Social Media as means of improving marketing Techniques with customers of the Hotel industry: A case study of Crowne Plaza, Heathrow

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER # 2: LITERATURE REVIEW1

Social Media for Marketing1

Social Media2

Facebook6

Facebook Groups7

Targeted Marketing with Facebook9

Adoption of Social Media Applications9

Traditions of marketing in the hotel industry10

Improving Communications12

Use of Social Media12

Realising Sales14

Conventional Marketing Mix and Social Media15

Mass Media Impact and Influence21

Summary22

REFERENCES24

APPENDIX30

Questionnaire30

CHAPTER # 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter presents the review of literature to understand the use of social media in the hotel industry and how it can be used as a marketing tool. In a crowded and competitive market, producers adopt marketing strategies such as branding to differentiate their products and services, especially in the new era of social media networks (Hunter and Perreault 2007 34). With the emerging phenomenon of social media networks, public relations and marketing professionals have had to integrate this marketing tool into their strategic planning (Yin 2003 45).

Social Media for Marketing

Current literature identifies that research has been undertaken into the use of blogs, online communities, and virtual worlds, for branding and marketing objectives. Many companies are now utilizing these new channels and tools, on the Internet, to communicate their messages to consumers, some with more success and awareness, than others (Sekaran and Bougie 2009 48). Cisco is also active in a number of other social networks, including Wikipedia, YouTube, Facebook and Flickr (Woodley 2010 84). Paul Smith, head of technical and corporate marketing, believes that this offer much more personalised ways of marketing to people, enabling more accurate delivery of messages to the target consumer at the right time (Zhang 2010 338). Cisco also views it as an exciting new way to educate both employees and customers about their services, serving up more digestible chunks of information in a more interactive format.

Social Media

Researchers are yet to experience all the elements that social media has to offer. In recent years, social networking sites (SNS) have become the leading form of social media and one of the most important for communicators due to its connectivity component ( Darlington 2010 38). SNS have generated millions of new users within months. In February 2010, Facebook reported that it had reached 400 million active users, double the number reported in April 2009. Many of the users have incorporated these sites into their daily routine. Some of the most popular SNS today include Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Myspace. SNS cater to an array of audiences based on specific interest or shared characteristics such as language, racial, sexual or religious identities (Shavelson and Towne 2002 98). While the technological features tend to remain fairly consistent from site to site, it is the member engagement and what the users bring to the various sites that build a unique culture within each of these communities (Shkedi 2005 48). According to the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, SNS are Web-based services that allow individuals to

Construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system,

Articulate a list of other users with whom they share a connection, and

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