How to make your hotel stand out from the crowd

Last year, we saw some big moves from the large international hotel groups with mergers, acquisitions and new brands. I can't help but wonder how much more the brand landscape can keep growing in this way, as the customer seeks a more personal and original experience? The big global hotel operators have dozens of logos across their websites, each one pitched at a different audience, in an original way, for a new market: a younger crowd, a mature crowd, the discerning traveller, the upwardly mobile, global domination or local spirit, the business road warrior, fitness and lifestyle junkie, boutique, social, couples, groups, families, millennials and Generation Z. You get the idea. If one brand doesn’t quite fit the latest persona, along comes another new brand to corner the market. Let's be clear, the international hotel chains have each built fantastic platforms and infrastructure over many, many years which give each of their brands a voice. They’ve built loyalty initiatives with tens of millions of guests connected to a dynamic CRM tool with points, miles and upgrades making sure they are heard. They have built boxes in every major gateway city and airport. They have technology budgets to make your eyes water, developing proprietary systems for competitive advantage. They have cool, open plan offices with hundreds of people analysing statistics and social listening. It’s a successful formula. The question for hotel owners and operators is, how much does the scale development of hotel brands with monolithic systems provide the answer of choice for the customer? It clearly works for some, as global examples demonstrate, however you could choose to be discovered differently rather than riding the brand superhighway. At Roomzzz, we’re not building a global institution, or aiming for global domination, at least not yet. Roomzzz Aparthotels was born 12 years ago without much of a benchmark in the UK. There was a vision of guest experience, great design and service, with intuition for the unfulfilled opportunity. We have a great family history, and we’ve developed our story with real purpose. The brand has evolved from an honest and sincere spirit of adventure. So, what is it going to take to get yourself noticed and stand out from the crowd? Brands do talk, big or small. A brand is not just a hundred hotels in ten different countries with a standard operating procedure manual five volumes thick. Your independent, stand-alone property can find ways to communicate in words and pictures to truly differentiate from the crowd and carve out an identity which will bring the customer to them. A brand is likely to be the most complex decision, if not the most expensive consideration you’ll have to make for a new hotel or a re-positioned property. Joining a big brand network comes at quite a cost to access the huge audience the groups maintain. Alternatively, developing your own brand or identity could be a game changer, and there are plenty of examples which stand on their own two feet in the wonderful world of hospitality, with a unique proposition which makes them what they are and able to drive measurable success. The point here is that you need to find your lane. What is it that you do? What is it that you do that no-one else is doing? More importantly, what do you want your guests to say about you and remember you for? Let that drive your focus on standards and experience. Develop a message and a story that makes sense and then the business needs to find as many ways as it can to tell that story, keep it fresh and build the momentum and the consistency that enforces the brand. You may want to talk about the service that you deliver – what makes it different? You may want to talk about the facilities you provide and the benefits your customer will experience? And what about the price point, location, package or standards? Who are you trying to reach and what should they discover about you? The best experience is all joined up with the customer centre stage; from their booking to arrival, throughout the stay and beyond. Let your standards, your brand, your team and your marketing bring the whole thing together and you’ll be one step ahead of the rest. If you want to stand out from the crowd in 2019, you have to make connections with your audience. Have some genuine purpose for what you do and how you communicate. Generate a compelling story that guests will love and feel they can experience. Big brands can make a lot of noise, but it's not necessarily the volume that everyone hears. Consumers today want to hear a tune they like, a great melody, a fantastic chorus. Your brand has the chance to sing your own tune in today’s digital, connected world and be heard in a very different way to the white noise and the blur of other brands. Be sure your marketing is consistent across the multitude of channels available now: Digital, Print, TV, Radio, Social, PR, B2B Sales. One last thing. Walk the talk. You think you’ve done your part, built your business, well marketed to the world, with a highly original, genuine and captivating experience! What else will make the difference and get you the attention and success you deserve? In this transparent, agile and data rich world we live in today, customer sentiment provides true distinction. Arguably the most important way you could make a statement about what you do is nurturing your customers to shout about it. There’s nothing more valuable than guests emphasising your brand and your USP’s on social media and review sites. Reputation is powerful. Work hard for it, celebrate success and take your team on the journey so that it matters as much to them as it should to you. In so doing, you’ll stand out from the crowd and truly find your own space where success is assured. By Robert Alley, chief operating officer at Roomzzz Aparthotels