Benefits of Using Social Media Marketing in the Hospitality Industry: The Differences between Organic and Paid Social Media

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Social Media Marketing: The Differences between Organic and Paid Social Media

In today's society, we are heavily influenced by the power of social media and the content or social media advertising we read there. The phrase social media can be defined as any service through which users can create and share a variety of ideas, thoughts, or content through different platforms to different groups of people using the internet. These platforms can include but are not limited to the following:

• Social networking websites (Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter)
• Image Sharing Sites - (Pinterest, Snapchat or Instagram)
• Audio-video sharing sites (Tik Tok, Vimeo or Youtube)
• Online rating/ review forums - (Tripadvisor or Trustpilot) 
• Online groups - (Tumbler, Reddit or Community Blogs)

What is Social Media Marketing? 

Social Media Marketing (SSM) for a hotel involves marketing through these platforms to connect with your customers and drive them to your hotel's website and hopefully encourage the customer to purchase. Your customers are already engaging with hotels on social media so if you are not on any social platform speaking directly to your customers you are missing out! Many hotels use a social media marketing agency like Priemum Digital to help them with their social media marketing strategy. SSM now only allows you to engage with your customers but it helps build your brand awareness and increase sales. 

What is the Biggest Social Platform? 

According to Chaffey (2022), there are 4.62 billion users of social media around the world who spend on average 2 and a half hours per day on different platforms. Below are the most used social media platforms in the world as of January 2021.

We can see that Facebook is the top platform in the world with 2,910 million users worldwide and of these, 3.94 million are from Ireland. This is followed by Youtube with 2,562 million users worldwide. 

What Social Platform is best for your Hotel? 

To market your hotel using social media, you must first identify and understand your buyer persona as part of your social media strategy for hotels. Then you can identify what channels your customers use and understand what social media platforms for hotels will work best for you. You do not want to put all your marketing budget into a social channel where you will not see a good return on investment. Social media is time-consuming so you also don't want to waste time on a channel that's not going to produce for the hotel. Read more about some of the different platforms on my colleague's blog.

What Content is Best to Engage your Customers? 

SSM can include activities such as posting text, images, video, and other content to the different social platforms to drive user engagement. The type of content you will create will depend on your product offering and your buyer personas. Video and image is the most popular form of content however video content performs best with most algorithms on social platforms as it captures a viewer’s attention for longer. So if your hotel is not creating video content it is time to start. 

Should you use Paid or Organic Social Media? 

When it comes to social media the answer is easy you will want both organic and paid social media as they can be both used for different goals in your social strategy. 

Organic Social Media 

Organic social media are all posts that you share with no money behind them so they are free. These posts will engage the customers that follow you better know as your organic reach. They will also engage your followers’ followers if they share your post. People may also see your organic post is they are following any hashtags that you use on your post. Recent algorithm updates have made organic social media highly competitive. While it is hard to get your organic content seen by your own followers it is very slow to get new customers through organic reach and this is where paid social media comes into play.

Paid Social Media 

Social media advertising is vital to your business if you’re looking to reach a new, targeted audience in a short period of time. It is extremely hard to reach a wide audience organically. Social media advertising incorporates paid elements into your social media strategy, using boosted posts or creating ad campaigns. 

Boosted Posts 

Boosting a post allows you to reach more people for a small fee. The natural reach of people has declined due to a change in algorithms. When boosting your post, you can be specific in terms of the demographic you wish to reach, the budget you wish to spend, and how long you wish to run your campaign. Boosted posts are vital during the launch of a promotion to drive your campaign to more people to engage with your content. Boosted posts do differ from sponsored posts because they are not created in the Ads Manager of your specific social media platform and don't offer as many customisation features as the sponsored posts.

Sponsored Posts

All social media platforms offer a pay-per-click (PPC) basis for advertising which is highly targeted. This is where your analytics is very important as you will understand your customer and can mirror who you are advertising to. Sponsored posts allow you to target and retarget customers, driving relevant traffic to your website. Where boosted posts can increase your page likes, comments, shares or overall brand awareness, sponsored posts have many more features. With Facebook sponsored posts they can be placed on Instagram in addition to the Facebook mobile app or the desktop newsfeed and you can choose their placement on the page. With ads manager, you can create carousel adverts or adverts with a call to action button on it.

To conclude, if you are not using social media to its best then you need to start taking it seriously. Social media is not just for posting an event poster for your hotel or a new menu. Social media is a way to engage with your audience, gain new customers and increase your business. Too many hotels are afraid to spend money on social media and opt for organic posts only but you really do need to have paid advertising to make the most of your platforms. Once you know your buyer persona then you can target them through your chosen platform. Remember, you are better to pick one platform and do it to the best of your ability than have 6 platforms and do them all badly as this all reflects on your brand. 

For more information on, the benefits of using social media in the Hospitality Industry read more Premium Digital blogs.

Premium Digital Working for Success in Hospitality.

Written by Philip Kelly

References: 

• Chaffey, D., 2022. Global social media statistics research summary 2022. [online] Smart Insights. Available at: <https://www.smartinsights.com/social-media-marketing/social-media-strategy/new-global-social-media-research/> [Accessed 12 February 2022].