After a 20-month ride like no other 20 months, my wife and I embarked on an 11-day cruise to the Dutch Caribbean. I mention this because it felt like I had not taken a day off in 20 months. In actuality, we had made a couple of family trips that we had put off during the first year of this pandemic. But this is a story of the beginning of a great recovery.
The Celebrity cruise ship was capped at 60% capacity and staff numbered at 1,000 employees, almost a 1:1 relationship between guests and employees. Service was impeccable and the staff made it abundantly clear that they wanted to please. Practicing safety, 100% of the staff tested negative for COVID-19 at the end of the cruise. All guests had to be vaccinated and tested within 48 hours of embarkation.
The cruise industry is very similar to ours. So how are we going to grow our markets in hospitality this year? By wowing guests. Today’s guests will not likely remain brand loyal if not treated well. This time is an opportunity to both retain market share and grow it. Sure, we have our work cut out for us to find employees, deal with the new reality of pandemic fear and legislation, and hope for the return of business, as well as group and international travel. Marketing today will require a more predictive and customized approach to marketing than before. A new playbook with new tools is now required, and this can and should be done via storytelling, utilization of data and analytics and customer service.
The best storytelling advisor I know, Kindra Hall says, “with so many ways to get to know you and your business before they even reach out, if you aren't carefully crafting the story of who you are on your digital platforms, you may be losing leads before you even knew they were there.” Hall discusses how important it is to check your “about us” page on your website.
Moving to data utilization and analytics, the marketing focus has to be granular and scaled across the entire marketing organization, delivering “the right message to the right consumer, at the right moment, at the right place — all the time.”
By 2023, marketers will no longer be able to use cookies on a Google Chrome browser — what is being referred to as the “cookie-less future.” Without cookies to easily track consumer activity online, brands will need to find new ways to acquire consumer-facing data.
Brands that want to reduce their reliance on third-party data will need to decide how much they are going to invest in acquiring “zero-party” data — information that consumers explicitly share with a company — and first-party data, such as purchased information.
Digitally savvy talent is hard to find and costs more than we have paid before. There is an advantage to having great communication, sales and analytics skills, and being “tech-savvy.” Find someone with both analytics and sales skills, and you have a good candidate for chief marketing officer.
"Wow" customer service is easy to say, harder to do. Putting the general manager in the middle of the action at the front desk, at breakfast and at any manager reception or food and beverage activity can seal the deal with our guests. Put that in play and watch your reviews soar to new heights.
2022 is both an exciting year and a year of transition back to strong financial performance. Costs are higher, so the name of the game is driving revenue.
Robert A. Rauch, CHA, is CEO and founder of R.A. Rauch & Associates, a hospitality management and consulting firm based in San Diego.
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