Influencer Marketing Hotel marketing must not be missed in the New Normal era. Back in the days before digital flourished, hotel advertising had the use of newspapers. Billboard or flyer. But in the digital age and especially in the New Normal era where consumer behavior has changed, everyone is with mobile phones, everyone uses Social Media. Traditional media that used to have changed itself to online. Even books have become e-books. Celebs don't have to come from TV anymore because now everyone Can create a popular trend for themselves through Social Media. An online presence must generate content to be conveyed. Influencers are a great help because they are both content and media at the same time. Able to create engaging content and distribute the content to different platforms. Tellscore has provided influencer marketing knowledge to push hotels to bang. To be known to be loved and to increase sales for hotels.

The content will be covered in 5 main areas: Why does a business use Influencer Marketing, What types of Influencer, Influencer New Normal, Influencer Marketing Process and Tracking and Measurement.
 

 1. Why do businesses need influencer marketing?
 

Marketing changes Influencer marketing is the most common form of marketing. Which really influencers have been around for a long time, such as friends telling friends, Word of mouth. But in this age where technology has come into play, instead of talking person to person, one can post on social media once and reach many people to share experiences. Causing Influencer Marketing to grow very rapidly. 87% of buyers are influenced by influencer purchasing decisions. Most people believe their friends or influencers even know it is an ad. But sometimes when they see certain content too often, even though they know that it is an advertisement, it makes them want to try it themselves.

The health of a brand depends largely on consumer opinion. 75% of marketers have increased their influencer budget since 2018. It is suggested that the budget for influencers use should be 25-40% of the total digital advertising budget. An influencer is to let a third party tell it because when the brand owner speaks for himself, people won't trust it because consumers think it is selling things to themselves. Therefore, giving the third party who is the one that consumers like When they say they like that one, use this one, the consumer believes that the item must be good.

2. What kinds of influencers are there?

Today, everyone can be an influencer. Even in the hotel business, no one knows the hotel as well as the owner himself. So, the first speaker is from itself first, such as a living posting of an image, an invitation message, or even a direct Inbox. Therefore, the main medium that can be used first is yourself or friends, relatives, or employees to post on various social media Which was the first mouthpiece that could. Look at yourself at the people around you who are ready to speak before hiring an expensive influencer.

Influencer type

• Professional (Expert) is an expert in one subject, for example, Sea Chat Pawi will think about IT or Fangled will think about digital. Is an expert in each of those lines to provide knowledge.
  
  
• Lifestyle, whether food, travel, beauty, reviews such as Pimtha focus on comfortable stories.
  
  
• Public Figure, including celebrities that everyone knows
  
  
• The creator is someone who makes a page using new creativity. In presenting content
  
  
• Publisher / Media bringing stories to society, social reflection such as The Standard, The Matter, Mission to the Moon.

The hotels can choose what kind of information they want to present and select a fan page that meets the needs of the hotel.

Influencer Level

• General consumer Follower. Total follower from 0-1000.
  
  
• Nano is still common but has become more prominent and well-known in the group of friends. Total Follower from 1000 - 10,000
  
  
• Micro made its own page. Has its own clear approach, gradually growing to mold the page Began to have their own fan page base.
  
  
• Macro has all the qualities of an influencer, with clear guidelines, good pages, many followers
  
  
• A celebrity is known as a star. This group doesn't even need to be interested in the number of followers because they are already known.

How is each group suitable for marketing?
 

• Macro is ideal for building broader awareness because it is already known. But reaching to talk is more difficult.
  
  
• Micro is used to create interaction and participation. It's like a friend who can talk more easily.
  
  
• Consumer generating leads.

It is said that using a Micro-Influencer is worth it, how is it worth it? One kind of Facebook is that if a page doesn't have a lot of followers, Facebook will get more visibility to encourage people who are just starting out. But when it is a page that has a lot of followers in the millions, visibility will decline because Facebook wants the page to buy ads to reach more people. There are some interesting numbers, for example, if 1 million people are following, your chances of getting visibility are just 0.6%. But while a Micro-Influencer group with around 50,000 followers has a 15% chance of getting visibility. Therefore, if you want to invest, then worth spending a small amount of money. But a lot of people can see posts, to begin with, it is recommended to use a micro-influencer group would be suitable. The future of marketing will be geared toward one-to-one communication. Using a large number of people, for example, to reach a large group of people, a Micro-Influencer may be used by 10 100 people at a time to reach large numbers. Plus, there are many famous institutions talking about micro-influencers. Forbes, for example, says this is a golden year for Micro-Influencers.

And people like products from content creation rather than advertising. Therefore, advertising alone is not enough, and Micro-Influencer is required. Which studies have shown that sales are doubled compared to conventional ads and repeat purchases are 37% more than other channels.

3. How has influencers changed in the new normal?

With new situations, There are changes in consumer behavior and the spread of COVID. How are influencers? So that the brand can adapt and apply properly

• The mass line connects two worlds. For example, with a hotel, it cannot be done offline alone and must be online to help bring people offline.
  
  
• A serious sales line must come. Of course, one of the things that help to promote a hotel is beautiful images. When people see the picture and like it. But must have a cable that is both beautiful pictures and beautiful content There is a line to sell. Sell ​​vouchers as well, such as live selling.

Move line, get new goals, for example, no need to use a travel line to review hotels only. See if there are any groups that can add more reviews, for example, hotels with delicious food may bring a Food line to review. Or a hotel suitable for families, it uses the mother and childline, or Family Line comes to review. You must try to look more broadly. Let's look at a group of customers who are close to what negative impact if they do not receive our services.

• Real use, real talk, sincere,, many people wonder if using influencer to promote it must pretend that he was not selling or not. Do I have to act like I'm a real customer? Which in truth is honestly so that they came to sell things. Some pages say they sell things, but they choose the ones they sell are of good quality, screened for real quality. If not good, not promoting Is sincere that they sell real things, but they are used, they are good. Listeners will feel that this person is sincere.
  
  
• Data must be firm. Stat must be good. Technology must come. Not that the promotional post and it's over. Make it impossible to work in the future that things are done well or not. Should be done in the same way or in a new way. Therefore, information must be collected about the promotion already. How many people are following? The good performance or not. Is it good to use this group? Is the response good? Or whether it should be changed to a new one Information must always be collected and analyzed.

How should you adapt in tourism business? First, you need to understand the consumer behavior first. Especially during this period that no foreign tourists must turn to understand Thai behavior. Maybe a small thing Little thing that we don't think of, or if they think about it and can adjust it, customers will be in with us. For example, upon arriving at the hotel, all the girls like to put on makeup before going to take beautiful photos. But hotels often use yellow lights that make it difficult for women to make up. But if the hotel has a zone in the room for makeup, women will feel that they understand us, which is a sensitive matter. Or is there a socket beside the bed? Because people like to play on mobile phones before bedtime. Which of these small things, if he is impressed, will tell others? Post telling stories, writing descriptions, and posting beautiful pictures without having an influencer. Whether influencing influencer marketing or not, it must always be the answer that hotels must answer first. We need to know what the strength of our hotel is. Why tourists need to use the service but on the other hand, if the customer doesn't like it, it will review back as well as to how they don't like it. And if he uses an influencer, he will be a voice for the hotel to promote in the strong points. For example, customers like to take pictures on social media, they must have a lot of spots to take pictures. Or, if you are a family customer with young children, you will want to go to a hotel with a child zone. Or a group of cat lovers would want a hotel that has a place where cats can sleep comfortably and happily hang out with them.
 

4. The Process of Influencer Marketing

There are 5 steps in total.

1. Set the target audience

Must know the customer Who are the customers? What do customers want? Why does he have to use our service? How is the purchase of products and services? For example, do they first look at a friend's review? Or go to the OTA? For some operators who still do not understand customers, there are 10 trends of Thai customers that the hotel should know as follows:

• Travel alone, don't need anyone
  
• Green Tide Sustainable tourism Care for the environment Eco Resort, Green Hotel
  
• Local experiences, such as Farm Stay, are not just sightseeing, but there are activities to do too.
  
• Small group excursions, couples, or small families.
  
• Work and travel, after COVID came, many people could work from anywhere.
  
• Travel among the elderly
  
• Less visited area 
  
• Travel with pets
  
• Multi-generation travel such as having parents, children, grandparents, and grandchildren. Will like doing activities with family
  
• Travel Tech plan the trips and book online.

Source: https://www.thanseTakij.com/infographic/874

2. Set the goals you want

Most SMEs tend to want multiple items, but they should choose one item at a time will make the goal clearer.

There are 3 goals for Influencer Marketing:

• Awareness makes the hotel more identity. Create image Build credibility Suitable for new hotels or introducing new services and hotels that have never done influencer marketing before should start with this goal
  
  
• Engagement,  create interactions such as creating activities to have fun on Facebook or how to make posts, and have people comment and share.
  
  
• Conversion, lead Generating Conversions, or leads such as click, lead input, promo code (not just generating sales). If you are just starting out, you should not be impatient. Do it gradually, step by step is better, not just starting to do it, focus on selling immediately.
   

3. Choose a communication channel

The first thing you should have is a website that is the front of your hotel house, which is like a dam that holds rainwater. By Influencer or various social media Is a water blender that serves to call rain Fetch water to the dam. So, there must be three things. First, you need a website. Next are various social media channels. Each platform has its own strengths and methods of use.

• Facebook is great in the beginning. Access to a lot of Thai people base, making content easy to do, and shoot ads easily and accurately.
  
  
• Twitter focuses on Real-Time, which is popular but limited because it must be a short message and quite limited customer groups with a specific group such as Korean series fans or group of teenagers
  
  
• Instagram is great if hotels focus on beautiful pictures, can also tag places, brands, or people.
  
  
• TikTok is an up and coming channel. The group used mostly teenagers. Which brands can create challenges for a quick campaign.
  
  
• YouTube is great for making long videos. Suitable for more serious content
  
  
• LINE is a medium that is very close to the consumer group. Good one on one communication with customers Because nowadays people like to chat. It is an important channel to close deals that are required.

4. Choose an influencer

There are methods for choosing:

• View the influencer's work history, does the style match you? How to post content?
  
  
• Presentation skills, each person has a different method. Some people post beautiful pictures but are not good at writing content. Some people do content well, but the photos are not beautiful or someone good at Live. The brand must first determine what kind of person you want, and then go find the right person
  

• See if the followers are the target audience or not. Because Influencer marketing is to make his followers become future hotel customers.
  
  
• Responsibility, is he posted on time? Does he understand the brief?
  
  
• Reach, Engagement, View to see if the performance of the page is good or not.
  
  
• Budget: Look at how much you have in your budget, then come back to plan again to see what kind of influencer matches your budget.
  

5. Monitoring and Measure

There are 3 measures: to create awareness, engagement, and lead generation

• Awareness The main KPI is to generate awareness, see impressions, reach posts, how many people saw it.
  
  
• Engagement: How many likes, comments, shares. Do they click, do they read?
  
  
• Increasing leads. How much is the traffic on the website, application, and reservation?

Influencer marketing is another powerful marketing tool, especially for the hotel business. Able to create both Awareness, Engagement and lead to the closure of the sale as well. However, for influencer marketing to be effective, you must know your customers well. Have a clear goal and choose an influencer that suits your customer group. The goals you want to reach and the available budget making the hotel famous, increasing sales, is within reach

Source: SCB IEP BOOTCAMP training program: THE HOSPITALITY SURVIVAL, Phuket