommended that there must be a combination of business models and business strategies so that the management can takes place in an efficient and effective way. The business models and strategies are designed and developed by the top management of the company to perform the work at the present time and in future to achieve the objectives and goals of the organization.  The strategies and models collectively work to accomplish the two main goals of hotel industry that are firstly they create the demand of the customers by increasing the volume of the business and also maximize the margins (Brady, 2011).

The business model sets the price at a higher level so that more profits can be earned. The retention rate of the customers is also increased by business models. Secondly, it lowers the cost of production by developing such strategies related to the production, selling, distribution, storage, services, etc. the cost of infrastructure and operational cost is also decrease with the effective use of business models an strategies (Richardson, 2011).

In the last few years, the internet and online marketing is gaining a good amount of value and attention. In other words, we can say that making a websites for the business and organizations is similar as making a banner for any shop or enterprise that is required to be place effectively. It helps to attract the potential customer in the market place and inform the about the business. Now days, the websites are helping the business organization in generating good amount of revenue and providing good leads to them. They are capable of doing such activities as websites are designed in a way that they attract more and more customers to the firm (El-Gohary, 2012).

The meaning of search marketing is to promote the website of a company by enhancing the presence of the same in the Search Engine Pages (SERPs). Now days, the irrelevant and out-dated websites are just not worth for the companies as the customers only look towards the updated versions and organized web pages and websites. It can become effective through spending time and money on it. There must be good content of the company. In term of search engines, it is more relevant and important. It is a kind of inevitable source in the highly competitive environment of business organizations where companies can perform best through being in the top of SERPs (First, 2016).

Business Model- Hotels

Here we discuss about the major six concepts related to search marketing-

There must be an understanding for search engines- Organizations must understand the relevancy of search engines as they are the one who make the online business successful. Therefore, they should learn that how the search engines help the running and working of the websites (Xu & Quaddus, 2010).

Selection of the keywords- There should be proper incorporation of keywords should take place in the formation of websites as it is the most important concept of the same. This process is also termed as content optimization. Keyword means the sentence of word typed at the time of search.

Selection of the URL of the websites- The companies should be careful while selecting the URL for the company. It is noticed that companies whose URLs are easy and friendly are more effective in comparison of others. Especially, when a company is dealing in customer’s goods and services, it becomes more relevant (Slater, Hult, & Olson, 2010).

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) and organic results- It is a decent way to enhance the presence of websites if they are effectively used.  PPC give platform for the search engines and the organic results helps to influence the ranks of the search engines (Strauss, 2016).

Back limits- These links play a crucial role to improve the reputation of the websites if the other websites are trying to endorse your own websites. Therefore, the content of the websites must be of good quality.

The effective use of google tools- Product research, coupons, sitemaps, and analytics are the major tools that help to monitor the performance of the websites and also the valuable information (Tsiotsou & Goldsmith, 2012).

Now days, the internet has become one of the most demanded in crowed place. Every organization is facing a huge amount of competition in search engine results. Simultaneously, the customers are looking for the goods and services that can improve the standards of living. The local research has become very popular and also important. The search of online terms is moving from the desktop to handy items. With the interference of mobile technology, the search is become easier for the customers. It is observed that in 2015, the search had crossed the milestone. The search volumes are increasing on a high scale. There is a traffic in the searches of local terms that is converting in a better sense (Pride & Ferrell, 2012).

Various types of business models

Conclusion

The present study describes about various types of benefits that companies have due to the invention of internet and internet marketing. It is helping out in many ways like time saving global reach, productivity, effectiveness and the overall growth and development of the company is directly or indirectly related to the marketing of the same. There are many drivers of internet marketing like social media, phones, emails, newsletters, etc. the use of internet in hotel industry has brought an immense change in the working of hospitality industry. The innovation takes place after the internet marketing is very effective and efficient as it is turning the old and traditional ways of marketing into new and innovative ways that are very prominent in nature.

In the second part, we have discussed about the business models and business strategies adopted by the organizations and especially the hotel industries. The business model crates a high impact on the performance of an industry as it regulates and controls the working o the entire organization. In this study we have learnt different types of business models like Freemium, franchise, etc. they all are very impactful and create positive influence on the organizations. It is not mandatory that a hotel adopt a single business model. It is observed that hotels that are maintain their structure through more than one business models and with the effect of business strategies are more successful and growing. Hence we can say that business models are created in accordance with the need and requirement.

At last, we have studied about the search marketing. Search marketing refers to the promotion of the websites of a company by enhancing the presence of the same in the Search Engine Pages (SERPs). Now days, the irrelevant and out-dated websites are just not worth for the companies as the customers only look towards the updated versions and organized web pages and websites.

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