Marketing Plan
Question:
Discuss about the Marketing Effectiveness Of Social Media In The Hotel.
In today’s highly competitive business environment, companies primarily emphasize on producing profits and revenues by its business practices and activities. Marketing is the process of an organization, which is focused on selecting appropriate customers and targeting them, so that they can affect their buying behavior and decision. Marketing plan is one of the most of significant document, which is prepared by an organization to bring its new products and services in the market. This report includes a marketing plan for a well-established hospitality organization in Australia, i.e. Pier One Hotel.
This marketing plan includes both external and internal environmental analysis of this hotel by using different tools and frameworks, like; PESTLE and SWOT analysis. Moreover, there is the discussion about the major objectives and goals of Pier One Hotel, which are both qualitative and quantitative in nature. The organization is implementing various marketing strategies to attain these marketing objectives. Under marketing strategies, marketing mix elements are taken into consideration that includes product, price, place and promotion strategies. This hotel is adopting various effective strategies to promote its hotel and hospitality services in Australia and all over the world. In addition to this, the organization is planning to expand its business operations globally. Under this marketing plan, the company is targeting millennial travellers towards its services. Furthermore, it entails an action plan that can be used by Pier One Hotel for implementing all the strategies and tactics in practice.
Pier One Hotel is one of the well-established hotels in Sydney, Australia. The hotel is based alongside the bridge and offers luxury hospitality experience with domestically inspired restaurants and water-view accommodations. It is built on water with its private pontoon and panoramic Sydney Harbour views. The mission statement of Pier One Hotel is to provide excellent and luxurious hospitality services and traditional standards to its guests. The major goal of this mission statement is to offer high quality standards and services in its rooms, food and other departments. By determining the needs and demands of customers, the organization has designed its services, so that it can entice a larger population towards its hospitality services. The goals and mission statement of Pier One Hotel will support it in enhancing the awareness of customers to service offerings. It is able to provide an exclusive experience to its guests, whether they are travelling for business or leisure purpose (Pier One Sydney Harbour, 2018). This hotel is situated on water, so it is considered by visitors as a tourist site that caters as an extra resource for Pier One. Thus, it offers various unique and exclusive accommodations, which are within 15 minutes walking distance from all dining and shopping destinations.
Pier One Hotel is a well-known hospitality organization, which is located in the heart of historic rocks of Sydney, Australia. It was a famous attraction, which was offering retail, restaurants and amusements till it was re-emerged into a hotel establishing in the year 1999. By revolutionizing its hotel business, the organization is able to provide an exclusive and quality sure experience, whether they are staying approaching for business or leisure purpose. Primarily, Pier One Hotel is offering accommodation and restaurant services to its customers or guests. It offers space for meetings, conferences and special events. In its services, it also includes effective packages and technology advancement to fulfill the needs of conferences and business travellers. In addition to this, it also attracts the people to enjoy their stay at their rooms and other services, which are accompanied an accommodation at hotel. All the suites and rooms have modern décor with the maritime theme. Each and every room/suite includes various facilities and amenities such as minibar, flat screen TV, sofa bed, spa tub etc.
Environmental Analysis
Alongside the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Pier One Hotel is established on water, so it viewed by travellers as a tourist destination that is the additional attraction for hotel. Leisure and event customers play an important role in the growth and success of organization (Pier One Sydney Harbour, 2018). There are some specific service features, which can be identified as its major strengths such as; hotel ambience, environment, location of hotel etc. Its restaurant, named as Gantry Restaurant and bar provides fine dining with wonderful views of waterfront of Sydney. The organization is generating profits and revenues by offering its services as Sydney is a great option for travellers, who are interested in food, shopping, leisure and restaurants. Currently, Pier One Hotel is one of the top rated locations in the state. The feedback of guests indicates that they love the property and its services more than other properties in nearby areas.
Thus, it can be said that Pier One is able to generate significant revenues and profits from its unique and effective services. For attracting more guests, Pier One Hotel is adopting various advertising and promotional strategies. It is using online marketing campaigns to avail the brand positioning to target market (Baker, 2014). Moreover, it adopts other methods of promotion such as; direct marketing sales promotion, traditional advertising etc. The organization is promoting its hotels and services by the use of promotional pages and Facebook advertisements. By doing this, the organization is able to advertise its hotel and hospitality services while sustaining effective publicity.
External Environmental Analysis is a process of analyzing different factors that affect growth and business operations of a firm indirectly. These are the external factors, which cannot be avoided and controlled by an organization (Kandampully, Zhang, and Bilgihan, 2015). These particular factors may have a large impact on strategies, decision making process and business performance of company. This section of report conducts PESTLE Analysis for Pier One Hotel, Sydney. It analyzes different factors like; political, economic, social, technological, legal and environmental factors. PESTLE analysis of Pier One Hotel in Australia is stated below;
Political environment and factors play an important in hospitality and hotel business in the country. Government and these factors have a large impact on business operations and revenue generation of a hotel. In Australia, the government supports the functioning of Pier One Hotel to increase the number of guests and travellers, who visit Sydney. Political environment in Australia is stable that is beneficial for development of hospitality business of Pier One Hotel. Government of country has imposed various food quality standards restaurants and hotel, so this organization needs to comply with these policies and regulations (Baker, & Magnini, 2016). They are restricted to provide hygiene, healthy food products and to use the ingredients, which are approved under food and safety standards. The position and performance of Pier One Hotel is affected by consumer protection, employment policies and competitive regulations of Australia.
With the decrease in inflation and increase in GDP (Gross Domestic Product), the economic conditions in Australia are likely to become better. It is the major reason behind the increase in the wealth and property of population in the country. It is increasing the number of travellers, who are willing and spend their time in hotels. It will increase the arrival of visitors to Sydney and there will be increase in the demand for accommodation at hotel. Pier One Hotel is providing exclusive and unique hospitality experience to the guests, so it can be in their priority list. Due to this, Australian population will have more disposable income, which they can spend on leisure activities. It indicates that there are some economic factors that can encourage the Pier One Hotel to seek the profitability and development of hospitality business (Baum, 2016). Thus, Pier One Hotel can offer appropriate classes of hospitality services, which suit higher class people and cheaper packages that ordinary population can buy. Moreover, increased exchange rate offers opportunity to Pier One Hotel to target Australian population and international clients, which have high-value currencies.
Pier One Hotel: Strengths and Services
Pier One Hotel is one of the most popular hotels among international travellers. There may be some social and cultural factors, which can affect the business of Pier One Hotel such as; customer buying decision, demographic characteristics, lifestyle of customers etc. The organization needs to develop its services by considering the life style and level of people. In Australia, aging population is more than younger population. So, customers will prefer matured packages and services in hotels. Most of the people in country are very conscious about their eating habits. They prefer the food that is healthier and less fatty. Pier One Hotel needs to prepare healthier food and recruit the chefs, who are aware about different eating habits (Bowie, Buttle, Brookes, & Mariussen, 2016).
Technological factors are one of the primary environmental factors, which impact both hotel business and its customers as well. With the increased technology advancement, Pier One Hotel has to understand that an advanced and better infrastructure will assist it in enhancing the business operations and services (Bordean, 2010). This hotel is adopting modern and advanced technologies to entice the customers from worldwide. Furthermore, it uses internet marketing and websites for making reservations at hotels. It utilizes debit card and e-payment card to make the payment transaction easier. By implementing updated technology, Pier One Hotel can decrease the wages and some costs.
For Pier One Hotel, it is significant to follow all the laws and regulations of food and safety laws. The organization needs to comply with all the ethical and legal requirements, which are imposed on macro-environment of hospitality organization. In Australia, some religious customers put limitations on hotels. So, Pier One Hotel has to become more attentive about the plans and policies. It needs to establish a suitable system to make sure that all of its guests are served equally. In addition to this, this organization should maintain non-discriminatory policies and ethical standards in its service offerings.
There are various factors, which are related to the natural environment. Changes in the weather and environment have direct effect on hotel organizations (Buhalis, and Crotts, 2013). Pier One Hotel needs to develop the activities, which do not create pollution on environment. The changes in weather and environment have negative effect on restaurants and hotels. It can delay the flights and arrival of travellers to Sydney.
Thus, Australia provides a favorable environment to Pier One Hotel to operate its hotel and restaurant business. By dealing with the impact of these factors, organization can generate significant revenues and profits in Australia.
In Australian hospitality industry, there are various leading players, which are posing intense competition for Pier One Hotel. One of the biggest competitors of Pier One Hotel is The QT Sydney that is a boutique hotel in the city with similar services and price range. This hotel is situated at the location, where public transportation is available outside the front gate. It is built in a Heritage Building and serves the travellers, who are seeking for an amazing stay and accommodation. Moreover, Four Seasons Sydney is another competitor that stands in product or service category with more than triple number of rooms and suites. This organization is ideal for weddings, events and large conferences (Chu, Tang & Luo, 2016). The combined rooms and event spaces can host more than thousand customers in comparison to Pier One. Lastly, The Sydney Opera House is also one of the well-established buildings in the world and it rules the Sydney’s Harbor. For attracting the customers, this hotel provides the tickets to shows like The King and I.
Advertising and Promotion Strategies
Developing commercial partnership is one of the important practices for availing growth in the country. There are various partners of Pier One Hotel like; Marriott Hotel works as intermediary of Pier One Hotel. Due to reputation and image of Marriott Hotel, Pier One has various customers. Looking at that Pier One is operating its hotel under Marriott, it brand image is connected with Marriott that enhances its marketing and promotion both domestically and globally. In Australia, government is supporting the growth of tourism and hospitality that is the top indicator for growth of hotel business. Government is providing funds to the hotel for improving its infrastructure. Furthermore, it has partnered with many suppliers such as conference suppliers, who make sure that conference needs of people are satisfied (Dopson, and Hayes, 2016). Apart from this, other partners are such as social and event organizers, Audio Visual, live bands, wedding planners and party organizer. Tourism agencies and airline companies are also commercial partners to Pier One Hotel in Sydney.
Along with the tourism industry, hospitality industry is also growing with a significant growth rate. There are various trends, which are occurring in travel and hospitality industry. One of the most significant trends is increasing impact of rich travellers from developing countries on travel spending and expenses. In addition to business and leisure travellers, millennial traveller is the new segment that is emerging in Australia. Sydney welcomed approximately 9.8 million domestic visitors that were increased by 8.9% (National Visitor Survey, 2017).
SWOT analysis is an important framework that evaluates four major factors of company, i.e. strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. From them, strengths and weaknesses are the factors for internal analysis, which provide an understanding of business (Freeman, 2016). Opportunities and threats are the external factors, which management requires understanding before making any decision. Pier One hotel is managing its strengths and opportunities in an effective way, so that it can attract and retain millennial travellers at its hotel. These strengths and opportunities can assist the organization to overcome its weaknesses and threats in Australian hospitality industry. By this, the company will be able to attract millennial guests from all over the world. SWOT analysis of Pier One Hotel is given below;
Internal Factors |
Strengths |
Weaknesses |
· One of the major strengths of Pier One is higher brand recognition and recall among competitors and customers · Location of this Hotel is the biggest strength as it is situated on Sydney Harbour Bridge that can offer a unique and better experience to millennial customers. · The organization has enhanced its brand image by partnering with Marriott as Marriott is already a well-recognized and established hotel all over the world. · Pier One Hotel is among leading hospitality players with quality services, effective conference packages, audio visual services and technical support. · The organization is using different technologies, which will assist in attracting millennial guests, as they like to live with their smart phones and in the technical word. |
· Sydney is receiving travellers from different countries and cultures, so there is a need of effective training about different cultures and languages at Pier One Hotel. · This hotel is operating its hospitality business with different management styles and it is the biggest weakness that is faced by Pier One Sydney. · The rooms and other hospitality services at Pier One Hotel are not well-designed and efficient as per the expectations of millennial customers. · Pier One Hotel has limited market share in spite of better brand recall · Pier One hotel has lack of brand presence and recognition among millennial travellers in global hospitality markets (Huang, & Sarigöllü, 2014.) |
|
External Factors |
Opportunities |
Threats |
· Pier One has various opportunities to expand its business in international market · Due to its prominent location, this hotel is able to entice both leisure customers and tourists. · Decrease in the value of Australian Dollar is improving the number of international travellers because they see Australia as an affordable tourist destination. · It can enhance its hospitality services by implementing innovation in services and using modern technology, as millennial guest is tech savvy. · It can design its services and hotel facilities according to the needs and expectations of millennial guests. · As many of the smartphone applications are used by millennial guests, so Pier One Hotel can focus on providing its services through different apps like Groupon. |
· However, the location of hotel is a better opportunity for customers, but it can be adverse in situations of climate changes. · Some economic challenges can reduce the tourism and arrival of millennial customers. These economic challenges may include inflation, economic depression and recession etc. · Organization is facing intense competition in Sydney hospitality sector, as there are various hospitality players, which are already have well-established business. · Entry of many local and global brands has posed a threat for Pier One Hotel, Sydney (Gali?i?, & Laškarin, 2014). |
From the above internal analysis, it can be evaluated that Pier One Hotel has favorable internal environment for attracting millennial travellers towards its services. By considering the opportunities, the organization should improve and enhance its hotel and hospitality services as per the demands and expectations of millennial travellers. It will enable the Pier One Hotel to overcome its weaknesses and threats and attain its objective of increasing millennial travellers by 20% in next 1 year.
Internal research is the process of analyzing the internal environment on the basis of internal sources and data records. On the basis of this internal data of organization, the organization can make the marketing decisions by adopting marketing information system and its theories. Marketing information system can assist the organization in making decision regarding company’s marketing processes and practices. Analysis of internal data will support the organization in measuring its performance (Goryushkina, Shkurkin, Petrenko, Demin, & Yarovaya, 2016). The theory of marketing information system states that this system includes people, processes, tools and equipment to collect, evaluate and deliver the required, adequate and accurate data to the team, who make decisions regarding marketing. By using this theory, the internal research can be conducted for Pier One Hotel. It can be done by analyzing the below-given internal data of hotel:
- Occupancy Levels
According to the figures and below-given graph, it can be stated that Sydney is the Australian city with highest hotel occupancy rate. At Pier One Sydney, the occupancy level is generally very higher than other nearby hotels. It is going up to over 100 %. Sometimes, one room can be rented more than one time in a day. The below given graph shows the hotel occupancy rates at Sydney hotels that is more than other cities in Australia, i.e. Brisbane and Melbourne. Pier One Hotel is also a part of these hotels in Sydney, so hotel occupancy rate can also be estimated at this hotel also (Solomon, 2014). When the company will implement the marketing plan for attracting millennial customers also, then it will be able to increase its occupancy rate also.
- Types of guests
At Pier One Hotel, the major types of guests are the people, who are arriving Sydney for business and leisure purpose. It welcomes the travellers, who are interested in restaurants, food and shopping in Sydney. It is the best attraction for tourists in Sydney. Now, the organization is planning to target the millennial customers in Australia and worldwide (Huang, & Sarigöllü, 2014). In the future, this organization is targeting to increase millennial guests by 20% in the duration of next 12 months.
- Average length of stay
Average length of stay is the average value of days guests stay at hotel in a specific period. It can be calculated by adding total lengths of stay of each guest in a month and dividing by number of guest in that month. At Pier One Hotel, rates vary by the availability, types of room and season. During the high demand period, the organization is applying a need for minimum length of stay. Average length of stay at this hotel is better than other hotels in Sydney. This hotel is situated in a unique and attractive location of Sydney, so average length of stay of travellers is more than others.
- Seasonality of the business
Seasonality is one of the most important factors in the hospitality and tourism industry. There are few months, which are most appropriate to visit Sydney. As Pier One Hotel is located in Sydney, so it has peak season September through November and from March to May (Kandampully, Zhang, and Bilgihan, 2015). These are the months that skirt low and high seasons of the city. These months offer millennial travellers relaxed temperatures. These specific months increase the tourist arrival in Australia and guest arrival at Pier One Hotel. The millennial travellers travel to Sydney to get relaxed, so this season will be beneficial for Pier One Hotel.
- Origin of guests (domestic/international)
Both local and international guests are reaching to Sydney and taking accommodation services of Pier One Hotel. Being situated on water, it is considered as the best tourism destination for tourists. At Pier One Hotel, the millennial travellers are arriving for all purposes such as shopping, leisure and business purposes.
- Payment methods
Pier One Hotel accepts the payment through Visa, MasterCard, American Express and Diners Club as well as travellers’ cheque and cash. To confirm the reservation, the hotel management asks for credit card details of guest (Kim, Kim, Kim & Magnini, 2016). The millennial customers prefer to use updated and higher technology, so this hotel is offering the reservation and booking facility through smartphone application and its official website.
- Guest satisfaction
Guest Satisfaction is the most significant objective for the management and staff at Pier One Hotel. They are making various efforts for satisfying the millennial guests and meeting their needs and demands during their stay. The level of guest satisfaction can be measured by considering the rating given by the guests. According to this, Pier One Hotel is one of the top rated properties in Sydney. Mostly, people like the location of the hotel, so they have rated it on 9.5 for couple stay and accommodation. Under guest satisfaction, it is rated for the best value in the city. Guests are receiving more for their payment in comparison to other hotels (Sargeant, & Jay, 2014).
Thus, the internal research indicates that Pier One Hotel is managing its services with the changes in market trends and guest preferences. It is generating its guest base and revenues by offering luxurious and quality hospitality services (Legrand, Sloan, and Chen, 2016). Through this marketing plan, the organization will focus on improving its internal environment and providing satisfactory services to millennial customers.
Organizational structure of an organization is the systematic framework that defines how the practices like allocation of tasks, communication and supervision are managed and coordinated for attaining the objectives of organization. The organizational structure of Pier One Hotel includes different reporting structures, where the organization can place its marketing information system. Pier One Hotel has managed its information system by developing a systematic structure that includes different levels of hierarchy (McDonald, & Wilson, 2016). This hierarchy starts from General Manager, Assistant Manager and Deputy Assistant Manager, who are working on the same level. Deputy Manager is liable to manage different departments of hotels like; Finance, front office, Human Resource Management, Food Director, Sales and Logistics. All of these departments have assigned with different responsibilities and tasks. Food Director includes restaurant manager and kitchen manager, who manage the tasks and responsibilities of waiters, cashier, food runners, chef and executive chef. Under this organizational structure, the lower authority is reporting higher authority regarding their jobs and related issues.
By increasing the cooperation and communication with individual department, Pier One Hotel is continuously improving the organization culture of hotel (Mok, Sparks, & Kadampully, 2013). All the levels of management at Pier One Hotel are working according to its code of conduct and effective policies. These departments are managed by adopting an effective management information system such as MIS and ERP. These systems are assisting Pier One Hotel to manage all the business processes and activities, which can help the hotel in enticing millennial travellers towards its hospitality services. All the information is flowed by the use of effective technology.
By considering the above organizational structure, this hotel can analyze the information need of organization and make decision regarding its marketing processes (Kandampully, Zhang, and Bilgihan, 2015). Under this organizational structure, all management levels of Pier One Hotel ensure that it is able to meet positive service encounter in case of millennial travellers.
Determining segmentation and target markets is an important part under marketing plan formulation process. Market segmentation is the process, through which an organization aims a particular market segment after looking at some specific variables and characteristics such as behavioral, demographic, geographic and psychographic characteristics (Luttrell, 2016). Pier One Hotel is offering quality and luxurious hospitality services to Australian and international travellers. In the Australia, tourist arrival is increasing with a significant growth rate and the country is expecting to receive more than 1$ million travellers. By looking at the internal records of the hotel, it can be stated that currently, there are two types of travellers such as business travellers and leisure travellers who are coming in. In Sydney, the arrival of business travellers has been increasing by approximately 6% every year (National Visitor Survey, 2017). Most of the targeted audiences are travelling for leisure and fun activities. At Pier One Hotel, These customers are looking for getting luxury and premium hospitality services at Affordable prices. These travellers are targeted on the basis of behavioral, demographic and psychographic characteristics. Apart from business and leisure travellers, now the organization is targeting millennial customers towards its hospitality services. Different characteristics of targeted travellers are stated below;
Under the process market segmentation, this organization is targeting the people by considering their similar behavioral characteristics. Pier One Hotel categorizes the guests as per the events and occasions. The business professionals need to organize meeting with their clients so it is providing the conference room for meetings and business events. In addition to this, it offers its suites and halls for wedding and small function purposes (Pavlou, & Stewart, 2015).
Demographic segmentation is one of the most important bases for determining the appropriate customer segment. For Pier One Hotel, leisure and business travellers are the major customers. The organization is emphasizing on the guests, who are travelling to Sydney for leisure and business purposes (Xu, & Gursoy, 2015). The suites and rooms of this hotels offers various facilities and amenities like; free internet and Wi-Fi facilities, lobby facilities for these guests that are from different income and age group. As far as age group is concerned, 15 to 44 years old people are the largest age group of travellers to Sydney. The organization is making efforts to fulfill their leisure needs.
Under this segmentation, Pier One Hotel is categorizing the people by considering their personality traits, behavior, attitudes, values and lifestyles. After determining these characteristics, this hotel is developing its hospitality services to fulfill the needs of guests (World Economic Forum, 2015). It is making efforts to find out new and unique food menus. The lifestyle and needs of customers are changing towards hospitality services. They want to avail the services according to their needs and wants. They need free internet services, comfortable room spaces, advanced facilities etc. Considering this fact, Pier One Hotel is making its services more advanced and fulfilling the needs of targeted audiences.
In future the organization should expand its target market by targeting the arrival of millennial travellers to Sydney. Generally, the group of millennial travellers includes the young adults, who are born after 1980s. After collecting the market information regarding the segment, it can be analyzed that millennial travellers are driving the hotel and hospitality sector with swing and full force (Steenkamp, 2017). This segment is influencing the hotels across the world to implement new and effective ways. They are working to meet the needs and demands of these travellers. As this generation is continuously growing and getting matured so Pier One Hotel need to fulfill their emerging needs and conditions to effectively advertise to them (Childs, 2018). To target millennial travellers, this hotel requires adopting some technology innovation and other changes, so that it can meet their expectations and provide value for their money. After looking at the revenue management software and cost acquisition, it can be stated that business travellers are the most profitable segment for the Pier One Hotel. The reason behind this is that these guests can bring most of its revenues at least resources.
Thus, by targeting the customers, who are sophisticated, self-defined and individualistic and the people, who are willing to pay more money for their stay while on business trip, Pier One Hotel will be able to generate more revenues and profits in the country (Sargeant, & Jay, 2014). To attract millennial customers, the company will adopt and implement effective marketing strategies and tactics.
Goals of Pier One Hotel include the targets like enhance the brand presence in international markets and capture international business opportunities in hotel and hospitality industry. In addition to this, the hotel aims to attract millennial guests towards its hotel and hospitality services. For attaining these goals, organization will function with its team effectively and implement effective strategies accordingly.
To develop this marketing plan, Pier One Hotel will establish marketing objectives for its hotel and hospitality services. The primary objectives of the organization are stated below;
- To increase the number of millennial guests by 20% in next timeframe of 12 months in Pier One Hotel.
- To increase the gross sales of rooms by 25% in the timeframe of next three years
- To enhance the hotel’s brand through advertising and promotional techniques
- To bring innovations in hospitality services, so that it can enhance the profitability and sales volume
- To increase the hotel’s market share by significant percentage.
- To provide the 100 percentage customer satisfaction and provide full value for their money (Newsroom, 2016)
The above mentioned objectives of Pier One Hotel can be evaluated by the use of dimensions of SMART framework, which is stated below;
The marketing objective of Pier One Hotel are really specific and clear, because it will upgrade its services with higher technology innovations and fulfill the needs of new target market, i.e. millennial travellers. It will focus on travellers, who love to spend money on their accommodation. The organization has established a specific objective that it will make efforts to increase the number of millennial travellers by 20%. To increase the sales volume and profitability, it will adopt different social networking sites such as Instagram, Facebook, Youtube etc. It will assist the organization in making the customers more aware (Zhechev, 2016).
In the above written objectives, there are various objectives, which can be measured by the organization. The effectiveness of objectives can be measured by considering the number of millennial travellers’ arrival at hotel and their average length of stay at Pier One Hotel. To increase the number of customers and room sales, it will ensure the higher level of guest satisfaction (Pentescu, 2016).
For Pier One Hotel, there is nothing that cannot be achieved by this hotel. It will make various efforts and implement effective strategies, so that it can attain the objectives easily. It will try to improve the accommodation experience of millennial guests by making some technological innovation in its services. It will train its staff to deal with the millennial travellers. In this way, the objectives of Pier One Hotel are attainable, if it will implement effective tactics under marketing plan (Solomon, 2014).
The objectives of this company are tied with the goals and result-oriented, which will lead the organization to attain profitability and enhance the performance of this hotel and overall position in international hospitality industry. It will maintain the higher standards of services for providing higher level of millennial guest satisfaction.
For meeting these objectives, the Pier One hotel will establish a timeframe of 12 months, under which it will focus on the activities and strategies for generating a large guest base of millennial travellers towards its hospitality services.
To attain the above mentioned goals and objectives, the Pier One Hotel will adopt some specific strategies and tactics. Under this marketing plan, the organization is targeting millennial travellers. These are the travellers, who want their accommodations to be efficient and well-designed. It should be like their highly technological world, which they stay in with their smartphones (Srivastava, & Maitra, 2016). To meet their needs and wants, organization will develop various strategies, which are given below;
For attracting the customers from Australian market, especially millennial, considering as they have higher spending rate, it is significant that Pier One Hotel should advertise the brand name effectively by using different positioning strategies (Schuckert, Liu, & Law, 2015). For instance, the organization is using value brand positioning that assists in determining how guests respond to advertisements and other promotional techniques can be adopted through different heuristics like; brand loyalty, reliability on emotions and norms etc.
Pier One Hotel should spend the expenses and time into marketing of its services to millennial customers. For this, it is significant that the organization should understand the spending pattern and culture of the customers. Moreover, it is important to evaluate that why the millennial travellers should travel to Sydney and choose to accommodate in this hotel (Cunill, 2017). By implementing market research strategy, the organization should conduct research about the trends and changes in the hospitality industry. This strategy will assist the organization offering the services effectively.
Pier One Hotel is a service organization and offering hotel and hospitality services to different target customers. Pier One Hotel is offering accommodation and restaurant services to its customers or guests. It offers space for meetings, conferences and special events. To serve the millennial travellers, it should make technology innovation in service offerings. It should provide them personalized and meaningful hotel experience (Sheth & Sisodia, 2015).
The hospitality services at Pier One Hotel are very affordable for each group society class. The firm has categorized its services in different packages, so that it can be afforded by the people from each income class. For millennial traveller, it can offer different packages with higher prices because they are ready to spend money on their stay (Leung, Bai, & Stahura, 2015).
By expanding its target market, Pier One Hotel needs to expand its global presence. It is one of the most popular hotels in Australia. To target the millennial travellers, it should enhance its distribution channels. To approach millennial travellers, it will use both direct and indirect channels of distribution. It can expand its business in some neighboring nations such as Pacific Region and New Zealand. As these people are tech savvy, so it should enhance the technologies to make reservation and online payment at hotel (Newsroom, 2016).
Pier One Hotel should focus on promoting its services among millennial customers. Millennial travellers are tech savvy, so the company should conduct an online marketing campaign. It will give the organization opportunity for position its brand among targeted customers. As per a survey, 95% of the internet users are between the age of 25 years and 35 years and they are using internet and social networking sites every day. In addition to this, it can promote its hospitality services through newspaper, social media sites, magazines etc. These advertising and promotional activities will enhance the organization’s efforts to get most profitable customers from this new target market (Assaf, Josiassen, Mattila, & Cvelbar, 2015).
Marketing of services for millennial customers is very profitable for the organization. This is the target segments, which covers a huge part of total population. After preparing this marketing plan, Pier One Hotel will implement this plan by developing an action plan. This action plan will include all the processes and activities along with used resources and time duration (Westwood, 2016). Under each and every strategy of Pier One Hotel, it will establish the activities with their priorities and specific resources will be allocated for every strategy.
The action plan for Pier One Hotel is stated below;
Strategy |
Activity |
Priority |
Resources |
Timing |
Product Strategy |
· Development of services and effective hospitality service delivery · Use of updated and innovative technology at hotel rooms · There should be availability of hospitality services on internet and website. |
1 |
· Financial resources for service development such as hiring cost and training cost of hotel staff · Human resources for effective service delivery |
1-3-2018 to 1-4-2018 |
Pricing Strategy |
· Set an appropriate pricing for each income group of millennial customers · Provide discounts to regular business and millennial travellers · Most of the millennial travellers are ready to pay the money for their relaxation. |
1 |
· Financial Resources · Research and development for analysing the market trends and changing needs of customers |
1-4-2018 to 1-5-2018 |
Distribution |
· It will use non-traditional channels of distribution such as; internet, online booking services, mobile application. · The major focus of organization should be on offering booking services through their smartphones. |
3 |
· Suppliers · Third party websites · Online travel agencies · Tangible and intangible resources · IT personnel (Ryan, 2016) |
1-5-2018 to 1-8-2018 |
Advertising and Promotion |
· Online Marketing · Print media · Social media · E-mail Marketing |
2 |
· Marketing personnel · Internet resources |
1-8-2018 to 1-11-2018 |
Sales strategies |
· Development of loyalty programs · Direct sales through wholesalers, online travel agents and third party websites |
2 |
· Finance · Human Resources · Travel agents |
1-11-2018 to 1-2-2019 |
The above action plan states that Pier One Hotel should use effective strategies by including different activities under specific timeframe. Under product strategy, the organization needs to enhance its hospitality services by involving new techniques. The organization understands that millennial guests are tech savvy and they grew up with the internet and mobile phones. Most of them make research for their travel plans and hotel booking through their mobile devices. 85% of these customers own their smartphone and connect on social media sites. Under product/service strategy, Pier One Hotel should improve its hospitality services and provide updated technologies to enhance the accommodation experience of millennial customers. Under pricing strategy, Pier One Hotel will ensure that they provide the service value to millennial travellers for their money.
As discussed above, millennial customers are actively using updated technologies and smartphones, so that organization should enable them to book their room through smartphone applications (Sargeant, & Jay, 2014). For this, this hotel will use its IT resources and third party resources. After establishing services, Pier One Hotel will focus on promoting and advertising its services among millennial customers. Under this, the major emphasis of organization will be on social media networking sites and internet, as millennial travellers are actively engaged to use these sites. In addition to this, Pier One Hotel will focus on implementing effective sales strategies, so that it attract and retain millennial customers towards its hospitality services in Sydney. By the execution of loyalty programs, it will be able to attract this targeted segment. In this way, this action plan will assist Pier One Hotel in attaining its objective of increasing number of millennial travellers by 20%.
There are various ley performance indicators, which can be used by Pier One Hotel to evaluate the effectiveness of marketing plan. For this hotel, the key performance indicators are such as; number of guests, average length of stay at hotel, sales revenues, occupancy rate, revenue per available room and labor cost ratio. By considering these KPIs, this hotel can analyze whether its marketing plan is working. It can look at the increased number of millennial travellers at Pier One Hotel. For monthly evaluation, it will consider the average length of stay for a month that will assist in understanding the effectiveness of new marketing plan (Presbury, 2008).
Conclusion
Marketing is a strategic tool, which each and every company implements in order to develop and emphasize on several marketing processes of the firm. It offers an opportunity to implement new and innovative ideas related needs of business to be established. From the above report, it can be concluded that Pier One Hotel is using effective marketing strategies for attracting its targeted customers like; business travellers, leisure travellers and millennial travellers. The report prepares a marketing plan for the company after analyzing its external and internal environment. The organization is a well-established hotel in Sydney and offering luxurious and quality hospitality services to its potential guests. The report defines different marketing and strategies aspects regarding Pier One Hotel. Moreover, the organization can implement this plan by using action plan and evaluate this using Key Performance Indicators.
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