Ms. Knutson

Sales & Marketing

Swarm Marketing for Your Hotel

By Bonnie Knutson, Professor, The School of Hospitality Business/MSU

There have been a lot of Aha moments in marketing. Positioning. Branding, The New Coke fiasco. The advent of Social Media. And even Flashmobs. One such moment occurred in 2004, when many believe the concept of Swarm Marketing was born. In that year, two brothers from New York created a parody of the US election process and posted it on their website. They emailed some family and friends with the clip, and voila, within days, it the parody was seen by more than 80 million worldwide. It went, as we say today, viral.

Basically, dictionaries define a swarm as a large number of things massed together and usually in motion. Think about a school of fish, a horde of bees, or a herd of wild horses. And think about consumers too. Connected by social media networks, consumers are sharing the swarming traits of these fish, bees, and wild horses that will change the way you think about marketing your hotel. A few years ago, Chuck Brymer, President and CEO of DDB Worldwide, wrote a book on swarm marketing in which he shows how human digital swarms are like their animal brethren in nature.

First, swarms move fast. They dart from place to place, often turning on a dime. Think about how quickly a catchy ad or a video clip on YouTube can spread exponentially to a worldwide audience. Ditto with a guest, either happy or unhappy with their stay at your property, who blogs his/her experience to a multitude of followers. And this spreading can happen in a Nano-second.

Second, swarms are always connected. For people, this changes the nature and scope of family, friends, colleagues, communities, or neighborhoods. They are more likely to trust what their swarm members say online than anything you can put out in your ads, websites, or sales calls. In other words, increasing the influence that people have on each other -- e.g., by sharing what products/services are good, bad, or ugly -- will tend to make popular hotels more popular and widen the gap between the good and the bad or ugly. It is word of mouth gone wild – or, as I often term it, word of finger. Swarm theory also tells us that swarm members move to the same place or brand. That’s probably the understatement of the year. All you have to do is watch a group of high school kids spread the word via texting, Facebook, and Twitter, about the new coolest brand of jeans and see how fast every store (online or brick and mortar) sells out of the must-have item. And if they didn’t have a good time at their senior banquet held in your ballroom, woe is you for trying to book their future banquets, weddings, bar/bah mitzvahs, Quinceañeras, ad infinitum.

People now rely more of their swarm members about where to stay instead of your hotel’s advertising. So while you may control the property, you no longer control the hotel’s brand message and/or image. What a business traveler from Chicago tweets about his stay carries more weight with his swarm than the slickest TV ad your agency produces. What the young mother puts on her Facebook page will influence others far more than the new weekend family package you tout on your website. What a meeting planner posts on his/her blog will prompt other planners to hold or not hold their meetings at your conference center much more than any sales person could hope to do. And don’t forget those high school kids either.

Finally, swarms have no leaders. There isn’t a celebrity ant, an organizer bee (although there is a queen but she doesn’t lead), or a head horse to lead the group. Yet they move together because they share interests, values, needs, and information. So do your guests.

So how do you build your hotel’s swarm? In essence, your hotel has to engage people and create and connect with a community so that they swarm to your brand. That probably sounds easier said than done. But Brymer suggests that a business needs three competencies to make it work; I totally agree .

• Conviction of the brand’s vision. There is an old saying that, behind every great man is a great woman. While that may or may not be true, it is true that behind every great brand is a great idea – an idea that clearly and consistently delivers an authentic experience that catches the fancy of consumers. For instance, the highly respected destination resort spa, Canyon Ranch, has remained dedicated to its vision of an “innovative approach to health, wellness and holistic and integrative care, and for the uniquely relaxing and inspiring experience we provide. In every…endeavor, Canyon Ranch remains true to its inspiration and history.” I count myself as a member of its their swarm. Disney has remained true to Walt’s vision of building the “happiest place on earth.” And boy-oh-boy, does the Mouse ever have a loyal swarm. W Hotels’s dream is a hip “storybook of style,” Californa’s landmark Madonna Inn “expresses one couple’s imagination to create their dream,” and the Hilton label (now Hilton Worldwide) with 11 separate brands encompassing about 3800 hotels with more thatn 600,000 rooms in 84 countries is still committed to its belief in filling “the earth with the light and warmth of hospitality.”

• Collaboration between the business and its customers. The infamous Internet superhighway is not a one-way street; it’s a two-way high-speed freeway where you communicate with your customers and your customers communicate with you – in real time! This dynamic technology means that guests can now tell you what your new amenity package should be. They can provide immediate input to a possible change in menu items, react to a possible new advertising campaign before you roll it out, and even co-create the architecture of you next renovation. The opportunities to develop a collaborative swarm for your hotel are endless. They let you draw from their passion and their intelligence and they are for every property – not just the “big boys.” One of the most successful stories of collaboration I know is that of Biggby Coffee (www.biggby.com). While not in the lodging sector, it offers a great roadmap for collaboration via this technological superhighway. Take a look at what they do for some innovative ideas.

• Creativity has to be a constant and newly defined to include the nature and behavior of swarms. So your hotel staff has to think like the swarm, meaning that your creative thinking has to engage – not just include – your customer communities. Nearly a decade ago, I wrote an article about a very smart business thinker, Dr. William Lazer, whom I lovingly call my Spartan Sage. In it, I quoted his thinking: “Creativity is the engine for innovation, which is the lifeline of any organization. Without innovation, there can be no future for the business. The leaders of the future will be creative people who look outside their organization to see what is going on. They will take it all in and expand on it. They will be the point of convergence of all stimuli; in other words, they will have a wide camera lens versus a narrow lens.” It is more important than ever that this lens includes your swarm.

More than ever, today the swarm will decide your future. It only takes a few ants to find a food source for the colony, or a small number of fish to turn the entire school in a different direction. It is the same with a swarm of digital people. They will flock to or flee from your hotel based on information from only a few in their swarm (i.e. their social networks) so it will be increasingly important for you to include and engage your hotel’s online community.

Your REVAR will thank you.

Bonnie J. Knutson is a professor in The School of Hospitality Business in the Broad College of Business at Michigan State University. She is an authority on emerging lifestyle trends and innovative marketing. Her work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and on PBS and CNN. She has had numerous articles in industry, business, and academic publications. Bonnie is a frequent speaker for executive education as well as business and industry meetings, workshops, and seminars. Dr. Knutson is also editor of the Journal of Hospitality & Leisure Marketing. Ms. Knutson can be contacted at 517-353-9211 or drbonnie@msu.edu Extended Bio...

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