5 Ways to Engage Guests With a Hotel App

Discover five guest marketing strategies to boost revenue

According to a recent survey by Hotelogix, 83% of guests prefer to receive hotel service promotions on their mobile devices. As more travelers become accustomed to using their mobile devices to manage their daily lives, a hotel app creates endless opportunities to reach guests when they are paying the most attention, help them discover all the amenities and activities a property has to offer, and ultimately improve the overall guest experience. A hotel app also enables hoteliers to incorporate guest marketing into their guest communications, offering guests rewards and other promotions with a personal touch. To help boost guest engagement, upsell services, and strengthen brand loyalty, start with these five best practices for guest marketing.

1. Create Engaging In-App Promotions

Create eye-grabbing banners so when your guests use a hotel app to check-in, view a digital menu, or look up operating hours, they are drawn to the item or event you are promoting. Rotating banners as well as stationary banners on the top or bottom of the screen allow you to put special offers in front of guests in ways they are more likely to see and engage with. A little extra time upfront spent on making a great in-app promotion ad goes a long way.

2. Make Communication a Two-Way Street

When it comes to guest marketing through an app, sending a text to a group or a specific person enables them to respond to the message. For example, instead of a generic message on a website to entice a guest to upgrade their room, consider sending a welcome text with an upgrade offer such as, “We see you are arriving at our hotel tomorrow. Would you be interested in upgrading to a room with a beautiful view of the ocean for an additional 30?” Messages like these eliminate barriers for your guest to act on them because they are easy to respond to and are more personal than an upsell option when booking online.

3. Tailor Offers Based on Guest Habits

Whether you are coming up with promotions for your guest app, or you sending targeted offers via text, tailoring your promotions and upsells to your guests’ habits may bring better results. Do you have strategies or technology in place to track guest preferences? If not, now is the time to institute some form of data collection; if so, now is the time to act on that information. You don’t want to waste time on marketing items, activities, or upsell that your guests don’t want. You and your team know your guests’ habits better than anyone, use that knowledge to elevate their experience and increase your revenue.

4. Maximize Push Notifications

In the age of the smartphone, push notifications can be seen as annoying or disruptive. However, using them wisely can have a positive effect and a productive outcome. The key is two-fold: use push notifications with intention and avoid over-using. Timely push notifications can be of great benefit to you and your guests. Because guests can’t reply to push notifications, this means of communication should be informative, giving them details about the event or promotion that will encourage them to act on it. This could look like sending out a message about happy hour shortly before it starts or promoting a ticket sale for an upcoming event. Push notifications have many uses outside of marketing as well, like updating a guest on their service request status, which is why they should be used for marketing with great intention and care. You can think of push notifications as the secret weapon of guest marketing solutions, maximize their impact by sending timely information that is sure to pique guests interest.

5. Utilize Omnichannel Messaging

Omnichannel Marketing is a marketing strategy that leverages the various channels to achieve greater results. This might include a mobile app, smart-room tablets, and casting. The goal is to increase the ways in which your guests see and are able to interact with an ad. If, for example, you are promoting a discounted spa treatment, a guest might see a banner ad for the deal while they are out and when they return to their room they are reminded of the offer by seeing the same ad on their smart-room tablet and the TV. Utilizing omnichannel marketing keeps whatever you are prompting at top of mind, so your guests are sure to see it and are given increased opportunities to act on it.

Ultimately, the goal in implementing guest marketing solution strategies like these five listed here is so you don’t have to worry about your promotions getting lost in a sea of emails again. By sending targeted messages, personalized offers, and special promotions to your guests at multiple touchpoints you widen your sphere of influence and create great opportunities for revenue return.

Want to learn more about INTELITY’s guest marketing solutions? Request a demo today.

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