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2012 Best in the World Awards

The 2012 Condé Nast Traveler Reader’s Best in the World Awards was recently released and includes a prestigious group of winners, including a few of our clients. For 25 years, Condé Nast Traveler has looked to its readers to name the world’s most perfect places; this year more of their well-traveled readers voted than ever before.

The 8 Luxury Resorts below are not only award winning properties, they each benefit from Top 10 Google Rankings for competitive terms in competitive market regions. Through our digital and search marketing efforts, we drive direct distribution dollars to the Resort. By working closely with executive teams, we keep each at the top of their market to achieve powerful results that clearly impact their bottom line.

Congratulations to the Best in the World including:

 #13 – The Hotel Contessa, Top 25 Hotels in the Southwest
Located on San Antonio’s famed Riverwalk, Hotel Contessa is #13 on the list of top Hotels in the Southwest.

 #15 – Turtle Bay Resort, Top 25 Golf Resorts in HI
This breathtaking North Shore Oahu Resort ranked #15 in Condé Nast’s list of Top 25 Golf Resorts in Hawaii.

#18 – Kahala Hotel & Resort, Top 25 Resorts in Hawaii
Just minutes from Waikiki, this luxury beachfront Oahu resort is known for its opulence and service beyond compare.

Oahu also ranks #4 of the Top 10 Islands in the United States on this year’s list.

This year’s Best in the World Awards also include a list of the 40 Top Resorts in Florida, and we are honored to say that we digitally market 5 of the Resorts including:

 #1 – Little Palm Island Resort & Spa
This secluded slice-of-heaven was rated as Florida’s #1 Resort. Little Palm Island Resort & Spa is only accessible by boat or seaplane, making it a true escape that should be on everyone’s bucket list.

#4 – La Playa Beach & Golf Resort
The only luxury beachfront resort on the Gulf Coast of Florida, La Playa Beach & Golf Resort offers phenomenal service, dining, and sunsets.

#6 – Ocean Key Resort & Spa
Located on historic Duval Street, this premier beachfront Key West resort offers the perfect blend of luxury and classic Florida Keys charm.

#31 – Naples Bay Resort
This four-diamond resort is the newest luxury property in the heart Downtown Naples, just minutes from Florida’s famed beaches.

#40 – Costa d’Este Beach Resort
Located ocean-side in the beautiful Vero Beach community, Costa d’Este Beach Resort is the perfect world-class escape if you enjoy white sand beaches and lush natural views.

 

 

24 Oct 2012

Is Hotel Review Site TripAdvisor Now A Social Network?

Just over 2 years ago Screen Pilot discovered that the business listings on TripAdvisor weren’t as SEO friendly as many were lead to believe. Today we’re taking another look at TripAdvisor.Their intention is to educate travelers about travel destinations, resorts, hotels and lodges by using real traveller experiences. However recently it has been accused of being more like Facebook even by its own users. Lets look at the facts.

Recently it added a function that ties in with Facebook (TA has been working with Facebook more and more recently because of a partnership between the 2 similar to Netflix and Spotify). It allows you to see not just reviews by friends but also reviews by friends of friends. Read more about it here. Of course this utilizes the Facebook social networking functionality rather then a platform of their own. But still…

TripAdvisor Facebook App

However social functionality isn’t all they’ve pursued recently. They’ve also partnered with Kayak to add their 60 million hotel reviews to the travel website. Expedia already have a similar tie up in place. This move allows TripAdvisor to reach more users outside of their traditional channels and increase their audience. It also benefits Kayak because it gives them more content.

More evidence of a move towards social is found in the forums. Of course this is not through TripAdvisors design but rather an organic change that has occurred because of a change in their users habits. Though as shown in the link in our opening paragraph not all users are happy with this change. Some believe the site needs to keep objective reviews as its core focus and the socializing within the forums amongst heavy TA users is distracting from these values.

Honestly I believe that Trip Advisor thinks social is the future of the web and is looking for a happy medium between review and social networking. The next argument is whether this move towards social is good for its users and businesses or not. Will the social shift dilute the quality of reviews found on the site or improve the platform because ultimately we trust our friends and family more than a random member of the public? We’ll leave that for you to debate.

18 May 2012
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What does Facebook Timeline mean for your brand page?

Over the last few weeks Facebook has been rolling out their timeline functionality onto brand pages and they are now available for all (though not all have chosen to move over yet). We’ve been watching with interest to see how these changes will affect the way you interact with your fans and how you attract new fans. Let’s look at those changes together.

No More ‘Fan-Gating’

The new brand pages have done away with the default landing tab for non-fans. Now everyone is directed to the main timeline view. This makes it a lot more difficult to convert non-fans to fans. The trick here will be to use posts and other channels to drive non-fans to fan-gate tabs or create a compelling Timeline that doesn’t need a fan-gate.

Users Can Send Direct Messages To Brand Pages

This is a double-edged sword. Some customer communication is certainly more suited to the privacy of Direct Messages rather than wall posts and this addition will certainly help that. However, while a wall post can get lost in the crowd the public will EXPECT a response back from a Direct Message. This isn’t a problem as long as you are prepared to be reply to these messages in a timely fashion. If you can use this effectively it could be an excellent customer service tool for your business. We’d suggest that if you aren’t ready for it then take advantage of the “Off Button” for this feature for now.

Cover Photo

This is an excellent space that allows you to get really smart with branding your Facebook page. Some brand pages have thrown themselves into this already. Here are a few examples to get your juices flowing.

new york times cover photo

The New York Times Staff – They also utilize the timeline function brilliantly to highlight news throughout their history.

people magazine cover photo

People Magazine did a great job of creating a cover photo thats fits their brand and is perfect for the space that Facebook provides.

Sportscenter Cover Photo

I used this mainly because I love SportsCenter but also enjoyed the shot of  their studio from behind the camera.

Using The Timeline

Another great opportunity to tell the story of your brand using Facebook is the new Timeline. Some companies like Coca-Cola and even Facebook themselves have gone back in time and filled in their Timelines back to when they were founded. Efforts like this should keep fans on your page longer and more engaged. If you have 5 minutes, I urge you to take a look at those 2 examples: Coca-Cola & Facebook.

A negative here is that the two-column format of the Timeline seems to get in the way of natural conversation between fans and the brand. The wall certainly had the upper hand here.

Pinned Posts

This allows you to keep a post at the top of your Timeline for up to 7 days. Rather than be frustrated by the time limit on this function, try and use it to your advantage – Fan of the week, Employee of the week, Special offer of the week. The possibilities are endless!

Although the Facebook Timeline for brands has been available for a few weeks now very few brands have activated it and even fewer are using it to its full potential.

Remember that on March 30th everyone will be moved over to Timeline. We urge you to spend time moving over to the new format and taking advantage of it as soon as possible. If you don’t have the time then get in touch with the Screen Pilot team and we’ll see what we can do for you!

21 Mar 2012
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Google Launches Hotel Finder

Well, you wondered what Google would do in the travel space – Here it is… Google Hotel Finder.  According to Google, “is a new experimental product that makes it easier to compare and book hotels that are found across the web.”

Albeit experimental, the basic premise is that you have a multitude of ways to search for your ideal place to rest your head at night.

So, I hear you asking some questions:

Where are they sending bookings?

Not surprisingly, they are continuing with their alliances for the following in-direct distribution channels;

  • Priceline
  • Hotels.com
  • Expedia
  • Property website is an option though.
So, some good news for those looking for direct distribution. You still get the opportunity for someone to book direct and Google aren’t just taking a back-hander for what would normally be an affiliate agreement (or maybe they are?!). Verbatim is;
“[..]available booking options for the hotel, which may include both the hotel owner and resale vendors. You can choose to book the room through any of these channels, including the hotel owner.”
Where’s the media being shown pulled from?
Seems like they are pulling media from Google Places listings.  That’s good news if you’re on top of your Local SEO efforts, but not so much if you’re not (hint, get on top of it)

Google Hotel Finder via Screen Pilot

 

Reviews?

The other day we (seemingly) broke the news about the changes made in dumping 3rd party reviews. Seems to ring true here too in the fact that they apparently are only pulling from Google User reviews.  (Hint #2, get your staff to come up with ways to engage guests to generate Google Reviews).

What we like:

We do like the Edit Shape function which allows you to set a specific sector on a map for the results in the UI to reflect.

What we don’t like:

Look, we’re biased here.  We are paid to generate direct distribution for our hospitality clients, so any time a heavyweight throws in options other than booking direct to a client’s website, we’re never too happy. (We’re not saying there isn’t a place for in-direct channels, just not here). So, the fact that Google are obviously incentivised to send a stream of traffic to (and have been for a while, this isn’t anything new) will have some dampening effect on what effect, if any, a public roll out will have.

 

I’ve talked for years about how Google will make their move further into the travel sector. This is their boldest move yet but don’t forget – all Google will do for the foreseeable future is to stream traffic to other websites in the most profitable way they can. I dare say we’ll see options in AdWords soon for premium placements in these results. Chances are they will start off with the Display Network integration but the travels space is a huge segment for Google and some something more robust will come down the line should this experiment hit the open market. On the fullfilment side, Google will never get into the transactional side of this business.  They aren’t a customer support kinda company – period. So, they will generate revenus from traffic streaming in their normal ways.

Your thoughts?

 

28 Jul 2011

Google kills 95% of your Google Places hotel reviews. What does it mean for SEO?

2 blog posts in one day! No we haven’t gone mad… yet. We just thought that you all should see this news as soon as possible.

In the last few hours Google has changed their algorithm that pulls in review numbers. Previously when you searched for a hotel, let’s say in Chattanooga TN, you were shown a count of reviews box to the right of each search result that numbered in the hundreds or even thousands for 1st page GP results. This was because Google pulled the reviews from a number of different sources to build the cumulative count of reviews. However, now Google shows an extremely low number. Why?

 

 

 

 

The review number for this hotel is now, just 15. Previously for the Chattanoogan this figure was in excess of  200 reviews ( Tripadvisor + hotels.com + yahoo etc. etc.). This change may have a close correlation with the gaining traction of Google +1. Google wants its active members to get involved and have the main say behind review results.

So what is the impact hotel and other industry local SEO effort? The number of Google Places reviews (and their quality) will likely have a huge say in future SERP rankings. For instance my search above ranks the hotels almost perfectly in review number order – 32, 15, 4 & 5.

So what’s your follow up question to that? Hands up please… That’s right… How do we get more Google reviews? Thats something that agencies and clients need to think about and resolve before Google leaves them behind.

21 Jul 2011
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