Hotel Videos – The Hotel Marketing Blog

Facebook pushes in on YouTube territory with SmartTV App

Facebook just announced a slew of video related updates yesterday, designed to increase their presence in the video space dominated by YouTube. The main reveal included the launch of a dedicated app for Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV and Samsung Smart TV, with more platforms to come. This app, much like YouTube’s SmartTV app, will allow for a leanback type experience. According to FB’s blog post, the app will allow users to watch videos shared by friends or Pages you follow, top live videos from around the world, and recommended videos based on your interests. You can also catch up on videos you’ve saved to watch later, as well as revisit videos you’ve watched, shared or uploaded.

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Why 360 Video and Virtual Reality Matters and 5 Great Ways To Use It

Interest in 360 degree video and 360 VR (Virtual Reality) is at an all time high as the tech matures and becomes more accessible. The Google Trends chart below shows the sharp spike in searches around the world, starting mid to late 2015. 360 content is hard to avoid these days…and even harder to ignore as a marketer. In some ways, 360 has also been a precursor to the virtual reality revolution that is almost upon us. So how can you tap into this powerful new format as a marketer? In this post we explore the basics of 360 video content and 5 great marketing ideas to get your efforts started.

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YouTube takes on Facebook with Live Mobile Video and SuperChat

YouTube has just jumped on the live video bandwagon on mobile, given the growing prominence of the mobile platform and Facebook’s early foray (though not as early as Twitter’s acquisition and launch of Periscope in 2015…or smaller rivals like Meerkat).

The feature has just launched to YouTube creators with 10,000 subscribers or more…what’s interesting though are the added monetization options. Creators already earn an ad revenue share from their videos…with a new feature called ‘SuperChat’, viewers can now jump to the top of the comment queue by paying live streaming content creators. Popular creators who’ve been using platforms like YouNow and Live.me are switching to YouTube, given it’s broader reach and appeal.

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Pinterest for Hoteliers – A Guide to Pinterest for Hotels, Resorts and Restaurants

Pinterest has been all the rage recently, with various news sites and brands sitting up and taking notice. Pinterest.com isn’t new, though…it was (Beta) launched in 2010 and rose to fame in 2011 when it was declared one of the 50 best websites of the year by TIME magazine. By the end of last year, it garnered a lot more attention as it made it to the Hitwise list of top 10 social networks, Techcrunch’s best new startup title and also gained a reputation for driving more referral traffic to online retailers than YouTube, Google+ or LinkedIN.

So what’s the big deal, you ask? And, what, pray tell…is it exactly?

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The curse of too much choice

A great TED talks video by Sheena Iyengar that talks about the perils of too much choice. To quote from the video blurb:

We all want customized experiences and products — but when faced with 700 options, consumers freeze up. With fascinating new research, Sheena Iyengar demonstrates how businesses (and others) can improve the experience of choosing.

We all know what happens when you’re faced with too much choice…if you’ve ever stood in the local hypermarket aisle, facing endless brands of washing powder, you’ll know exactly what I mean. We all love choice…but do we really need 25 varieties of washing powder? Humans are great at processing 6-7 pieces of information at a time and at eliminating the choices we know we DON’T want.

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Hotel Internet Marketing by 2013 – Are we on Track?

I came across a piece I’d written about 17-18 months ago on the future of hotel internet marketing. The article talked about 5 broad tech trends that I thought would radically alter the way we approached digital / internet marketing for hotels back at the end of 2008. I thought it’d be fun to take a re-look at the article and see how far we’ve actually come in the last year or more and if those predictions still hold water… here goes:

1. Choice is king.
The clear winners of the online distribution race will be suppliers and 3rd parties that provide the most choice to the customer. “Experience building” will become key to the looking and booking process online. This will mean that successful suppliers (hotels) will have to break down elements of their inventory like rooms, dining, sports, spa and supporting services into individual units that can be booked and packaged both internally and externally. The more elements you provide to what I like to call the “Experience Engine”, the better the choice available to customers to personalize and tailor their experiences. This creation of experience units will also allow tourism industry suppliers to collaborate more effectively online, as well as spur the evolution of 3rd party providers who provide superior experience engines, taking destination marketing to a whole new level.

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Augmented Reality Maps make their debut

After Blaise Aguera y Arcas offered a tantalizing peek at the world of Microsoft PhotoSynth a couple of years ago, he recently made a return to TED to demo the latest incredible innovation in mapping.

Watch the video as he offers a preview of the incredible mapping advancements Microsoft has made and the augmented reality features to come:

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