TIM 304 Final

What kind of research should be conducted for the communications mix?

Research for the Communications Mix • We must know the target market to develop the optimal communications mix and strategy, we must use media research • Entails a comprehensive review of the readership or viewership data gathered and measured by the media under consideration • In the long run, good research ensures that communications dollars deliver best return in terms of audience delivery and response. • Many properties (e.g. individually owned restaurants) will not have such involved communications mixes • Properties most likely engage in merchandising, sales promotion, and some advertising, if not personal selling • Good public relations can be used by any business • Research should be conducted both internally and externally • Five major questions to be answered * Where Are We Now? • How are we perceived by prospective customers now? • How do we compare with the competition? • What do their customers think of us? • Are they aware of what we have to offer? • Have they tried us? Why not? • If they have tried us, do they return? Why or why not? • What are their attitudes and feelings? • Doesn't matter what management think if consumers don't think it. * Why Are We There? • Evaluate product and previous communications efforts • Do we need to change the product? Or change the perceptions? • Besides product evaluation, we should consider the following questions: • Are prices perceived to be too high? • What is the real quality level of our service? • Is the competition doing the same thing, only better? • Are our attributes and benefits what we think they are? • Do we really solve consumers' problems? Are they the right ones? • What puts us in this position? • What are our strengths and weaknesses? • What are the users' dissatisfactions? • What is the profile of users? • What is the usage pattern of users? • Have we communicated what we want to communicate? • How is our product used? • Find out how we got to where we are. Good to know what you are doing right and why as well. * Where Could We Be? • Be realistic. • Do we have the right staff? Can we afford to do it without raising the prices? Do we have the market for it? • Is it realistic to change perceptions? • Also consider: • What market position could we achieve? • Are there new buyers and users out there? • Can we increase awareness? • Can we change beliefs or create new ones? • Can we increase benefits and solve other problems? • Do we have the right target markets? Are there others? • Can we create new target markets? • Can we steal from the competition? • What unmet needs, wants, and problems are there that we have the capability of fulfilling? Use these answers to establish our communication objectives. * How Can We Get There? • The creative thinking part • When based on good, solid research, it is easier and more likely to work. • What do we have to change? • Product/service mix? Presentation mix? The product, the service, the price, the atmospherics, the facilities, the employees, or perhaps the location. • Might have to change the distribution networks or the target market • Once we have the product right (and not until then), we can commence the effort to change what we have to change via the communications mix. • The customer doesn't like to be fooled, and certainly not twice. * Are We Getting There? • Probably the most neglected stage of communications research • Means starting over at the beginning, except that now the field is narrower because we know what we are looking for. • Measure the impact of communication - what have we or haven't we changed? • Not have we gained more customers, but have we changed perceptions?

How can you design your sales promotions to fulfill your marketing needs?

• Sales promotions are designed to fulfill a specific marketing need • First thing is to define that need: create new business, create awareness, and create trial purchase, increase demand in slow periods, take business away from the competition, meet the competition in its own promotional efforts • Promotions should be tied to something positive, such as a new or better facility, a new product, or a special time or offering • Promotions tied to negative features (e.g. lack of business) tend to backfire. • Coupons designed to generate business by bringing in new customers do not work. Even if they do succeed in bringing in customers, they may not be from the designated target market, and few of them may ever return. • There may be a temporary increase in business, but it is obtained at a cost. • The net gain is minimal, if not negative. • Discount in such a way that you don't sabotage the integrity of your menu. • Disguise the lure, as there is always a correlation between product and price in the consumer's mind • Over time, discounting raises questions about the integrity of your pricing structure • If you must discount, put together a separate package to your regular offering that will engender no recognizable negative effect on your customer's perception of the value and price of your menu.

What are the future challenges of online distribution?

• The Internet has fundamentally changed travel and hospitality distribution, creating key challenges that marketing managers in the hospitality industry are facing 1. The consideration set for travel options has expanded exponentially as search engines provide multiple travel options within seconds. • The competitive set may be not only other properties in your destination, but other destinations around the world. • Problems may be solved outside the normal geographic area that a marketing manager typically thinks about. 2. Price transparency and consistency • Component of both brand integrity and customer loyalty is trust as the consumer must trust that the brand will look after the customer's best interest and not practice opportunistic behavior • When prices vary for no particular reason, trust erodes • Hotel must carefully manage its prices across the various distribution channels • Many firms post the "best available rate" on their own websites 3. Need to manage transaction costs • Better understand their customers and determine ways to drive them through the most efficient channel • Critical component of this goal is understanding the types of info customers want to see about a specific destination or property and provide it to them. 4. Reallocation of marketing dollars (increasing spending on online channels, search engine optimization, web site design and functionality) 5. Advent of what is known as Web 2.0 • Web 2.0: refer to a supposed second generation of Internet-based services that let people collaborate and share information online in a new way - such as social networking sites, wikis (a type of website that enables users to easily add, remove or otherwise edit and change some available content, sometimes without the need for registration) and folksonomies (the process of folksonomic tagging is intended to make a body of info increasingly easier to search, discover, and navigate over time). • Examples: myspace and tripadvisor • Marketers need to keep well informed about what people are saying about the organization • RSS - real simple syndication: enables consumers to customize the information that they wish to receive so they don't need to look the information up daily (great deals come your way, not the other way) 6. Onward distribution: the process whereby negotiated rates to wholesalers are passed on to other websites either intentionally or unintentionally • Most websites have good intentions, but some can easily dilute your brand by catering to a different market and boasting deeply discounted room rates and making negotiated rates available to the public, undercutting your own "best available rate" • Ensure you have an onward distribution clause on all of your contracts with those suppliers. 7. Rise of third parties that are going after the group market 8. Increase in packaging • Good challenge because it allows the hospitality organization to mask the price of the individual components • Challenge arises in the software needed to create dynamic packaging, which is what the consumer demands.

How can databases be used?

* Using the Database • Database marketing should first be employed to contact past customers - assemble list through PMS, registration cards, old invoices, credit card companies, business cards, or e-mail addresses from the website • Consensual marketing can be used to build databases - customers offer their e-mail in exchange for newsletters, info on special packages. • Use software to organize list of past customers, then use fields (indication on the database that one characteristic is different from another) to segment the customers. Fields: residence of guest, date of reservation/checkout, market segment type, amount spent. • Database marketing has been tracking driven, typically requiring returns of between 2-5% to be deemed successful • Database marketing now has an image component that remains untrackable; keeps the hospitality entity in touch with its customers • New customers can be obtained through database marketing • New customers can be found by profiling past customers, as similar customers tend to buy similar faciltiies. By analyzing the fields of the past customers, a very good picture of new customers begins to emerge. Past customer fields: age, location, income, type of car driven, purchase habits, media usage, local business contacts, number of visits to restaurants in a month. • Seek lists of "like" customers • Electronic commerce cannot be successful without an up-to-date and accurate database • Hospitality industry requires consumers to provide name, address, and method of payment before consuming the product • Purpose of frequent guest programs is to record purchase behaviors • Good database will contain the recency of purchase, the frequency of purchase, the monetary value of the purchases, and the specific items purchased • Cost of data storage has declined • Collect customers' preferences to develop a long-term relationship with customer * Ways to Use the Database 1. Customer segmentation • Some are more valuable than others, use RFM analysis (recency, frequency, monetary value) to determine the value of individual customers. 2. Communicate with the customer • Deliver a consistent message with product usage • If the message is not targeted based on buying behavior, the message becomes spam and after a while is automatically deleted. 3. Use the database is for customer management - give the customers what they want before they have to ask for it; provide customers with choices 4. Improve the delivery of sales promotions • Stealth communication: sent directly to specific customers, the competition may never know about it and hence be unable to offer a similar promotion • Promotions can be sent at a time when the customer is most likely to buy but needs some sort of reminder or inducement 5. Conduct customer and product marketing research • Comment cards is not representative of everyone using the hospitality product • Firm can contact a representative sample of customers 6. Increase the channels of distribution • Remind customers to book directly

What are the ten guidelines for building strong brands?

1. Brand Identity: brand-as-person, brand-as-organization, brand-as-symbol, and brand-as-product. 2. Value Proposition: Consider emotional and self-expressive benefits, and functional benefits. Understand the brand-customer relationship. 3. Brand Position: Have a brand position that will provide clear guidance to those implementing a communication program. The position is actively communicated. 4. Execution: Execute the communication program so that it achieves brilliance and durability. Generate alternatives beyond media. 5. Consistency over Time: Maintain symbols, imagery, and metaphors that work. Understand and resist organizational biases toward changing the identity, position, and execution. 6. Brand System: Make sure the brands in the portfolio are consistent and synergistic. Know their roles. Have or develop silver bullets to help support brand identities and positions. Exploit branded features and services. Use sub-brands to clarify and modify the brand. Know the strategic brands. 7. Brand Leverage: Extend brands and develop co-branding programs only if the brand identity will be both used and reinforced. Identify range of brands and, for each, develop an identity and specify how that identity will be different in disparate product contexts. Manage the integrity of the resulting brand identities. 8. Tracking Brand Equity: Track brand equity over time, including awareness, perceived quality, brand loyalty and especially brand associations. 9. Brand Responsibility: Create the identity and position and coordinate the execution over organizational units, media and markets. Beware when a brand is being used in a business in which it is not the cornerstone. 10. Invest in Brands: Continue investing in brands even when the financial goals are not being met.

What are the guidelines for developing sales promotions?

1. Be Single-Minded • It is well to keep the purpose single-minded and not try to accomplish too many things at one time - do you want to create business or awareness? • Trying to do more than one or two of these things tends to diffuse the promotion, confuse the market, and accomplish none of your goals. 2. Define the Target Market • What are the demographic and psychographic characteristics? First-time users? • The promotion must specifically focus on the needs of the target market. 3. Decide Specifically What You Want to Promote • What you want to promote is not necessarily the tangible item you are promoting. • You may use a special drink to promote new décor in the lounge or free breakfast in bed to promote its rooms on the weekends. 4. Decide the Best Way to Promote It • Rather than give something away or charge a lower price, you may want to offer what is typically referred to as a "premium" program • Rather than emphasize discounts, premium programs focus on the addition of a specific "premium" that accompanies the offer (e.g. $100 F&B credit or comp Internet) • Promote higher quality at a higher price • Offer an additional service, a package price, or a future incentive or try to capture names and addresses by running a promotion. • Before you give something away or charge less, think carefully about what you will get in return. 5. Make Sure You Can Fulfill the Demand • Many customers are alienated and lost forever by failure to deliver on the promotion • If you're offering weekend packages, provide the rooms even if you have to upgrade • At a minimum, provide rain checks for a later date; then, when customers collect on them, give them something better, just to compensate for the inconvenience • Too many promotions end up losing customers rather than winning them because management forgets why it is having the promotion in the first place. 6. Make Sure Reality Meets Expectations • Making sure reality meets customers' expectation is similar to fulfilling the demand. • Don't embellish on what you have to offer; stick to the facts. IF you don't have it, don't say it. • Don't be picky on other items. • Some management tries to make up for what they are losing on the promotion in other ways, only to create an upset customer. 7. Communicate Your Promotion and All Related Aspects to the Market • Some promotional literature or ads are confusing, bury all the conditions of the promotion in the illegible fine print at the bottom of an ad, or presume so much knowledge on the customer's part that the customer ignores the ad or gets irritated • Specify clearly all pertinent information such as price, quality, procedure, place, dates, time, and any other necessary details • When customers ask for "it," give it to them, don't play games. 8. Communicate the Promotion to Your Employees • Promotions break down too often over failure to communicate with employees 9. Measure the Results • More than just measuring bodies or dollars. • Did the promotion meet its objectives? • What were the benefits, gains, losses? • What was the total cost relative to the actual return? Did the promotion at least pay for itself? • Will it work again? Why or why not? • Will there be a last effect, or was it a one-shot deal? • Some of the best promotional results are nothing more than goodwill, which will pay off in the future. * Developing Sales Promotions • The use of sales promotions in the hospitality industry centers on creation of demand • A promotion is the development and execution of an event outside the normal day-to-day business. • Goal of a sales promotion is twofold: increase the satisfaction of the guest while increasing revenues for the hospitality establishment • If guests are extremely satisfied with a promotion, but costs are so high that money is lost, the promotion is unsuccessful. • If the hotel or restaurant makes money, but the customer feels slighted, the promotion is equally unsuccessful. • Two types of sales promotions: those centered on established events and those created entirely on their own. • Creating sales promotions independent of an established event is more difficult to develop and execute.

What are the top 10 successful secrets of e-mail marketing?

1. Building your list - be selective about who is added to your list or you'll create more work for yourself • Obtain their permission first using a value proposition; strengthen the bond 2. HTML vs. text? No contest... it's HTML for higher response rates • HTML directs reader's eye and communicates a better brand impression • Lets you track open rates, click-throughs and pass-alongs (forwarding emails) 3. Relevancy - make certain your emails are extremely relevant and valuable to the recipients • Be known for sending high-quality messages or you'll be ignored, unsubscribed, or complained about • "From" represents brand and "Subject" represents the timely and relevant proposition 4. How often to send email: as often as your subscribers want to hear from you 5. Email length - keep it short and packed with value; straightforward 6. Content - give them something they can't live without • "Come on; I'm easy to read" • Make sure content is distinctive and can't be found anywhere else (e.g. industry news and analysis, useful insights from your experience, or product tips). Make sure it's good enough to be passed along. 7. Don't turn your email into a visual circus; less is more. 8. Test everything • Reinforce navigational cues by stating the wanted action, such as "Click Here" or "Buy Now" • "Split copy testing": send one offer worded in a certain way and the same offer worded differently and see which does better 9. Multimedia emails • Certain niches may want it, but if recipients are not ready/don't want it, you could damage your relationship 10. What to expect after you hit "send" • Valid responses: real people requesting specific information or action • Hard bounces: abandoned email addresses; delete them • Mailboxes that are full and can't accept new emails. If they occur regularly, remove them. • Spam filter rejections • Spam filter messages: These messages tell you why your email has been filtered out (rating system and words that put you over the threshold) • "Out of office" replies

What are the top 10 trends for the new 10 years for internet marketing?

1. Pay Per Call Rings In 2. Feed Marketing Flourishes: RSS and podcasting. Podcasts may employ the sponsorship model, or subscription (further off), or simply be done for the coolness factor, customer retention, or PR pop that you'll get if you do it early enough. 3. Email Marketing Will Survive: Spam issues will recede dramatically. Email is easy, cheap, effective and everywhere. 4. Personal Agents Propagate: Agent software learns your habits and helps you sift through relevant information. Agent will bring you both B2B and B2C offerings and deals. 5. Reverb Marketing, In Stereo: Synchronize their messaging so the end user hears and sees complementary messages at or near the same time. 6. Audio Blogs/Video Blogs (V-Blogs) 7. IPTV Adds interactivity: TV over Internet Protocol. IPTV will be more interactive, so you can click and buy right then and there. 8. Commercial Content on Demand: messages from marketers need to be so appealing that the audience actually requests the message. 9. Publishing Faces Tectonic Shifts: newspapers will have to show free content online and only print special issues. Perhaps by asking their readers for demographic information that enables the publisher to sell targeted advertisements at a premium. 10. Direct Marketers Will Take Over the Internet: 11. Internet-Free Zones Becomes the Hot New Trend

What are the tips in designing the successful sales promotion?

1. Identify the Gap • One purpose of a sales promotion from the management perspective is to increase revenues • Plan promotions when facility is not at capacity, so you can create new demand • Many promotions are designed to build revenues during slack times or sell products that are traditionally in low demand. 2. Design the Sales Promotion • There are two areas to address when designing the promotion: the customer and time • Normally, the customer should be considered before putting any type of promotion together • However, management might design a promotion because of excess inventory • Promotion must be consistent with the positioning of the restaurant or hotel. • Second important aspect is the timing and planning • Takes time to plan a promotion • Promotional material needs to be prepared and supplies need to be ordered to guarantee that when guests arrive at the facility, not only is the promotional item available, but employees are aware of the promotion • Proper delivery of a promotion includes the integration of a variety of items (advertising, merchandising, PR) must be coordinated. • A clear and concise message must be put forth to the customer • May not be necessary for promotions centered on established events, but promotions that are attempting to present a novel concept have to be clear and may have to be explained to customers and also to employees 3. Analyze the Competition • Competition should be analyzed before a sales promotion is developed, so you can do something different. • A close watch on competitive activity can give the promotion designer a head start on potential problems. 4. Allocate the Resources • No sales promotion will be successful if the customers are unaware of the activity • A major reason for the failure of a promotion is underestimating the resources needed to bring in customers • All parts of the communications mix should be evaluated for their ability to bring customers to a promotion • Public relations, advertising, and even direct sales can be used to get the message to potential participants • E-mail can be a cost effective way • Traditional merchandising methods such as table tents, elevator signage, and employee buttons can be used 5. Establish Goals • How should success be judged? What level of sales must be achieved to cover the cost of the promotion? • Goals should be set in advance for evaluating the promotion at the conclusion of the event • Goals also need to be realistic, and a measurement form should exist before the promotion takes place 6. Research the Promotion • See whether the potential customers would actually like to participate • Up-front consumer research can avoid failure • Research can be undertaken to understand the likely response of a firm's customers to promotions of its competitors 7. Understand the Break-Even Point • Understand the economic consequences of the sales promotion before its execution • Break-even analysis should be conducted early in the sales promotion planning • Both overallocation and underallocation of resources must be carefully analyzed in relation to the success of the promotion • Pricing is an important factor in sales promotions and not just because of profits. How will it affect demand? Will the market be apprehensive of the quality? 8. Execute the Sales Promotion • Execution includes delivery of the product to the customer in the framework of the created expectation • Promotion delivery is more critical than normal delivery because the customer is excited and anticipatory • The promotion has created a demand that has created a special reason to use the product, and expectations are unusually high. • Proper execution includes employee participation • Entire staff needs to understand the promotion and its specific involvement • Employee involvement, even in the design stages, will increase the chances for optimal delivery of the correct product. • Execution also means maintain the property inventory of goods to be sold • Part of the planning process is the development of goals • Purchasing should be based on the attainment of these goals. • More desirable to have some waste than to not fulfill expectations. 9. Evaluate the Sales Promotion • Ask the following questions: • Were the goals met? • Would the customer have come anyway? • Were resources optimally allocated? • Did it generate revenues sufficient to cover the costs? • Second half consists of the following questions: • Were the customers satisfied? • Were there any unusual complaints? • Do comments reflect any information that might be useful for future promotions? • All of these questions should be addressed in the evaluation process to allow a total assessment of the event. • "No analysis can provide absolute evidence that any program produces a definitive amount of incremental sales. The best we can do is make some subjective assumptions, temper them with common sense and good business judgment and reach a "comfort zone" regarding what portion of sales were generated as a direct result of the program versus guest patronage that would have occurred anyway. • Two tests management can undertake to help understand whether "customers would have come anyway" 1. Traditional pretest/posttest with a control group: target population is divided into two similar groups based on buying behavior, loyalty toward the firm. Groups are determined by their RFM (recency, frequency, monetary value). Each group is split into a test group and a control group. The test group receives the sales promotion offer, while the second group receives nothing. Purchase behavior of the two groups is tracked after the promotion. To be successful, the purchase behavior of the test group should be much higher than the purchase behavior of the control group. Obviously, the difference between the two groups should exceed the cost of the promotion. 2. "They would have come anyway analysis": Management makes basic assumptions about the percentage of customers who came because of the promotion and those who would have come anyway. By examining the different percentages of each group and the cost of the promotion, management can gain an estimate of whether the promotion was a success. • When all feedback has been analyzed, the final stage is formulating the next promotion. What other promotions can be developed to fill in gap periods or to sell slower-moving products or time periods? Process of promotional development begins all over again.

What are some examples of hospitality channels of distribution?

1. Representation firms 2. Reservation services 3. Consortia 4. Incentive travel organizations 5. Offline travel agents 6. Centralized reservation systems 7. GDS-based systems 8. Tour operators/discount brokers/consolidators/wholesalers 9. Corporate travel departments 10. Travel management companies 11. Convention meeting planner organizations 12. Destination management organizations 13. Online intermediaries for businesses or groups 14. Online intermediaries for transient, business, and packages

What are some examples of successful restaurant promotions?

1. Publicity stunts: Celebrity chef cook-off, really unique contest, beat a world record, do something with the potential for national exposure. 2. Public relations: advertising that you don't have to pay for. Create and publicize newsworthy stories. Worthwhile to spend 15-30% of your budget on a solid public relations program. Find a firm that has creativity and excitement about your restaurant. Always think about your position (exclusivity). Everyone wants to be associated with a winner. 3. Bouncebacks: bounces guests from peak times to off-peak times and can work to encourage frequency in F&B. Offer incentives at the point of purchase on popular services to encourage the guest to try your restaurant another time (can only be redeemed at certain times) 4. Stop discounting: tells people we don't deserve full price. Include value-added services. Never offer coupons, only offer certificates. 5. Business socials: Leverage their resources to promote your restaurant, and also target your core audience. Host socials where your food is center stage. Partner with a business or charitable organization to stretch your marketing budget while delivering higher returns on investment. 6. Sampling: pick the best 203 items on your menu and get solid representatives of your restaurant out to meet and greet at these off-property functions. 7. Host food events: "Taste of ____" is a great way to position your restaurant as a center of the food scene in your market. Leverage the reputation, profile, and credibility of all of the other participants, and share the expense of holding the event. 8. Toss up Tuesdays: pick slowest day and flip a coin for the food tab. 9. Menu bingo: Encourages frequency and getting members to try different items on the menu. 10. Birthday program: Use e-mail. • Differentiate your restaurant from the others and create excitement in a way that reinforces your positioning strategy. Execute promotions in a way that aligns with the image of your restaurant. • Smart marketing is best achieved through non-traditional techniques that are executed inside your restaurant and among your existing customer base.

What are the six positioning approaches?

Checklist for Positioning Approaches • Positioning by attribute, feature, or customer benefit • Heavenly Bed for Westins • Positioning by price or quality • Positioning with respect to use or application • Positioned on the reasons for using it (e.g. business or incentive travel) • Positioning according to the users or class of users • Where people who run things can stop running" • Positioning with respect to a product class • E.g. Preferred Hotel • Positioning vis-à-vis the competition • "Head-on" positioning and is used to bring out differences among services

Define communications strategy. What are the six stages?

Communications Strategy • Communications strategies are concerned with the planning, implementing, and control of persuasive communication with customers • Strategy is the plan, tactics are the actions • When you get bogged down in the tactics, communications are often not consistent with strategic objectives • Strategic persuasion: persuade the client that our hotel of all hotels, can best serve his needs. • In advertising, the first step in the development of a communications strategy is to decide what our objectives are and what we hope to accomplish • These are broad objectives that will serve as an umbrella for all communication efforts; that is, they will permeate the advertising, selling, promotion, merchandising, and public relations • Some objectives may have subobjectives, but they will all be subsumed under the main objectives • We may have more than one objective at a time • We want the objectives to be congruent and not in conflict with each other • Strategic objectives: (create or a change an image, position, provide benefits, offer solutions to problems, create awareness, create belief, stir emotions, change attitudes, create expectations, stimulate action) *Six Stages of a Communications Strategy 1. To whom to say it Target market(s) - those who use it or those who we want to use it. 2. Why to say it • Prior users persuade to use again or more often (offering new benefits, offering specials at slow periods, show improvements, develop relationships, recapture, reposition, adopt as first choice) • Nonusers (get interested, get attention, make part of evoked set, position, arouse desire, provide more info to evaluate, explain features, persuade to use) 3. What to say • Awareness, to desire, to buy • Awareness, interest, evaluation, trial • Logos, pathos, ethos • Cognitive, affective, conative 4. How to say it Humor, sex, cost/value, bargain, slice of life, lifestyle, mood, atmospherics, testimonial, service, quality, action, etc. 5. How often to say it Depends on budget 6. Where to say it Selecting the media or personal selling that would most likely reach the target market most effectively and efficiently 1. To Whom to Say It • First stage of the communications strategy is to define the target market • The appropriate research should be done and the needs and wants of the target market clearly identified 2. Why to Say It • Concerned with what effect we expect the communication to have it; what we want to accomplish 3. What To Say • This stage evolves from "why to say it" • Deals with the method chosen to achieve the strategic objective and is based on knowing some things about the target market • Four models of communications strategy: first two deal with the consumer stage, and the second two deal with the communications effort. Model 1 • We need to know what stage the target market is in • Six steps that ultimately lead to purchase behavior (although think about all of the advertising you can remember for what you didn't purchase or "impulse purchase) • Steps are not equal: some achieved rapidly or simultaneously, but when there is more psychological or economic commitment or risk involved (high involvement), consumers will take longer to climb the steps and each step will be more important. • Steps through which the consumer progresses describe the consumer's state of mind: 1. Is unaware of the existence of the product or service 2. Is aware of the existence of the product or service 3. Is knowledgeable about specific feature or benefits of the product or service 4. Has favorable attitudes toward the product or service 5. Prefers the product or service over other alternatives 6. Intends to purchase the product or service the next time the need arises 7. Actually purhcases the product or service 8. Has purchased the product or service before Model 2: Adoption Process Model • Model of consumer behavior contends that adoption, or the purchase of a product, is a process 1. Process starts with awareness, which can develop from walking down a street, seeing a billboard or an ad, or word of mouth. • Apart from word of mouth, most awareness is created by advertising & PR 2. Once aware, the next step in the hierarchy is interest. If they are interested, they will seek further info and details, such as its features, the cost, how to buy it. • This information may be obtained from exposure to advertising, or through the consumer's own initiative - that is, consumers will call or e-mail to obtain more information on their own. • Personal selling plays an important part in providing info when marketing to groups and meeting planners. 3. Evaluation: consumers ask themselves a number of questions. Does it solve my problems/needs? Does it do it better? Is it worth the risk? Advertising, personal selling, and PR play important roles at this stage. If evaluation is favorable, the consumer evolves to the next stage, trial. 4. Trial: usually means the same as purchase; there is really no other way to try it. Promotion and merchandising parts of the communications mix are often used to induce trial; beyond that, use is induced by other mix elements. 5. If the trial is favorable, consumers may "adopt" the product and become repeat customers. They may tell others, thus becoming sources of awareness, information, and evaluation for others who are at various stages of the evaluation process. • Marketers can influence adoption through performance and relationship marketing, which is why the quality of these two factors is so critical to successful marketing • Marketers should know the stage of their target market before developing marketing communications • This knowledge strongly influence the communications strategy and objectives, which should be developed with reference to the two models of "influence," which are models 2 and 3 Model 3: Three basic rules of persuasion 1. Logos: logic and reasoning (e.g. it is a safe place); these are rational appeals. 2. Pathos: emotions (e.g. the destination provides the opportunity to refresh). These are emotional, mood appeals. 3. Ethos: source credibility (e.g. five diamond hotel). These are belief appeals, evidence. • For the marketer, these rules represent commonsense treatment in communicating with the target market. Model 4 • We next use the stages of the customer's attitudes to judge the effect we want the communications to have and the strategy to obtain that effect. Attitudinal Components and Their Impact on Communications Strategy Consumer Stage Effect Stage Strategy Cognitive: the stage of thoughts/beliefs Create awareness, beliefs Provide information, get attention, inform, remind Affective: the stage of emotion Change attitudes and feelings, get involved, evaluate Position, create benefits and image, stir emotions, arouse Conative: the stage of motivation and intention Stimulation and direct desires, adopt Move to action, reinforce • Logos addresses the affective stage to develop favorable attitudes toward the product and, finally, the evaluation and trial stages. It attends to the affective stage to develop preference for the product over other possibilities and, finally, the trial stage. 4. How to Say It • Once the first three stages of communication strategy have been considered, the creative juice of everyone tend to focus on the advertising copy and its appeal to the customer, the execution stage. • Search for the one that will work best, that most precisely accomplishes the objectives consistent with the identified target market. • Elements used to generate appeal: humor, sexy, cronyism, surprise, complexity, price/value, slice of life, lifestyle, self-improvement, mood, testimonial, quality • Compare ads to the gap model: • How do the ads fit this model? • What expectations do they create? • What problems do they solve? • What is the price-value relationship and the risk? 5. How Often to Say It • Both consumer-driven and budget-driven • Repetition has been shown to help build awareness and enhance product recall over time • However, continued repetition of the same message also produces an undesirable outcome called "wear out," or the gradual decline in the ability of the advertising execution to capture and retain the attention of the intended audience (referred as "habituation to a stimulus") • Careful thought and planning is required to determine the number of executions used in the campaign, as well as their frequency of exposure. 6. Where to Say It • Where applies to the various components of the communications mix • If we use advertising, we must select the appropriate media, offline or online, electronic or print, and out of home • Electronic media include television, radio, and now online services • Print media include newspapers, magazines, and direct mail • Out-of-home media include billboards, bulletins, transit displays • Demography, lifestyle, and social values of the target audience are all evaluated when composing a media plan to ensure that the final media selection "reaches" the target both effectively and efficiently.

What are the essential criteria for effective positioning?

Effective Positioning • Two essential criteria for effective positioning: image and differentiation • Images and differentiation mean creating beliefs • Takes us back to the basic marketing concept, the notion of needs and wants, and problems and solutions - the promise we make to the customer • Next we have to develop the affective reaction, the attitude toward the belief, and the action that will create the intention to buy • Effective positioning must promise the benefit the customer will receive, it must create the expectation, and it must offer a solution to the customer's problem • The solution should be different from and better than the competition's • "Advertising which promises no benefits to the customer does not sell, yet the majority of campaigns contain no promise whatever." Checklist for Determining a Desired Position • Analyze product attributes that are salient and/or determinant and/or important to customers • Examine the distribution of these attributes among different market segments. • Determine the optimal position for the product/service in regard to each attribute, taking into consideration the positions occupied by existing brands • Choose an overall position for the product, based on the overall match between product attributes and their distribution in the population and the positions of existing brands

How can you evaluate a channel? What factors are needed to ensure continued success of the channel?

Evaluation of the Channel • Have channel members report statistics (e.g. how many bookings are produced or how many coupons turned in) • If unit management is unable to spot-check these numbers, the channel member will be in control when it comes time to negotiate the next agreement. • Objectives need to be quantitative • Understand the break-even point of the channel (what it takes to cover additional commissions and some combined advertising costs) • Channel should be evaluated and decide if they should increase marketing support for the program or dropping the channel member completely • Do not just measure covers or rooms. • The marketing-driven company with good channel management skills will ensure customer satisfaction throughout the process • Two ongoing factors needed to ensure continued success: motivation and recruitment • Motivation: must be recognized that most channel members are carrying many similar products into the marketplace. Travel agents have a variety of hotels and airfares from which to choose. The representative firms have several hotels in their portfolio that match the needs of their customers. • Number of promotional tie-ins and franchising options are plentiful. 1. Motivation • Some type of motivation must be continuously offered by the channel leader in order to promote continued success (unless product offered is so desirable that several channel members are bidding on the rights) • Push strategies are the primary source of motivational support • Incentive trips for outstanding travel agents or the best franchisee in the system will go a long way toward smoothing operating channels of distribution • Takes a year to win and only few employees collect the prize • Customer good incentives (appliances and televisions) make bonus system easier to attain and provide short-term gratification for participants • Top management attention • Travel agency owners need personal attention that allows their views to surface to someone important • May buy more loyalty • Owner of the business is often left out of the process 2. Recruitment • Second ongoing task for the channel manager is to recruit new channel members • This task must be organized and planned • Danger is subtle because a company may not realize that it is exposed until a member • Easy for others to steal from your members • Without having a good recruitment program, your hotel has to find a strong replacement channel member. Since you are in dire need, the negotiations will sing in favor of the new channel member. • There will be times that a channel member leaves or needs to be replaced. However, have alternatives ready and prescreened. • Necessary to provide alternatives to channel members who are not performing satisfactorily. • Easier to deal with an unsatisfactory situation once you have other options than to have to recruit channel members when you are at a disadvantage.

What is the difference between objective positioning and subjective positioning?

Objective Positioning • Objective positioning: concerned almost entirely with the objective attributes of the physical product; with what actually exists • Creating an image about the product that reflects its physical characteristics and functional features • Businesses conjure up specific images based on the name itself - it derives from an objective, concrete, specific attribute • Objective positioning need not always be concrete, it may be more abstract than these previous examples (e.g. luxury, speed). • Objective product positioning can be very important and is often used in the hospitality industry (Heavenly Bed, and type of food) • If a product has a unique characteristic or unique functional feature, that feature may be used to objectively position the product, to create an image, and to differentiate it from the competition • Less successful objective positioning occurs when the feature is not unique. Subjective Positioning • Subjective positioning: concerned with subjective attributes of the product or brand. The image, not of the physical aspects of the product, but other attributes as perceived by the customer - they belong not necessarily to the product, but to the customer's mental perception of the product. • Perceptions and the resulting image may or may not reflect the true state of the product's characteristics and may simply exist in the customer's mind. • Hope that the people in the target market will agree on a favorable image or characteristic, whether or not it is factual. • Much more difficult in practice than objective positioning

What's the difference between tangible and intangible positioning?

Tangible Positioning • Two very important differences in the types of positioning when they are used in the hospitality industry: tangible positioning and intangible positioning. • Tangible positioning: the industry's product has almost reached commodity status • Use positioning to create a unique image and differentiate yourself. • While the nuts and bolts of your product are important, it is not normally what gets someone's initial interest and makes the sale. • Subjective positioning of tangible features requires developing intangible images Intangible Positioning • Intangible positioning: we sell tangible products, but we market the intangible experience. If we were selling rooms, what difference would it make where the customer went, assuming a comparable level of quality? • The tangibles are so difficult to differentiate, to be competitive we have to market the intangible aspects of the product or service. • Even when tangible, they have a measure of intangibility because they are consumed rather than possessed. • To emphasize the tangible elements is to fail to differentiate from the competition. To emphasize the abstract is to compound the intangibility. • Hospitality positioning needs to focus on enhancing and differentiating the intangible realities through the manipulation of tangible cues (e.g. atrium lobbies) • Create a subjective position in the customer's mind. This is why target marketing is so important - we need to know what mental constructs are held by the customer in the target market and what tangible evidence sustains them. • Positioning is a relative term. It is not just how the brand is perceived alone, but how the perceived image stands in relation to competing images. • The customer's mental perception, which may or may not differ from the actual physical characteristics. • Most important when the product is intangible and there is little difference rom the competition on physical characteristics.

How has the Internet transformed marketing?

The First Generation of Electronic Marketing (E-marketing) • Guests used to be handled by the GM, then the relationship was with the travel agent, now the individual relationship with the guest is starting to return with the advent of loyalty programs • The return of the individual relationship is the popularity of the Internet, as the Internet has given hospitality entities an opportunity to communicate directly with the customer again. • Employment of travel agents is expected to decline The Role of the Internet in Transforming Marketing • First channel of distribution in the e-commerce arena is GDS and the second is the Internet • Internet is designed to reach the consumer directly, without the need for intermediaries • Internet began as a way to distribute information • Second generation of Internet marketing ushered in the new applications for marketing and direct selling • Simple transactions were the foundation of Internet commerce, but as technology improved, the size and complexity of transactions increased. • Early in the developing stages of the Internet, opportunistic online travel agencies stepped into the distribution process to become Internet travel agents and wholesalers • Technology at the time made the booking process cumbersome as many hotels received e-mail requests for reservations, where agents checked availability, responded with a rate, and awaited the customer's reaction via e-mail. • This time-consuming process, combined with consumers hesitating to send their credit card info over the unsecured Internet, many consumers continued to use the old-fashioned method of booking, especially because there was no real price difference • With the economy strong, hotels had no incentive to discount rooms • The tragedy of September 11 accelerated the impact of the Internet on the distribution of travel services • Hotels had hundreds of vacant rooms because travelers were wary of traveling • To sell these rooms, hoteliers turned to the third party websites on the Internet who advertised discounted hotel rooms • Consumers, fearful of the economy, focused on finding the best deal. These deals were available on the Internet. • Many reservations were made by these third party sites, which had improved the booking process • The business model underlying the initial third party sites was modeled after the traditional travel agent structure, but after September 11, hotels rushed to these sites and a new financial model, the merchant model, evolved. Third party sites negotiated net rates from the hotels, then marked up the price. • To compete with these third party sites and gain control of their inventory, hotel brands built their own sites to attract customers and became direct competitors of the third party marketers. • In 2004, we observed a fundamental shift back to the original customer relationship. • Consumers recognized they could get more info, competitive rates, and good service by going directly the company's website. • Theory that those booking through intermediaries would have inferior service, many travelers did not agree. • E-mail addresses were then captured and hospitality entities were again communicating directly with the consumer. • The Internet has enabled the individual hotels to begin to regain control of their customer relationships as they created their own websites.

Define brand

• Brand: A series of tangible and intangible elements that connect with emotion to create a perception in a consumer's mind about a product or service

What should be considered in the design of a hospitality website?

• Internet marketing begins with a website (the new rack brochure) • Reflection of the personality of the hotel through proper visuals, text and info • Drive business to their own brand websites to bypass expensive intermediaries • Knowledge of HTML, CGI scripting, Flash programming, artistic taste, graphic design skills • Needs of the customer comes first • Meaningful, but sales orientated descriptions must be combined with appropriate graphics to give a true feeling of the atmosphere and experience • What exactly is required will vary depending on the market segment • Economical: basic graphics and factually focused text • Up-market: combine increasingly detailed textual information with higher-quality graphical elements • "Content is King" • Provide visitors with the info they need to make a purchase decision • Location: proximity to attractions, activities, major businesses; info form airports or train stations • Also easy to overwhelm potential customers with a haze of irrelevant detail • Must provide visitors with quick and easy access to the info they require • Stream your website toward the needs of different target consumer groups (different parts of your website, different sections, separate sites) for meeting planners, travel agents, tour operators, wedding organizers, leisure customers, corporate customers • Each has specific needs that are of no interest to the others, and frequently the format that they need info presented is very different • Provide appropriate booking facilities • Last room availability and instant confirmation are essential • Restaurant reservation facility • Convenience is key, so reservation facility must be intuitive and easy to use • Provide right facilities to capture sale while the consumer is still on the site and reduce the risk of her defecting to competitors • Aesthetics is also important • Flows naturally from the corporate image and offline promotional material of the company in question • Web is different from paper, and elements such as animation and sound can be use effectively to reinforce the promotional message • Up-market companies need a richer look and feel, incorporating richer graphical and multimedia elements • Multimedia cannot be added gratuitously (Flash screens alienate customers) • Does this help build the image of the company or aid in the selling process? • Website navigation • Web surfers expect sites to confirm to certain conventions with respect to navigation; deviations from these conventions confuse visitors • Site maps and search facilities should be included where appropriate • All sites should be designed for two different audiences: the potential client and the search engine (more discerning) • A good site must also be listed prominently under appropriate search phrases on the major search engine • Organic search engine manipulation: designing your pages to maximize their position in the search engine indexes • Ensuring each page concentrates on a single subject, reinforcing this tehem by including appropriate words and phrases throughout the page's headings and text, prompting the search engine using the page's hidden meta tags, and linking each page to other similarly themed pages • Complex and ever-changing, so use a specialist • Different phases, or generations, of sites • First or second-generation sites take existing offline promo material and move it online without taking advantage of the power of the new medium • "Brochureware" does little to enhance the image of the company or generate incremental sales • Provide customers with in-depth target info and appropriate facilities to make it as convenient as possible for them to do business with you is the key to success. • Website has to be functional; it may be nice, but if it's hard to navigate, its effectiveness is greatly diminished • Four best practices for website design in the hospitality industry: 1. The reservation mask should be at the front of the page to enable customers to make their online reservations 2. The e-mail acquisition section should be on the home page 3. The sit should have text conveying best value to the customer, to ensure that the customer stays on the local site and does not shop for a better rate elsewhere on the Internet 4. Security for the transaction needs to be conveyed to the customer. Consumers are still concerned about online commerce, particularly outside of the United States. Many consumers are wary of credit card theft. • Once the website is developed, the site needs to be marketed. The primary marketing vehicles for websites are the search engines (Google, Yahoo, and MSN). • Hotels may be listed in the search engines two ways: organically or through paid placement • Organic search: the free listing of a hotel or resort property on the Internet • Rankings in the various search engines are the direct result of the information contained in the website. • Certain keywords are programmed onto the websites to allow the search engine to find them. • Customers using search engines rarely go past the third page, but positioning on the first page is the desired outcome. • Search engines charge for the listings on their sites • Pay per click allows hotel marketers to increase traffic to their sites. Each keyword or keyword grouping is auctioned, with the highest bidder getting the highest placement, and the second highest bidder getting second placement. • Internet has increased marketers' ability to track their efforts online • Each customer visit can be traced with a "cookie" or electronic impression of the visit, and the cookie can be followed throughout the site, showing the marketer the origin of the visitor to the site and what they did when they went into the site • Can track actual bookings from online marketing efforts; thus, a return on investment can be calculated for every online marketing campaign.

Describe internet channel intermediaries

• Customers can book rooms in a hotel in a variety of ways: • Calling the hotel directly • Calling the hotel's central reservation center • Going through a designated hotel representative • Visiting a traditional bricks-and-mortar travel agency • Walking directly into the hotel • Using an online travel agency (e.g. Travelocity or Expedia) • Directly through the hotel or resort's own website • Hotel consolidator typically follows one of two strategies 1. Merchant model strategy: consolidator contracts for inventory from the hotels at a fixed rate, often referred to as the net rate. (Hotels.com) • The net rates are usually sold to the consolidator at a deep discount. • The goal is to sell the rooms that cannot be sold using normal channels to ensure as high an occupancy as possible. • Usually, a specific amount of inventory is taken on a consignment basis under a one-year contract. There are times, however, when the hotel consolidator cannot sell the room through traditional channels. • The online hotel consolidators then either sell their allocated rooms to their affiliated websites at a marked-up price or sell them on their own website at a certain markup (Hotels.com may sell to Travelocity). • Rooms that are brooked in this way go directly to the hotel's CRS via a switch. 2. Agency model strategy: gives consolidator commissionable rates and then pays a commission on any rooms that are booked • Very similar to the bricks-and-mortar travel agency model • OTAs include: Lastminute.com, Travelocity.com, Expedia.com, and Orbitz.com • Consolidator typically books through the GDS • A hotel consolidator might follow both strategies simultaneously, as most merchant model sites also offer reservations under the traditional travel agent model, but these are usually buried under several pages of merchant model listings. • Opaque approach • Hotwire.com and Priceline.com • Hotwire uses the "posted price model:" customer first selects the general location where she would like to stay. Hotwire then shows the customer multiple prices for different categories of hotels. Customer then selects the hotel based on the price she is willing to pay. Once she has selected this price, the customer then finds out in which hotel she will be staying. The accepted bid cannot be changed or canceled. • Priceline uses the "name your price" model: the hotel customer first determines both the general geographic location in which he wishes to purchase. He then bids what he is willing to pay for this hotel room. The bid is either accepted or not. Once the bid is accepted, the customer then finds out in which he will be staying. The accepted bid canot be changed or canceled. • Works one of two ways, depending on whether the customer is buying a single part of the travel package or the whole package: 1. If the customer is buying only a single part of the package, they do not know the specific brand they will be buying after they have actually made the booking. However, they know the quality rating and general location of the hotel. 2. If the customer is buying a package, the hotel brand is shown to the customer, whereas other parts of the package may or may not be opaque • The customer does not know how much she is paying for each component of the total package • This is often referred to as price opaque, but not brand opaque • Allows a hotel to discount without letting its brand-loyal customers trade down to those loyal price points. • Segments customers each buying a different product: one buys a branded product and pays for the security. • Travelzoo sends customers to the landing page of a specific hotel. • To get to the hotel's reservation page on the hotel's website, customers can either go directly to the website and be forwarded to the reservation page or they can be directed to the reservation page or they can be directed to the reservation page by one of the secondary websites via links.

Define merchandising. What are the basic rules? What are some examples of good merchandising?

• Merchandising: primarily an in-house marketing technique designed to stimulate immediate purchase behavior through means other than personal selling or the purchase of time or space in the media • Merchandising is marketing to the captive customer once the customer comes into the hotel or restaurant • Goal of merchandising is to provide opportunities for customers to purchase related or auxiliary products and services, not just the basic product • Goal of merchandising: not just to stimulate sales; it also has a more long-term goal of increasing customer satisfaction (e.g. dessert/room service; on-the-floor promotion of a specific game). They have a better stay. • Approach merchandising from a marketing perspective - fulfilling customers' needs and wants and solving their problems • Provide a unique or exciting experience, and higher check averages/larger bills will follow. • If too much emphasis is on the increased revenue, we forget about the customer * Basic Rules of Merchandising • Opportunities are almost endless, limited only by the imagination • Very similar to sales promotions 1. Purpose • All merchandising should have a purpose • Commonly expressed purpose: to increase sales - not sufficient • Overall purpose is to increase customer satisfaction and loyalty or to fulfill needs and wants and solve problems. • Sometimes just knowing that something is available and can be had if wanted will establish the need or want or increase satisfaction - even when that thing is not consciously needed or wanted. • Human nature to feel that we can have something if we want it. • Go beyond the basic marketing concept as merchandising is involved in the creation of wants • Pastry cart • Use merchandising to make guests want to eat in hotel restaurants through elevator cards, signs in the lobby, and promotional flyers in the guest room. • In-room dining menu is a great opportunity if the menu is clean & appealing • Possible purposes • "If you want it, we have it." • Create excitement • Entertainment • Convenience (room service), relaxation (aperitifs), contentment, or information (directory) • Waiter greets guest with wine or a pot of coffee to meet a need, provide immediate service, and creating instant satisfaction even if there is a delay in ordering a meal 2. Compatibility and Consistency • Merchandising efforts should be compatible and consistent with the rest of the marketing effort in terms of quality, style, tone, class, and price • Should reinforce the basic product/service mix, since these efforts are part of the augmented product 3. Practicality • If you can't do it right, don't do it. You will lose customers. 4. Visibility • Let the customer know about what you are trying to sell and how to get it • Don't forget that for many guests, this is the first time they are in the hotel. Use elevator cards/flyers to tell guests where the restaurants are! • Visibility doesn't mean total clutter • Do not put so many table tents, flyers, and brochures on tables because guests may move them without looking just so they can put down their own things. • Clutter can also occur on the casino floor/ceiling. So much merchandising is hanging from the ceiling that the consumer does not see anything through the clutter. • Put yourself in the customer's shoes! .5. Simplicity • Make merchandising efforts easy to understand and make your merchandise easy to obtain • Be clear about how much it will cost, how long it will take and when it is available and provide any other information that makes it unnecessary for customers to make additional inquiries • Customers tend to just give up when they have to go through too much effort to purchase a service. 6. Knowledgeable Employees • Employees should know about the product/service you are promoting: what it is, how it works, how you get it, what you do with it. • Key to success of any in-house promotion is the knowledgeable employees who publicize it to the customers. • Merchandising is just one more marketing tool for creating and keeping customers • "Here is what else we can do" • Merchandising is a powerful tool: a revenue producer and customer satisfier. • Do not let it become a customer annoyer. * Examples of Good Merchandising • Business centers create a better guest experience if they are priced fairly. • Business-related restaurants offering a 45-minute guaranteed lunch • Pizza on finer hotels' room service menus. Price does not become the deciding factor; instead, the product (and its convenience) becomes the reason for purchase. You are satisfying a customer by fulfilling a need. • Inclusion of minibars satisfies customers and increases hotel profits. It must be priced reasonably and it must be items that guests want to see in their minibars. • Merchandising is marketing to the "captured" customer. Translate "capture" into "opportunity" as it is an opportunity to make the customer even more satisfied.

Describe the CAN-SPAM Act 2003

• Regulates the way companies can use e-mail as a legitimate marketing tool • Requirements • Subject line must not be misleading and must include a clear indication that the e-mail is an advertisement (unless prior affirmative consent has been given) • Messages must have a functioning and nonmisleading e-mail address in the "from" line of the header and serve as the reply-to address for at least 30 days • Body of the message must contain a valid physical postal address • Message must include easy-to-locate, clear, and explicit instructions detailing how to opt out of future mailings. Such opt-out requests must be honored within 10 working days.

Define the process of PR

• Public relations: the planned management of the media's and community's perception of the hospitality enterprise • Press cannot be told what to publish, but a PR effort can steer the story toward the best features of the product and away from negative images • PR efforts create stories that capture writers' attention with the hope the writers will, in turn, communicate "the good news" to the desired readers or target market. • Public relations is used to formulate an image in the consumer's mind of what the company or product represents *Undertaking Public Relations • Public relations efforts are not just initiated to deal with negative happenings or create positive happenings; instead, they represent an ongoing task and are an important part of marketing planning ~ Roles: • Improving awareness, projecting credibility, combating competition, evaluating new markets, creating direct sales leaders, reinforcing the effectiveness of sales promotion and advertising, motivating the sales force, introducing new products, building brand loyalty, dealing with consumer issues and in many other ways • Create images for the local, public, and financial communities as well as the firm's employees • Create favorable attitudes toward a firm, its products, and its efforts • Creates preopening publicity for hotels/restaurants through news releases that the media will carry. The result is the press may attend a grand opening or ribbon cutting. Invites dignitaries who makes news and whom the press/public is interested in. • Preopening PR efforts gets a hotel/restaurant off to a good start • Marketing an intangible product that does not yet exist • Several marketing objectives must be met: creating name recognition, establishing an image, building excitement, and cementing positive ties to the local community • Begins many months in advance of opening and gathers momentum as opening day approaches. • Keep the press and hence the public informed as to what is happening at the property or with the firm. • Large companies or properties usually have their own PR firm, which are hired on a monthly retainer to develop and maintain favorable publicity for the organization • Even smaller companies that cannot afford PR agencies, must practice PR in-house on an ongoing basis • Involves managing employee relations as well as relationships with taxi drivers and local police, the press, the competition, member of the distribution channels (e.g. airlines, travel agencies, tour operators), purveyors (who can be excellent carriers of good tidings), shareholders, bankers, and all manner of other publics with which the firm interacts. • Hotel and restaurant managers should belong to the appropriate community and public service organizations such as the Rotary, Chamber of Commerce, community tasks forces, and other groups. • Everything management does contributes in some manner to the PR program • Even the employees of the firm may be excellent PR ambassadors; in fact, for some firms they may be the most important of them all. • PR efforts serve well in times of need as a defensive weapon; but more important, as a continuous and ongoing offensive weapon. * Planning Public Relations • The rules that govern the proper planning of the communications mix also apply to PR. These include: • Purpose • Target market (in this case it may not be the customer at all, but might be the press, the financial community, the industry, employees, and intermediaries • Setting of tactics • Integration with the product or service • Integration with the firm's overall marketing efforts * Purpose • Purpose should be established before any further planning occurs • Must be definitive and quantifiable e.g. positive shifts in local opinions, and ultimately, increased number of covers) • Market research should be used to correctly evaluate customer perceptions, both before and after the PR effort. Only then can the effort be correctly focused. * Target Markets • When planning PR, it is important to consider the benefit to the customer in the target market • Not just short-term benefits, but long-term ones, as hotels and restaurants are a major part of the community in which they exist • They are the most public of all commercial enterprises, so much that they often become "public places" where people meet. • These same people will recommend places to out-of-towners. • PR will influence local responses to these questions even if they have never stayed or eaten at the property • PR creates an image in the mind of the consumer and reinforce that image in many ways • After finding the target audience, you must find out how to reach these prospects • Geographic location must be understood, and correct media to reach that geographic area must also be analyzed. • "Selling stories": good PR experts will have a network of editors to whom they can do that by calling on them personally • Relationship with editors and writers can be critical to breaking a story • PR is more of a science • PR expert will push a story like a product, calling editors, wining and dining, thank you notes. • Press release: a document that contains the message or story the hospitality enterprise wishes to communicate that is prepared in a manner that is consistent with the expectations of the media • Always contains the contact name and story of the PR professional who wrote the story, background info on the facility, and body copy of the story • Pitched or sold to the media • Personal contacts with the media differentiate a good PR firm from a poor one, as only a true professional has the contacts to follow up until the article is published or the story makes the nightly news. * Positioning • Cohesive message must be developed before a PR campaign is launched • The PR message will complement the message appearing in the other forms of the communications mix • PR stories should reinforce what the advertising message is telling customers • Positioning is where the "spin" is put on the story • Positioning must also be kept within the framework of the overall purpose of the PR effort • Easy to get distracted * Developing Tactics • Before the PR program is employed, develop stories on the product itself • Good starting points are personnel, customers, and history ~ Personnel • Numerous personnel stories can be developed and submitted based on the employees who work every day • Background of the chef, any awards/training ~ Customers • Sometimes customers become a story in themselves • Regulars convey an image of contentment that cause readers to try • Celebrities or politicians create curiosity • Positioning is still important: ensure the customer being featured is the right representative for the desired target market ~ History • A story line developed about the building, neighborhood, or owner's or manager's background can also provide a format of interest to the public (e.g. Donald Trump) * 10 Surefire Ways to Get Publicity 1. When possible, be unique and different with your hotel's design and amenities. 2. Just as you should start early designing your marketing strategy and hiring the most qualified sales staff, establish your PR strategy and select a qualified PR professional with lodging industry experience. 3. Once you and the consultant have established an agreement that details both parties' expectations, work with that person to establish a media target list, with names and contact info of the media outlet each person represents (local newspapers, area business magazines, radio and TV stations, chambers of commerce, industry association newsletters and convention and visitors bureau publications) 4. Decide what type of press release strategy will work best for your hotel: one press release, a series of releases, or a complete press kit that includes press releases, hotel background, and highlight, and other material such as owner/management company information. Listen to your consultant! 5. Select a professional photographer to shoot high-quality digital photos of the interior and exterior areas of your hotel. 6. Determine what is most unique about your hotel and highlight it in the headline of each press release. 7. Meet the media. Work with your PR consultant to organize a media reception and hotel tour. Hold a reception very soon after the hotel's opening; a pre-opening exclusive also may be given to a prominent media outlet if the opening or renovation merits that. 8. Hold an open house and invite the business community and/or public. Give away a few free weekends, pay for a local celebrity, or invite a radio/TV station. Drum up interest for this type of event. 9. One way to gather the media, the business community and public officials at the same time is to hold a ribbon cutting ceremony. Hire a professional photographer and invite the mayor, area government representatives, business leaders and other dignitaries. 10. In PR, repetition is everything. It takes multiple impressions to help brand your hotel. If you are happy with your PR representative, establish an ongoing relationship. Other reasons for press releases: personnel appointments, special events, celebrity appearances, sales promotions, to announce an award, respond to a crisis event or publicize a volunteer program. * Measuring Success • Measuring success is important in PR, but the impact of public relations is difficult to traffic • Based on the value of the exposure created in the medium relative to its equivalent value in terms of paid advertising: calculate the equivalent advertising rate to determine the corresponding "value" of the PR effort * Guidelines 1. The most common mistake hotels make are that they do not budget for PR expenses. In order to get results, you need to spend some money. 2. Be careful who you hire, as PR titles are often bestowed on people who have no training or experience in public relations. Best to use reputable PR firms. 3. Like a good marketing plan, it is imperative to have a written PR plan. Without such a plan, PR will not happen. 4. PR people must understand your marketing plan. You can't expect results unless you let them in on your plans and objectives. Make sure they understand that PR is part of the marketing mix. 5. A consistent, ongoing PR program should provide consistent, ongoing results. 6. It takes innovative ideas to get deserved PR coverage. 7. Remember: Great public relations depends upon creative management.

Describe Tour Operators/Discount Brokers/Consolidators/Wholesalers

• These terms are used interchangeably • They obtain room inventory via contracts and then resell the rooms to end users • Their profit is the difference between the price at which they purchased the room and the price at which they sell it to the end user. • Tour operators are different as they take nominal possession or secure an allotment of the hotel inventory in order to sell it to the public • May also take nominal possession of the F&B product by holding reservations in a number of outlets at anticipated tour destination points • May also arrange for ground transportation, side trips, historical site visits • Two types of tour operators: wholesalers (tour brokers) and ad hoc (series groups) • They all should work through travel agent retailers • Tour is not just groups, but also individuals and couples. • Wholesaler or broker contracts for specific blocks of rooms, airline seats, then uses various combinations of the communications and distribution mix to market the facilities to individual and group customers • Brochures are printed and distributed to travel agents or mailed to customers, usually on request • Customer picks up a brochure at a travel agency or responds to an ad to purchase * Wholesaler • Can take an allotment of rooms for a specific hotel at a discounted rate in different rate categories, with cutoff time periods • Can work on a "sell and report" basis; they report sales only after they are made, free of a cutoff time. • Includes people using a variety of transportation options. Negotiates with the airlines, cruise lines, railroads, hotels, car rentals, and bus companies to develop travel options to be resold as a total package. • Wholesalers negotiate the best deals from the suppliers and then re-sell the product at a price that includes their profit margins * International wholesalers exist both domestically and abroad * Ad hoc groups are organizations that are already formed and want to book a tour to a previously visited or new destination. • The tour operator takes possession of the inventory of hotel rooms and restaurant seats, but the risk is much lower because a solid booking is in place • A series group might be a solicited group of people who want to tour somewhere specific with specific, predetermined departure dates. • Tour operator needs the full cooperation of channel members to be successful • Ad hoc groups are the least complicated to administer • Wholesale tours are very risk as some hotels and restaurants have strict cancellation guidelines and if the tour doesn't sell, the wholesaler can end up holding a large, perishable inventory • Good channel management can work two ways • If the wholesaler is attempting to coordinate a tour series to a destination, the hotels and restaurants should remain flexible to help in the development of the distribution network. • Short-term decisions regarding cancellation clauses could prejudice an active channel member in the future. • When business is slow, the operators will wield clout to obtain the lowest possible rates.

What are the four fundamental components of database marketing?

Database Marketing Components • Database marketing has four fundamental components: strategy, data, information, and knowledge 1. Strategy • Strategy begins with the development of the marketing program (who is the target customer, where do they live, what do they buy, where else do they go?) • Once the strategy is conceived and integrated with other marketing vehicles, the data are assembled 2. Data • Actual names, addresses, numbers, dates of arrival/departure, room preferences, purchase ahbits, credit card usage • Initial database should contain data on past customers, then new prospects from list sources can be added • For data to be meaningful, they have to be accurate • Loyalty programs help ensure accuracy of data • Gain customers' permission to communicate with them (give customers ability to change their information online, opt in, provide preferences as to what info they want to receive and how often, and opt out) 3. Information • Consists of the analysis of the data • Demography and psychographics of customers need to be analyzed 4. Knowledge • Knowledge stage of a database program includes segmentation, clustering, and modeling • Segmentation includes gathering "like" customers together • Segments are then clustered (brunch eaters and weekend travelers are the same) • Once customers are clustered, the search for new lists (and customers) begins through modeling. Nonusers will cluster in a manner similar to that of current customers, and list sources screened in this manner will have a higher yield than those with no known similarity to current customers.

Describe the communications mix

Introduction • Communications mix: all communications between the firm and the target market that increase the tangibility of the product/service mix, that establish or monitor consumer expectation, or that persuade customers to purchase • Communications are a two-way street, it is also the feedback from the target market that tells the firm how well it is communicating and how well it is providing the services promised. This is part of relationship marketing. • Communications increases the tangibility of the product/service mix using words and pictures, not the product itself (presentation mix uses tangible physical evidence of the product) • Marketing communications persuade customers to purchase. Communications may be crafted to achieve nonbehavioral outcomes, the ultimate goal of most marketing communications is to induce purchase. The Communications Mix • The communications mix contains five elements: 1. Advertising 2. Sales promotion 3. Merchandising 4. Public relations and publicity 5. Personal selling

Define publicity

Publicity • When "natural stories" have been fully developed, other methods must be employed to keep the press interested in the hospitality enterprise • Publicity now needs to be "created" so that editors will continue to have something to write about • When creating publicity events, the purpose of the event needs to be established together with a target medium, and an evaluation of the event needs to follow. • Publicity, in this sense, is like promotion, except that publicity is aimed specifically at the media to generate more PR. • Promotions can be held without publicity; publicity helps with promotions. • Steps in creating publicity events: 1. Publicity begins with inviting the appropriate editors and media to the property for a specific event. Personal relationships developed by the PR manager are critical for attendance by the right people. • Event must be organized so that everything goes perfectly • If not executed well, the hotel/restaurant may be the object of negative publicity 2. At the event, press releases with background information are made available to the press. • PR professional should work the event by attending and pitching the points personally to the media • After the event, the PR manager should begin the placement work for the PR effort. Thank you notes and gifts remind the attendees of the importance of the event. • Follow-up calls are made to cajole the writers to place the story in the best life and to request favorable placement from the editors. • Physical placement of the story is just as important. 3. Last stage is program evaluation • Have more customers been generated? Has the perception been altered? • Measure customer perceptions through consumer research that measures both "pre" and "post" campaign images. • Effective PR programs include a provision for the unexpected - the negative publicity that can follow a natural disaster or unfortunate event. • Every PR plan must include a provision for "crisis communications" setting forth policies on such critical issues as who will serve as the official spokesperson to the press, what arrangements will be made to timely and accurate information to the press, how often the press will be briefed, etc. • When events take place at individual properties, franchise companies should make a corporate statement. There needs to be an open dialogue with the press, so that no one thinks a property is trying to hide something. • If a reporter wants to make a national story out of something, there is no way to stop him. But you can't run away from the issue and say no comment. • When accident occurs, the hotel is just as much a victim as the actual victim • Try to keep a local story from becoming a national story • Some companies have a 24-hour crisis hotline for its franchisees. • Corporate PR offices can help write statements for a property and guide property management on how best to answer questions from the press.

Define collateral

• Collateral: brochures, direct mail, and other forms of advertising • Same rules for advertising explained in this chapter apply to collateral. • Much hotel print advertising has progressed beyond the stereotypical ads, while hotel collateral has progressed only in rare instances and generally consists of relatively uninspiring visuals and copy. • In at least 75% of all hotel brochures, you couldn't tell one hotel from another, even if you changed the name, address, and picture. • Websites have provided a new outlet for creativity and become mandatory "brochures" on the Internet

Define repositioning. What are the procedures for repositioning?

Repositioning • Repositioning: constitutes changing a position or image in the marketplace • The process is the same as initial positioning with the addition of one other element—removing the old positioning image • Reasons for wanting a reposition: • You are occupying an unsuccessful position in the first place • Tried and failed to fully achieve a desired position • Competitors, too many and/or too powerful, have moved into the same position, making it overcrowded • Perceiving a new niche opportunity of which you wish to take advantage • Appeal to a new segment, to add a new segment while at the same time trying to hold on to an old one, or to increase the size of a segment • New ownership desires a new position or wishes to merge the position of a newly acquired property into that of other properties already owned • Developing a partially or totally new concept, downgrading a property that has become distressed, or upgrading one that has been refurbished. • Repositioning is a two-pronged effort: a negative image and customer ill-will must be overcome before a new impression can be created. The successful repositioning of a hotel begins with an intensive examination of the market the repositioner intends to enter. The Art of Repositioning • Repositioning rests on a change of image • Pitfalls associated with repositioning • Short-run effect may be a loss of sales while the repositioning is being accomplished • A gain in sales may occur only because people are "giving it another chance" • There may be a sales drop because the new position was a poor choice and the market is too limited or already dominated by a competitor • Find out why something has happened - do not assume! Procedures for Repositioning 1. Determine the present position. Before trying to change a perception, you have to know what that perception is. 2. Determine what position you wish to occupy. Calls for thorough and objective research of the market and the competition, as well as the resources and ability to occupy that position. Be realistic! 3. Make sure the product is truly different for the repositioning. Improvement in aesthetics must be followed through operationally. 4. Initiate the repositioning campaign based on the three criteria of effective positioning. These include image, differentiation, and promised benefits and should be formulated from the research of the target market. 5. Measure to see whether the position has significantly changed in the desired direction. This too is critical. Do not simply measure sales or profits, what you want to know is whether perceptions have truly changed.

What are the three types of product/service attributes?

Salience, Determinance, and Importance • Must understand how customers perceive and differentiate among salient, determinant, and important product or service attribute or benefits. • What's important in the customer choice process - why the customer is buying Salience • Salient attributes: those that are "top of the mind" • A list of strictly salient attributes obtained from customers may be misleading (sale of a shirt might be an inducement, but what determines your choice was the style) • Salient factors may be determinant factors, but they are not determinant when they are not the true differentiating factor the customer is looking for or when they are common throughout the product class • People say location is a salient attribute, but if there are five resorts, it's not a determinant factor • Use salient factors to get attention and create awareness. Determinance • Business travelers care about price, leisure travelers care about amenities • Determinant attributes: actually determine choice, such as reputation, price/value, or level of service • Most closely related to customer preferences or actual purchase decisions • Predispose customers to actions • Problem: customers do not always know exactly what forms the basis of their choice • Amenities, location, cleanliness become negatively determinant, as hotels should have them, but promoting them or positioning on them wouldn't work. • Use determinant factors to persuade customers to make a choice. Importance • Importance attributes: important to the customer after having made a choice • Example: it is important for bathroom amenities to be there, once the customer is accustomed to their being there, but they are still not determinant. • Once the choice has been made, what was salient or determinant fades into the background, unless they are found not to exist. • Use importance factors to arouse interest and create a benefit bundle that will lead to determinance. • Salience, determinance, and importance are complementary concepts • Selective perception, selective acceptance, and selective retention • All three occur with salient factors • Determinant and importance factors are more likely to cause selective retention because we remember what features helped provide the memorable experience or offered a solution to our problem. • Must positioning tat is done only on salient factors is less successful when these factors are not determinant • Good positioning requires that creating an image, differentiating the product or service, and making a promise are all based on determinant and/or importance factors.

Describe consortium

• Consortium: an agreement, combination or group formed to undertake an enterprise beyond the resources of any one member • Occur for both travel agencies and hotels • Most think of consortia as only referring to travel agencies, for example GIANTS, eTraCO, MAST, the Leisure Travel Group, and Virtuoso • However, consortium is a loosely knit group of independently owned and managed properties with different names, a joint marketing distribution purpose, and a common consortium designation • Purpose: open a channel of distribution by maximizing combined marketing resources while amortizing the associated marketing expenses • More common in the United States • Distribute hotel inventory at preferred rates to affiliated travel agencies • Many of the affiliated agencies are "in-plants," or travel agencies dedicated to one company.

Define advertising and roles that it plays.

• Advertising: mass communication that is paid for. • The most visible element of the communications mix • Broadest potential reach of all the components of the communications mi - it can reach the largest number of prospects and do so very quickly • Most expensive component • Include in advertising all those media that are part of the constant barrage of messages consumers receive daily through newspapers, magazines, television, radio, transit displays, outdoor boards, and online. • Include collateral, such as hotel brochures, flyers and pamphlets, and direct mail (not derived from databases) • Internet has made the advertising choices more complex • Banner advertising, skyscraper ads, pay per click ads, text link, and other forms of communication online are available to marketers today. • Thousands of travel-related Internet sites all claim thousands of visitors *Roles of Advertising • Advertising is intended to inform, create awareness, attempt to persuade, and reinforce the buying behavior of present customers • Play a major role in positioning • Advertising development is subject to the same guidelines • Most important objective function of advertising may be to create and maintain awareness of the company or the property or some particular component of either, such as a new addition or a new service. • Most important subjective function is to position the property or the company.

What are three methods of evaluating advertising effectiveness?

• Advertising effectiveness is measured in several ways: 1. A tracking measure can be inserted into the ad (such as a special website) 2. Image advertising can be measured by evaluating changes in pre- and postexposure perceptions of the property or brand. This technique entails conducting research. You can also measure other levels of advertising effectiveness including changes in both unaided and aided awareness of the property or brand and similar shifts in stated purchase intention. 3. Advertising efficiency can also be measured by the theoretical cost per thousand prospects who are exposed to the message. • Did it work? • Estimate the cost of the programs, including all of the components: ad preparation (ad design, creative work, copy, production, and other costs) plus media and agency costs. • Compare the total costs to the expected results. • Evaluate the potential return on investment by measuring expenses against the net room rate generated by the sale of each room (less costs of selling the room). If you can achieve the amount that needs to be sold to break even, you should do it. Both the advertising agency and hotel management should have clear expectations of the campaign and the net result after it's over. • There is no single preferred method for the measurement of advertising results, the most prudent approach to measurement is one that incorporates some combination of the methods outlined in this chapter.

Define brand equity. Why is branding important? How has technology impacted brand marketing?

• Brand equity: a set of assets (and liabilities) linked to a brand's name and symbol that adds to (or subtracts from) the value provided by a product or service to a firm and/or that firm's customers • The major assets categories are: brand name awareness, brand loyalty, perceived quality and brand associations • Branded properties are becoming ever more important • 70% in U.S., 30% in Canada, 10-15% elsewhere in the world • Brand names provides "instant recognition" • Companies that control well-recognized and well-reputed brands will be successful over the long run, depending on how they handle their brand identity. • Branding is important for hospitality companies because: • A strong brand attracts more franchisees, which translates into higher revenue. • Branding enables firms to gain management contracts, access to capital, and higher-than-average revenue per available room • Branding also allows firms to spread costs for supplies and technical issues, such as web connectivity, across multiple properties. • Technology has had a significant impact on brand marketing • Reservation systems are shifting from central reservation systems to Internet distribution • It brings branded properties wider recognition because they can afford to pay the necessary fees to get better placement on the ending search engine page • With multiple names appearing on the website, the customer will tend to examine only hotels they are familiar with and ignore the rest due to the risk associated with buying a hospitality product (risk results from the intangibility of the hospitality product and the simultaneous consumption and production) • Product consistency and integrity of branded properties affect the positioning of the entire brand • Protecting the brand's image and identities is done through quality standards and frequent inspections of properties

Define campaign management

• Campaign management: extension of customer relationship management. When properly implemented, automated CM can be used to launch, change, and redeliver campaign materials, calculate the return on investment, streamline your marketing activities, profile customers, and generally allow more flexibility in your campaigns. • Central place where management can see ever aspect of a campaign: creative, timing, results, current status. • Cost savings are substantial and the final product is far better than it once was (e.g. e-mail blasts). • Monitor the status of the campaign in near-real-time it is easy to see how consumers are interacting with the creative and determine what content is working and what should perhaps be changed. Making the necessary adjustments can be handled at low cost and quickly, making an entire campaign flexible to the demands of the target market. • CM will turn marketing communications into a two-way street. Automation of e-mail, the Web, and print campaigns will allow you to track how a customer interacts with your creative; it also allows you to create customer profiles. • Create and launch a personalized product-specific campaign to a selected audience while tracking customer reactions and adjust aspects that may be underperforming, all the while receiving consumer feedback and building the strength of the customer database.

What are some tips for handling negative publicity?

• Cannot control the actual content of the resulting press coverage, but it can ensure balanced reporting of the circumstances and the event. • Be prepared: anticipate the occurrence of some type of crisis through the preparation and maintenance of a crisis communications plan. Specify the policies and procedures that would apply in the event of an emergency or other event that could result in negative coverage of the business in the press. • Stick to the facts: report and comment on only what you know to be true, not on what you think may be true or on speculation that has yet to be confirmed. • Tell your story through a single spokesperson: should be identified in the crisis communications plan, and he should be the sole source of contact with the media. Minimizes the potential for miscommunication about the facts and/or the business's actions in the aftermath of the event. • Tell your story in a timely manner: There's nothing more suspicious than silence in the aftermath of some type of unfortunate event, so provide the press with periodic updates. • Tell the truth • Do the right thing: If a customer, stakeholder, or employee has been wronged, management should acknowledge the failure and do the right thing to make proper amends, even if the action has adverse financial implications

Describe promotional tie-ins

• Catchall for the burgeoning attempts of the industry to expand its marketbase through intermediaries (e.g. couponing, dining clubs) • Dining clubs: intermediary organization prints, markets, and distributes the coupons representing everything from a free dessert to a two-for-one offering • Hotel companies have been represented by various couponing organizations primarily selling a 50% off rack rate, which is often not that good of a deal. One can often negotiate for less. • Majority of airline customers eventually become hotel customers. Hotels work with airlines to arrange specific marketing packages to mutual destinations. • Channel of distribution grows longer • After hotel enters an agreement for distribution with an airline, a second channel member, the travel agent or tour operator, moves in. • Each intermediary, while offering new customers, takes a commission. • Hotel and rental car companies are, out of necessity, integrating their offers with the airline reservation systems. • By combining technology, these channel members present a unique opportunity to the customers to take advantage of "one-stop shopping" as agents can make arrangements using the GDS without ever using the telephone • None of this channel participation is without cost • Without constant supervision and evaluation, channels of distribution can sometimes become cost prohibitive • If revenues aren't high, they could lose money after paying fees and commissions.

Describe central reservation systems

• Central reservation system (CRS): integrates with both the GDS and PMS • Created so that individual hotel chains could provide consolidated access to their worldwide inventory through toll-free telephone calls • If well-managed, it will offer the customer the same availability and rates that may be found on both the GDS and at the hotel • Ideally, the local hotel will be electronically compatible with the CRS to ensure that similar information is available to the customer • When hotels communicate manually with the CRS, it results in incorrect information, availability, and rates and slow response time. • CRS functionality is being consolidated and outsourced to reduce cost • LHW has a third party company contracted to handle calls (private label service) • Seamless connectivity of the CRS is a benefit to the customer, in this case, the travel manager or travel agency • Allows two-way inventory management; the travel agent sees the same inventory that the reservation manager on property sees in the PMS • Room categories are based on availability, and rates are shown fro each category • Travel m managers and agents are able to provide the most accurate information to their travelers with seamless connectivity • Many hotel chains offer single image inventory, whereby the inventory is held at the CRS level but a different availability of inventory is maintained at the property level.

Describe corporate travel departments and travel management companies

• Corporate travel departments range from a corporate travel director who develops corporate travel policies and writes contracts with travel suppliers (e.g. hotels and airlines) to full in-house travel agencies • Goal: balance the needs of the business traveler with those of the organization • Help control corporate costs by negotiating volume discounts, providing information to employees, tracking costs, and monitoring future trends within the travel industry. • ACTE and NTBA provide travel managers a forum to share info, learn latest trends and meet with travel suppliers • Recent trend is for organizations to outsource the corporate travel department to travel management companies. • Large travel agents such as American Express and Rosenblueth Travel provide this service for organizations

Describe destination management organizations

• DMOs: organizations responsible for the management and/or marketing of destinations • The primary functions of DMOs: • a "community marketer," communicating the most appropriate destination image, attraction, and facilities to selected markets • an "industry coordinator," providing a clear focus and encouraging less industry fragmentation in order that companies may share in the growing benefits of tourism • a "quasi-public representative," adding legitimacy for the industry and protection to individual and group visitors • a "builder of community pride," enhancing quality of life and acting as the chief "flag carrier" for residents and visitors alike • Important that hospitality marketing executives be involved in these organizations to ensure their interests are properly represented • DMOs are also becoming more involved in online channels • Advertising on the web is a common practice used by tour operators to attract customers

Describe database marketing

• Database marketing used to be known as direct marketing, but • Direct marketing implies a one-way communication (from firm to the customer) • Database marketing involves two-way communications • Database marketing is both part of the communications mix and interactive marketing • Most important usage is that of managing relevant data on customers to identify them for the purpose of: • Developing a long-standing relationship of repeat business • Send desired messages at the right time, in the right form, to the right people • Develop the right product that satisfies their needs and wants • Databases are decision-support systems • Information in database systems typically includes internal data on customers and purchased data (list sources) on both customers and prospects • Info can be used to generate mailing lists and prospect lists for salespeople and to identify market segments • Direct communications channel with customers/prospects through a computerized customer database • Database marketing augments more traditional communications vehicles, such as advertising and personal selling • E-mail marketing has become an integral component of a comprehensive database marketing strategy • Database marketing works well with restaurant customers, weekend package customers, and individuals (more so than organizations). • Database info enables companies to target individuals or small segments of like customers, which is useful for sales support and direct marketing programs • Data marketing has three main benefits: 1. It provides a strategic advantage through the more effective use of marketing information internally 2. It improves the use of customer and market information 3. It forms a basis for developing long-term customer relationships, especially with those customers who account for a large portion of a firm's business. • E-mail can now track consumer behavior through: • "Click through" rates (how many customers opened the email) • Number of unique visitors to the landing page on a website (how many customers actually viewed the offer) • Actual bookings (how many customers made a reservation) • Form of database marketing is telemarketing (using phone to reach customers); has been used so frequently that it has become annoying and counterproductive • Once customer gives you permission, your name can go into the database, which complements advertising and personal selling, and used for further contact. • Proprietary marketing databases are developed by an individual company for its own use • Provide a competitive advantage in enabling a company to focus on a particular market segment • Example: databases with guest history or frequent guest program preferences • Powerful aspect of relationship marketing • E-mail confirmations allow hotels to thank customer, offer to book reservations, and send thank-you notes upon departure • Customized marketing databases are used to profile prospective customers • Data obtained from outside sources are customized to fit the property's customer profile • Customer info is obtained before contacting customer to filter product info appropriately • Contacts can be made with potential customers who have similar profiles to present customers as they will have a greater probability of becoming future customers

Describe the impact that multiple brands has on companies.

• Develop multiple brands for growth purposes and for market niches through development of a new concept or acquisitions • Provides growth and protection from the competition against a single brand. • Cannibalization: steal its own customers rather than letting someone else steal from them. May be self-defeating for the parent company if these chains cannibalized each other, so they must position • Have similar positioning strategies between its own brands as an outside competitor would toward its brands • Different market segments may include many of the same people, but they belong to a different segment when they use restaurants for different purposes, in different contexts, or at different time. • Positioning of each chain should be managed so that they do not steal from each other and then the standard positioning rules can be applied. • Brand extension: hotel chains with properties under the same or similar name, each trying to position to a different market segment • The success of brands depends on creating a clear differentiation in the minds of customers. • If advertising doesn't communicate the perception of a new product, then maybe the product isn't really new at all. • Chains pursuing diversification by introducing new products under different names have so far met with greater success. • A brand name is an asset, as long as it stands single-mindedly for a specific package of value and benefits. • Can hotel concepts under the same or similar names make the same claim? • Is each brand or product positioned to a different specific target market, each with specific needs that relate to the positioning? • Can these markets differentiate the positioning of each brand or product name so that they (the markets) know which one "belongs" to them? • This is the concern of positioning any multiple brands, more so when the problem is compounded by similar names. • If the answers to these questions are no, then there will be a clear case of cannibalization and customer confusion. • Multiple brand positioning can be done successfully as Marriott has • Each brand is based on the needs of a specific target market. Each is clearly differentiated from the other, so no customer would ever choose one when he or she wanted the other. • The traveler can have a choice in the same location • Even if each property is clearly positioned to its own market segment, cannibalization may still happen.

Define competitive positioning

• Examine images and positions of all entities that may compete • Anticipate the effects of the proposed positioning and the reactions of competitors • Examining strengths and weaknesses of competitive positioning can identify positions to adopt and to stay away from and areas of dissatisfaction where a new positioning could generate new customers or lure others from the competition. • If segment is expanding, this process could also identify a growth opportunity • Do not focus too much on only your immediate adjacent competition. As the economy becomes more global, newer markets and competitors must be understood to effectively market a hotel. • The risks involved in positioning or repositioning are high • Perceptual mapping reduces risk by helping the marketer: • Understand how competing products/services are perceived by the target markets in terms of strengths and weaknesses • Understand the similarities and dissimilarities between competing products/services • Position or reposition a product/service in the marketplace • Track the progress of a marketing campaign on the perceptions of the target markets. • Also be able to protect the position you establish by anticipating possible competitive reactions and taking measures to reduce their impact. • Positioning makes a statement of what the product is and how it should be evaluated • True positioning uses all of the marketing mix variables, including products/services offered, how they are presented, the price, and the methods used to communicate to the customer • No assurance of success until "share of mind" is achieved, when customers realize positioning efforts • Where promotional strategy comes into play as desired positions do not wait to be discovered.

What are the two sources of customer information?

• GDS offers limited info on individual guests aside from reservation info • Internet allows the consolidation of many fields of customer data, but careful consideration must be given to the techniques used to acquire customer data on the Internet • Two sources of e-mail data: spam and consensual data 1. Spam consists of unwanted e-mail that is sent to lists of e-mail names acquired from a variety of third party sources. Many companies can provide thousands of e-mail names for marketing purposes, yet consumers are becoming increasingly wary of unsolicited e-mails 2. Consensual data (permission-based marketing): Customers are given the option to provide their e-mail address in order to receive additional info or become eligible for a prize. Tell them exactly what they will be receiving in return for their e-mail address. Communicate only as often as the guest wants to hear form you. 3. E-mail should state where it comes from and offer the ability to opt out. • Some e-databases require more customer info, such as a request for proposal (RFP) at a hotel (company name, arrival/departure dates, meeting space requirements) to receive a relevant quote from the hotel. Data can be sorted and stored for future campaigns. • Other sources of e-mail addresses come from the online reservation systems, also known as booking engines • Booking engines require the e-mail address of the consumer in order to deliver the confirmation. • The hotel has access to this info on past customers and can sort the data by arrival dates for timely marketing messages. • Ease of customer communication often tempts hotel marketers to mail lots of info, but this can destroy the relationship with the guest.

Describe global distribution system

• Global distribution system (GDS) connects the travel agent to the individual hotel • Initially developed to list only airline flights, and some were even created by airlines • Now, the GDS allows the travel agent to book hotels, flights, rental cars, train tickets • Big players: Amadeus, Galileo, Sabre, and Worldspan • The largest of these is Worldspan, which processes 50% of all travel agent transactions • These companies are also part of companies that are major players in the travel industry (one company owns Galileo/Orbitz, another owns Sabre/American Airlines/Travelocity) • For a hotel to be booked electronically through the GDS, the hotel's CRS must have a computer connection to the GDS or it must contract with a distribution service provider (DSP) • Examples: Wizcom, Thisco, Pegasus, and Trust • Provides the switch that links the CRS with the GDS • Hotels are represented in the GSD by different codes (may be chain or representative company - LHW) • Once the travel agent picks a hotel, the information is transferred from the GDS to the hotel's CRS through one of the switching companies • These companies decode the info from the GDS and translate it into a code that each hotel can understand and input into its own reservation systems • At each point of the booking process, a fee is added, which is why companies want to market directly to the customer

What determines control and management of the channel? What is the purpose of maintaining good relationships among channels?

• In a typical conventional distribution system, the retailer carries many brands, including those of competing companies. • Control and management of the channel therefore lies in the strength of the product being sold. • If an item is in very high demand, the producer of this product may be able to set the terms of the system and may manipulate the retailer into carrying and merchandising other, weaker products as well • When the product is weak, the retailers will dictate the terms of the system to reach the customer • The same principles of control and channel management apply to the hospitality industry, except that the producer of the product is also the retailer • If the product is strong, the retailer has control over the wholesaler (tour operator) • If the product is weak, the wholesaler assumes the control. Relationships among Channels • Good channel management stems from the stems from the formulation of a good working relationship among channels from the start • All agreements pertaining to the workings of the channel should be in writing and should be updated as market conditions change • There is rarely an all-win situation, but if channel members are not deriving value form the network, that member will not participate actively and distribution will eventually become more difficult and more costly. • If the hotel begins to dispute the validity of the origin of the bookings or delays the payment, the relationship with the channel of distribution becomes ineffective and the representative firm will move on to other hotels (no-win situation) • Each channel member seeks to create customers for a profit, but without some give and take on a regular basis by all channel members, the system becomes tedious and disruptive • Carefully select partners and manage them well.

Describe incentive travel organizations

• Incentive travel organization: companies that specialize in handling strictly incentive reward travel (to reward top-performers) • Both large and small companies are relying on incentive houses to organize their trips • Reasons for using incentive houses: • There is a special need for destinations are new, different, and exciting to offer a real incentive for performance • Real need for the trip to be letter-perfect, as a poor trip destroys the morale of the employee they are trying to reward. • Keeping up with this worldwide is expensive and time-consuming. • Incentive houses partial out the costs of their expertise. Someone visits and inspects the destination, hotels, restaurants, and ground services before putting together the incentive package. Sells it to the company, who "sells" it to the employee. • For upscale hotels, particularly in resort areas or foreign destinations, it can be a real boost to be on the list of major incentive houses. • Property cannot buy an incentive house's services, it is earned by doing things right. • The customer pays for the incentive house's service • Incentive planners deal directly with individual properties as opposed to chain representatives because they want to be personally certain of the product • Each channel member involved with incentive travel is integrally dependent on the other members in the channel for performance (e.g. ground transportation). If customers are dissatisfied, they may choose another incentive house. Future house may be lost not only to another incentive house, but to another destination.

What are some of the challenges of e-commerce in China?

• Internet bookings are increasing in both Europe and Asia Pacific • Three primary challenges to online distribution (e-commerce) in China 1. Most prominent: cash-based nature of Chinese society and the fact that very few Chinese carry international credit cards; most carry a debit card from a domestic Chinese bank. Many bookings are abandoned before being finalized, and the customer calls the property to book directly. • Some successful solutions include: payment by mobile phone (money is transferred via text), cash pick-up (employees come to consumer's door), domestic bank card, post office payment 2. E-commerce is young in China, so very few Chinese have a track record of successful online transactions. • Little trust has been built up for the Internet as a distribution channel and many Chinese harbor concerns regarding the safety and security of personal information over the Internet • Translate security statement into Chinese and emphasize web security in Chinese advertising 3. Tendency to question the reliability of info provided online • Chinese are skeptical of room descriptions and hotel amenity lists online • Enrich content by including virtual tours, floor plans, and photographs • Success in the Chinese Internet market is contingent upon a hotel company's willingness to break the traditional mold of its cookie-cutter e-commerce platform and cater to the unique needs and concerns of the Chinese consumer.

What should advertising accomplish?

• Major advertising campaigns in the hospitality industry are conducted only by very large companies with significant resources • On the other end are the individual restaurants or motor inns that do almost no advertising • Between these two extremes lies a vast group who do limited advertising on very limited budgets. "Bang for your buck" principle is appropriate: Advertising dollars have to be carefully allocated to where they will do the most good. • The ideal hospitality advertisement will accomplish five things: 1. Tangibilize the service element so the reader can mentally grasp what is offered 2. Promise a benefit that can be delivered and/or provide solutions to problems 3. Differentiate the property form that of the competition 4. Have positive effects on employees who must execute the promises 5. Capitalize on word of mouth • Counter beliefs that are spread by the media, to get people talking. • Seldom easy to get all these elements into one advertisement; usually we have to settle for less. However, we should strive to differentiate with something other than grandiose claims. Unless there is something truly unique about the property, that kind of ad doesn't fill the requirements. • Make sure the copy provides differentiation. *Use of Advertising Today • If you cannot make an impact on the market through advertising, other than to create awareness and provide information, it might be better to save your dollars and put them to better use (for instance in the product or in lower prices, which will generate positive word of mouth, a far more powerful force than most advertising). • Consumer is bombarded with advertising messages, so what the mind is most responsive to are those features, experiences, needs, and wants that solve a problem or fulfill a need or desire. • Hospitality products and services are very similar in the same product class • Unique niches are harder to find, services are easy to copy, and aggressive competitors are using innovative positioning strategies. • It is difficult to gain a competitive advertising advantage solely through the use of advertising. • Too expensive to achieve effective awareness and persuasion levels by this means. • Successful advertising derives from a well-though-out and planned strategy. There is a tendency to look just at the execution and ignore the strategy, and base it on what someone likes rather than how it affects the customer.

Define marketing positioning. What's the objective? What happens if you do not have a distinctive position?

• Marketing positioning: the natural follow-through of market segmentation and target marketing • Positioning is built on those strategies because they define the market to which the positioning is directed • Objective of positioning: create a distinctive place in the minds of potential customers • Customers know who the firm is, how the firm is different from the competition, and how the firm can satisfy the customers' needs and wants • Creates the perception that the firm is best able to solve the customers' problems • If the firm does not create a distinctive place, the firm: 1. Is forced into a position of competing directly with stronger competition 2. Lacks true identity and customers do not know what it offers and what needs are fulfilled. This happens when a property tries to be all things to all people. 3. Has no position in customers' minds so that it lacks top-of-the-mind awareness and is not part of the customer's evoked set.

What are some approaches to the marketing budget?

• Not easy to determine. No universally accepted standards as to how much should be spent in a given product or market situation. • Situation is compounded by a complex set of circumstances that is never constant within or among properties or companies. • Common practices • Independent restaurants typically do not have marketing departments and may or may not fund advertising campaigns. If they are part of a chain or a franchise, they will pay a percentage of revenue to the parent company that does national or regional advertising for all units in the chain. • In the hotel industry, similar rules apply, but reservation costs are added to the equation. A franchised Days Inn may do zero local advertising, but will pay the franchisor a set fee per room or a percentage of revenue for both advertising support and the reservation system. These amounts are contractually negotiated. • More marketing funds are moving toward the Internet at the expense of some traditional communication vehicles, such as television. Many hotels do not have budgets to accommodate broadcast media, but the change is happening nonetheless. • No certainty about the duration of benefits of advertising and promotions • Cumulative effect depends on the loyalty of customers, their frequency of purchase, and competitive efforts, each of which may be influenced by a different set of variables. • Promotions may induce competitors to react, but it is hard to tell just what that reaction will be until it happens. The strength of the response may require additional expenditures to meet it. • Rules of thumb for determining marketing budgets: 1. Zero-Based Budgets: those set with respect to specific performance goals rather than projected gross revenues or previous levels of expenditure. 2. Competitive-Level Budgets: Those set with reference to the level of marketing expenditure by competitors. 3. Whatever's Left Over Method: This is perilous and typically used by sole proprietors. 4. Return on Investment Approach: Compares the expected return with the desired return and treats the expenditure as an investment to be recouped over the years. • Some promotional costs produce immediate results, but it may be difficult to determine the outcome. • Roles of advertising, sales departments, and sales promotions often overlap. • Hotel may arbitrarily set a figure such as 5% of sales as a benchmark, develop the marketing plan, and adjust as needed. • New opening, special events, and special situations will affect the final budget.

What are some examples of hotel restaurant branding?

• Outsourcing of F&B outlets to recognized brand names as historically, hotel F&B outlets have been notoriously unprofitable. • Hotel guests have traditionally "eaten out" on a majority of occasions, going instead to a recognized brand restaurant • Put brand names in-house to keep customers from going outside the hotel and as a point of differentiation among hotels. • F&B branding trend works in three ways: 1. Hotel to lease the space for a flat fee and/or a percentage of sales - the hotel loses control to another operator. 2. Hotel to acquire a franchise and become a franchisee, paying fees and royalties to the franchisor. 3. Undertake a joint venture in which both the hotel and the restaurant operator share the costs and the profits. • Joint ventures are being undertaken by hospitality and nonhospitality company (e.g. Nickelodeon and Holiday Inn)

What is the role of positioning?

• Positioning is not just advertising. It should be a single-minded concept, an umbrella from which everything else in the organization flows. • Also includes promotions, brochures, facilities, and décor • Also affects policies and procedures, employee attitudes, customer relations, complaint handling, and the myriad of other details that combine to make a hospitality experience • Positioning plays a vital role in the development of the entire marketing mix • Compete on more than just image, differentiation, and benefits offered. • Must be a consistency among the various offerings, and it is the positioning statement that guides this consistency • Chain operations should develop a consistency if the company desires to use one unit to generate business for another. • "Offer a unique product or service. Understand the customer decisions and then use it to your advantage to successfully stimulate sales. Understand what the customer wants and match that against what your chain has to offer." • Your position must be believable in the customer's mind • You must deliver on the promise on a consistent basis. • Make sure your niche is customer-driven, not restaurant driven • Subjective positioning is a strategy for creating a unique product image with the objective of creating and keeping customers • Exists solely in the mind of the customer and can occur automatically • Marketer must control the positioning, not just let it happen • Select a position in the marketplace and to achieve and hold that position by delivering it

Define internal positioning analysis

• Positioning maps help to determine positioning strategies vis-à-vis the competition. • Analyzing one's own position on a number of attributes or benefits • Use expectations and salient, determinant, or importance factors as one scale and performance perception as the other. • Questions • What is the expectation of the target market? • How does it perceive us on these attributes? • Internal analysis indicates where the operation may be failing internally • Aids in the best use of resources by indicating where they will count the most for the customer • Draw similar maps for the competition • Importance vs. Performance • Quadrant 1: where you are performing well on features that are important • Quadrant 2: where you're doing a poor job providing the features that are important • Quadrant 3: where features are not important and you are doing poorly in providing these features. Do not worry about features in this quadrant. • Quadrant 4: where you are overperforming by doing a great job on features that are of little importance to the customers • **Focus on Quandrant 2 and 4. Provide less of the features in Quadrant 4 and use the cost savings to improve the features in Quandrant 2 • If the target market doesn't perceive the image, it doesn't exist. If they don't believe that what you have to offer is a benefit, then it is isn't a benefit. If customers do not believe you can deliver the benefit, your promises are meaningless. If the benefit isn't important to the target market, it isn't important, and if your benefit is not perceived as different, you haven't differentiated. • Images, benefit, and differentiation are solely the perception of the customer, not management. • Intangibility of services offered and the simultaneous production and consumption of the offering leaves plenty of room for wrong images before the purchase • Hospitality research too often fails to identify the vital elements of benefits (what the features do for the customer or how important they are. • Architecture of a property, the décor, and the furnishings are not themselves benefits. The benefit is what the attributes do for the customer (e.g. security, grandeur, aura). • Credibility of these benefits may diminish if an expectation is not fulfilled. • Décor is soon forgotten if the service is slow and the wait staff is rude • Fulfillment of expectations or lack of it that creates the perception of deliverability for the customer • Benefits, like positioning, exist in the mind of the customer and are determinable only by asking the customer • Tangible attributes have lost their ability to differentiate and, at the same time, are no longer determinants in the customer choice process • Positioning is the ultimate weapon in niche marketing • Answers the following questions: 1. What position do you own now? 2. What position do you want to own? 3. Who must you outposition? 4. How can you do it?

What's the difference between push and pull strategies?

• Push/pull strategies are important elements in developing the communications mix • Especially in hospitality because we deal so heavily with other customer providers or intermediaries, such as travel agents, tour operators, and external reservation systems. • Push strategy: "pushing" the communications mix down through the distribution channels. For example, hotel companies call on travel agents, advertises in travel agent publications, uses media available on the computer screen of travel agents, provides travel agent bonuses, etc. to get their cooperation in sending customers. • Pull strategy: going directly to the market that will then go through the distribution channels to book their reservations with an idea in mind of what they want. "Call your travel agent" uses this method. The company is "pulling" the customer up through the distribution channel. • Both methods are common in the hospitality industry and often used simultaneously • Who are you targeting - the customer or the intermediary?

What are the principles and practices of sales promotions?

• Sales promotions are marketing communications that serve specifically as incentives to stimulate sales on a short-term basis. • Can also be effectively used to stimulate trial purchases • Frequently used to bring in business during periods of slow demand • Lure is tied to some form of discounting or the bundling of products and service at one price that gives the perception of a price discount • Casinos use their player tracking system, which is essentially a loyalty card, to reward customers, with cash back, double points, free food and merchandise, or discounts on food and merchandise. • Sales promotion involves the development of creative ideas aimed at producing new customers or driving more frequent purchases in support of the total marketing effort • Sales promotions must be in tune with overall objectives and must complement other elements of both the communications mix and the marketing mix • Sales promotions should provide customer satisfaction, but are not likely to build long-term customer loyalty (except when they are used to reward loyal guests) • Sales promotions are typically oriented toward the short term, as if they are perceived to run all the time, they rarely succeed in the long term • This is because the promotion becomes part of the product, and no longer performs as originally intended. The promotion becomes something you are forced to give customers as part of the customary transaction because the customers have come to expect the offer • They may not buy unless the offer is in place.

Describe word of mouth communication.

• The most powerful form of communications, especially in the hospitality industry, is word of mouth (WOM) because hospitality products are considered credence goods. • Credence goods: products or services that typically cannot be tested before purchase, so consumers are forced to seek outside advice on whether or not to purchase the service. • Elements of the communications mix can influence word-of-mouth behavior • Creating WOM is a critical outcome of the communications mix • Communications mix affects word of mouth and, indirectly, may persuade someone to purchase or not to purchase • We may see an ad, read/hear publicity, or talk to a salesperson and develop a perception and expectation. We may then communicate that perception to someone else via word of mouth even though we have no actual experience with the product • Word-of-mouth behavior originates from an actual experience with the product or the word of mouth of others who have had an actual experience • We control behavior more by what we do (relationship marketing) than by what we say • A strong foundation for good word-of-mouth communication is built by fulfilling the needs and expectations of our customers. • When this is not done, an important factor in recapturing a reputation is the way customer requests and complaints are handled.

Describe undercover marketing

• Undercover marketing (stealth marketing): marketing to consumers when they do not even realize they are being marketed to. • Many customers have become bitter toward basic advertisement campaigns. • Hire actors, who appear to be very approachable people, to use the product they are trying to promote in a visible location where potential consumers of the product are likely to congregate. • The actors then begin conversations with the people at the location and promote the use of that product. • Undercover marketing can have backlash when the customer finds out, he or she can tend to get angry with the company. They can generate negative buzz about this product.

What are the various types of word of mouth?

• Various types of WOM: • Buzz marketing: Using high-profile entertainment or news to get people to talk about your brand • Viral marketing: Creating entertaining or informative messages designed to be passed along in an exponential fashion, often electronically or by e-mail. • Community marketing: Forming or supporting niche communities that are likely to share interests about the brand (such as user groups, fan clubs, and discussion forums); providing tools, content, and information to support those communities. • Grassroots marketing: Organizing and motivating volunteers to engage in personal or local outreach. • Evangelist marketing: Cultivating evangelists, advocates, or volunteers who are encouraged to take a leadership role in actively spreading the word on your behalf. • Product seeding: Placing the right product into the right hands at the right time, providing information or samples to influential individuals. • Influencer marketing: Identifying key communities and opinion leaders who are likely to talk about products and have the ability to influence the opinions of others. • Cause marketing: Supporting social causes to earn respect and support from people who feel strongly about the cause. • Conversation creation: Using interesting or fun advertising, e-mails, catch phrases, entertainment, or promotions to start word of mouth activity • Brand blogging: Creating blogs and participating in the blogosphere in the spirit of open, transparent communications. • Referral programs: Creating tools that enable satisfied customers to refer their friends • In order to create WOM and encourage communications: • Firm gives people something interesting to talk about • Create communities and networks to connect people • Work with influential communities • Create evangelist or advocate programs, enlisting people to be evangelists while they're taking advantage of your services. • Use of weblogs (journal or newsletter) that is frequently updated and is intended for general public consumption. Blogs often have hyperlinks, which enable the user to search other similar information or connect with others reading the same blog.