Know-How Exchange : Strategy

I'm on the mailing list for a few 5-star resorts and chains (they must think I have more money than I do) and there are a number of ways they acquire names and communicate with prospects.

1. Referral from existing customers
2. Collecting details from guests and continuing to communicate after their initial stay
3. Buying lists of "HNWs" from various sources
4. Advertising in charge card magazines (AX, DC, CB, etc) and ride-alongs in monthly statement envelopes.
5. Advertising/editorial in in-flight, frequent-flyer and airline club magazines.

Resorts promote themsleves through holiday-prize promotion in association with big-budget consumer brands, high-profile TV games and TV-based (mass-market) competitions where they are getting in front of a huge, relatively untargeted audience, only some of whom may be in the target segment, some others may be in the influencer segment (e.g. agents, PAs, etc).

They use frequent-flyer style promos and rewards, and may surprise past guests or supposed high-level prospects with free promotional gifts.

Sometimes they give whole vacations away to people whom they think will be good influencers. Would you get a better or worse impression of a resort if, say, Bill and Hilary Clinton were on vacation there at the same time as you? Or Madonna, or Sarah Ferguson, or Claudia Schiffer? If you gave David Letterman a week in a five-star resort, do you think he's likely to give it a wrap on the show?

How important is the web? It can enable people to see a 360 degree tour of a resort and sample menus, winelists, bedrooms and bathrooms without leaving home. It allows resorts to communicate with prospects at very low incremental cost direct to the desktops.

I dunno, sounds like it's important to me...

Hope this helps...

Chris B