‘Authenticity is quickly becoming the new cultural currency’,- Richard Hyde, managing director of Small Luxury Hotels.
NB: This is an article from Net Affinity
Buzzwords like authenticity have surrounded marketing efforts for years as advertisers of all kinds have conducted brainstorms on how to seem more relatable to the people they are selling to. That includes hoteliers.
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TikTok is the second most visited website
The Gen Z member of the social media family, TikTok, has an algorithm that prioritizes content types over creators. Marketers who have tried to chase success with direct response ads on the platform have failed – “unscripted, off-the-cuff content blew the direct-response-style content away in all of our metrics. Testimonials [also] always do well and continue to perform in simple static ads with real people.” – Jeannie Assimos, head of content for Way.com.
TikTok name themselves ‘the leading destination for short-form mobile video. Our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy‘. They are a social media platform built upon sharing short videos that usually continue to loop.
TikTok and the travel industry
More recently, travel companies in their droves have begun using TikTok to build brand awareness and attract new customers. There are numerous reasons for this – it’s the most downloaded app for two years in a row, it dangles the potential for global reach and the video format gives hoteliers the opportunity to immerse people in their surroundings as well as showing off their brand’s personality.
An example within the travel industry is Booking.com’s TikTok campaign during the summer – TikTokMadeMeBookIt (the prize is a trip away, and to win, users must live in a certain location, ‘like’ the video, follow @bookingcom, and be able to leave within 48 hours.
“The TikTok community is already actively engaged in travel content – #travel has more than 90 billion views – so it is a natural fit for Booking.com to be an active part of this,” – Director of Social Media at Booking.com, Laura Kaye. Like anything new, it needs to be tested out in order to find the right balance, find out what works. Even the biggest companies do this! ‘We don’t really know what the TikTok community is looking for. We’re using the launch to build an audience, and we’re attracting people by giving away trips and putting out a bunch of different content to see what is resonating.’ – Laura Kaye
Skyscanner is another brand who are starting to explore TikTok. Like many travel brands giving it a stab, they think TikTok is a great way to connect with people in the ‘discovery phase’ of their journey.
The travel tag on TikTok is one of the most popular, with currently over 50 billion views
As a video-based social media app, TikTok is the perfect hotel marketing tool to showcase everything your hotel has to offer people.
Other popular tags include #smallluxuryhotels (more than 3 million views), #hoteldesign (more than 13 million views), and #besthotel (33 million views)
While we don’t think it’s worth spending hours of your time intricately editing TiktTok videos, it is worth looking at from a brand awareness point of view – if you have the resources in-house to do so. You will reach users with content that is fun, beautiful or with something that feels more personal, more unpolished.
