Social Media Marketing in Hotel Industry

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LITERATURE REVIEW1

Definitions of marketing1

Marketing in the hospitality industry1

E-marketing4

History and Developments of Social media6

Social Media and Networking in Marketing7

Online Booking11

CONCLUSION13

REFERENCES18

LITERATURE REVIEW

Definitions of marketing

Marketing can be defined as the function of organization or the company to develop, manufacture and sale of products and provision of services based on a comprehensive study of the market and the real needs of customers in order to obtain high profits. The main feature of the marketing concept is to ensure that the market orientation of the firm meets the needs of consumers.

There is a wide range of marketing tools, all of which are closely correlated with others including the market research, product policy, channels of distribution, price, advertising, and service. In general, they create a set of company's marketing principles and their effectiveness, in many respects, depends on the success of the company. With the development of the Internet and its related technologies, the field of marketing and all its approaches are constantly changing. Internet has unique characteristics, which are significantly different from those of traditional marketing tools.

Marketing in the hospitality industry

The hotel industry has been one of the fastest developing industries in the field of the business since the past many decades. However, this increasing growth and development pattern does not guarantee a satisfied and happy customer base. According to Piccoli (2008), there are many hotels which provide such services that are not able to meet the expectations of the customers and cause their reputation and market positioning to go down the maintained level. Many authors have conducted the researches on the subject and have declared the service quality as an important tool for maintaining the levels of customer satisfaction (Piccoli, 2008, p. 282).

The characterisation of the hotel industry is done by the high level interdependence of its service providers in order to maintain satisfied customers (Albrinck et al. 2008, p. 63). This is commonly achieved by maintaining a good supply chain network and a sophisticated system of meeting the customers' needs. Not only this, but various researchers have also emphasize the need for increased investment in information and communication technology (ICT) by the hotel industry, as a way to manage globalisation as well as the complex relationships among the different players (Piccoli, 2008, p. 282).

The successful managers in the marketing department of the hotel industry give more concentration to understanding the needs and wants of their consumers as clearly as it is possible for them to do (Albrinck et al. 2008, p. 63). The thorough application of the marketing research concepts has allowed the managers to understand and interpret the consumption of services by the consumers in a much better way (Piccoli, 2008, p. 282). The knowledge of consumer behaviour enables the marketing managers to introduce and implement sophisticated marketing programs which are aimed at targeting the specific segments of customers in the particular industry (Yang & Fu, 2007, p. 113). One of the most astonishing problems which is normally faced by the hotel managers are to understand ...