In 2007, when the “Facebook ads” feature was launched, marketers around the world got a new way to promote their products.
NB: This is an article from eZee Absolute
Even the hoteliers saw it as an opportunity to connect with their guests and market their property to them. Moreover, with the targeted ads, hotels were able to reach specific types of guests which they could cater to. Because they were able to filter down the audience on the basis of their location, interests, gender, age, and so on.
Subscribe to our weekly newsletter and stay up to date
Another best thing about Facebook marketing was the costing part. The marketers can control the investment that goes into ads as per their budget. For instance, you can start with an investment of $1 only.
Hence, if someone wants to run a trial ad campaign, it becomes easy for them to get started. Talking about the ad campaigns, they are not limited to images; there are other options as well such as videos, polls, carousel, instant experience, and collection.
For hotels, Facebook proved more useful when it gave an option to promote events as well. Since the majority of users are millennials and GenZ, this feature has helped properties gain quite an audience.
In fact, the ‘book now’ option enabled guests to book any event directly.
Furthermore, to help hotels generate more revenue, Facebook launched its booking engine. This helped the users to book the property directly and avoid going through the hassles of visiting various platforms.
Despite these features, many hoteliers still wonder if it is worth investing in hotel Facebook marketing. Well, let me tell you about it ahead.
Is Facebook Marketing for Hotels Still Effective?
These days, one can find a gazillion platforms to promote and list their hotel. But, Facebook does have an upper hand. Let me tell you some interesting facts about Facebook marketing shared by HootSuite:
- 48.5% of B2B decision-makers do their research on Facebook
- One can reach around 2.2 billion users with the help of Facebook Ads
- Around 47% of Facebook ads revenue generates from US and Canada
- There is a remarkable rise of 12% global users
Considering these stats, I can say that Facebook marketing for hotels still stands as a solid strategy.
After covid-19, Facebook launched a campaign to promote local business. And it gained a lot of support across the world.
Due to this, the search for local businesses increased by 23% in 2020. In fact, hotels got an opportunity to promote their business among locals, as people started to move out of their homes for a change.
You might be aware that WhatsApp and Instagram are now a part of the Facebook universe. Well, this has given an add-on benefit to hotels. Let me tell you how.
The ‘book now’ option is replaced with a different CTA (Call to action) and that is to send a message on WhatsApp. It enables the Facebook users visiting any hotel’s page to connect with the property managers or owners for booking related queries. In this way, hotels can collect enough guest data and use it for personalised marketing.
Apart from that, any post that you create for your hotel’s Instagram profile can be simultaneously updated on your Facebook page as well.
As I said earlier, events are an important component of Facebook marketing for hotels. So, let’s say even if you feel that promoting your property is not working, you can always go with highlighting the events at your hotel.
What is the Future of Facebook Marketing for Hotels?
By now, I hope you’d be aware of the effectiveness of Facebook marketing. But, let me give you a bit of an overview of how the future of Facebook marketing for hotels would look like.
Recently, Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook’s name has been changed and will henceforth be called Meta. With that, he also introduced us to the concept of the Metaverse.
In case you missed that, do watch this video to understand more about it.
Although the concept is still under development, we can’t wait to learn more about it. As far as hotels are concerned, it can give them ample new ways to connect with guests.
It could be a 3D tour to guests before they book any property, an augmented reality-based experience of the hotel as they visit their page, or something else. The possibilities are endless.
But one thing I’m sure of is that the way Facebook has evolved over the years, and as it still continues to do so, hotels will never fail to benefit from it.
Conclusion
When Facebook was launched in 2004, no one imagined that it would become a platform with billions of users. Moreover, with the acquisition of WhatsApp and Instagram, things have taken a different turn.
From being just a platform to connect with friends to creating Metaverse, Facebook has grown exponentially. For hotels, it became a source to connect with travelers across the world.
This gave hotels a platform to widen their reach as well as facilitate more bookings. Although it may seem that there is a depletion of Facebook users, the recorded stats tell a different story.
If you ask my opinion, I’d say you should not opt out of Facebook marketing. The way it is introducing new features day by day, you can expect more in the coming days.
Also, we need to explore the Metaverse. And I would be doing a separate blog for that. But that’s a different story altogether.
For now, I’d just summarise the entire blog in a couple of statements:
Facebook marketing for hotels is much more effective than it was years ago. And if you are not doing it, it’s time for you to get going with it or else you will be losing some valuable guests out there.
