Report about GDPR and the impact of marketing personalization and individualization on hotel, travel and leisure industries.

1. GDPR and the impact of
marketing individualization on hotel,
travel and leisure industries
REPORT
Building highly relevant
marketing that converts more

2. TABLE OF CONTENTS
Overview1.1
GDPR Impact on Revenue1.2
GDPR Impact on Marketing results1.3
Is Being Creative Going to Pay Back?1.4
The Most Used Communication Channels With
Customers In The Hotel Industry1.5
Trends in Email Marketing1.6
How Are Loyalty Programs Changing?1.7
Marketing Leaders using Marketing Indi-
vidualization as a Strategy
1.8
nº 6
nº 7
nº 8
nº 9
nº 10
nº 14
nº 16
nº 18
2

3. Customer Engagement Challenges for
Marketing Professionals in the hotel industry
Marketers that use Marketing Individualization
Vs. those who don’t, from an ROI perspective
Branding in the Hotel Industry
When not to use marketing nº 22
nº 23
nº 25
nº 25
1.9
1.10
1.11
1.12
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4. WE STRONGLY BELIEVE
THAT CONSUMERS
REQUIRE RELEVANT
MARKETING
COMMUNICATIONS
THAT MAKE THEM
REACT.
4

5. thought this was actually a unique opportunity
for hotels to embrace engagement and create
solid, creative strategies that result in a direct
impact on revenue in the short, mid and long
term, and also to focus on audiences of one
regardless of the amount of people you have in
your databases.
This report will help you understand more
about these changes. It will help you see the
opportunities, some challenges and approaches
to successfully navigate through these new,
warm waters. Helping companies like yours
understand this topic is actually vital to our
business. Why? Pirsonal makes hospitality’s
marketing communications relevant to the
individual to accelerate sales and increase
engagement. We provide a state of the art
personalized video marketing platform that
helps hotels evoke a reaction from audiences of
one, automatically. Named in the Top 10 Martech
Startups 2018, Pirsonal is a trusted personalized
video marketing partner to enterprise brands
and SMBs, combining the power of multimedia
personalization and marketing automation.
We strongly believe that consumers require
relevant marketing communications that make
them react. Personal data plays an important
role in the hospitality, travel, and leisure industry
as larger volumes of personal data from guests
are processed. This also represents a huge
opportunity.
CEO At Pirsonal
It seems obvious, but it is not. They are not the
same. Your audiences are constantly changing.
They demand a unique approach according
to their needs, experience and even budget.
At least this is what data and our experience
shows.
A few months ago the world as we know
it changed for a lot of hotel marketing,
ecommerce and CRM managers. By interacting
with them we learned that several of them
are still in-shock because of the implications
GDPR brings to their business. I remember a
conversation I had with the digital marketing
manager from a known hotel chain that told me
that the following day after our conversation the
chain board was going to decide if they would
start their database from zero or if they would
make the necessary changes to comply with the
GDPR. That’s not a trivial decision at all!
A few days ago I had another conversation with
the digital manager for another known firm that
stated that they didn’t really know what their
email marketing conversions were. I’m not sure
about your current situation, but I’m pretty sure
you can agree with me on something: this is
crazy!
These conversations triggered something in
my mind. We then decided to learn more about
the implications a market shift like the GDPR
has had for the Hotel Industry. At a glance, we
INTRODUCTION
Josías De La Espada
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6. Hospitality and travel is a trillion dollar industry, which is highly competitive due to
several marketing trends. According to a research by Triple School of management,
the majority of travel and hospitality bookings are shifting from offline mode to online
sources. Approximately, 53% of travel booking is made online. The most important
hospitality and travel marketing trends with a strong market presence include:
IMPACT OF GDPR
• Mobile Marketing:
Mobile customer experience has gained
momentum in every industry, especially,
the e-commerce industry. Furthermore,
mobile has contributed around 94%
of year-on-year growth in e-commerce
traffic. When it comes to mobile travel
and hospitality bookings, growth rates
between the years 2011 and 2015 reported
an increase of 1700%, accounting for 18%
of online revenue. In addition, 21% of
hotel bookings were carried out on mobile
devices.
• Increase in Expectation of Customers
Personalization:
In regards to marketing, it is important
to offer a personalized experience to
customers in order to grab their attention.
Though irregularity of travel and hospitality
bookings can indeed make this difficult,
there are still many ways to personalize
the experience. Some of the most effective
personalization methods include the
following:
· Apprehension and leverage of social
network data by instituting social logins
· Personalize appropriate marketing
messages by automating email
messages, where we see an increase in
the use of personalized video
· Create a customized onsite
experience, using information
collected about a customer
(booking date, check in information,
preferences, etc.)
· Make the customers feel unique
and special through personalization
All of the above will strengthen the
effect of the marketing efforts.
1.1 Overview
USD 4,4
BILLON
USD 504
MILLON
USD 175
MILLON
RENUEVE
PROFIT
GDPR FINE
FIGURE 1: GDPR Impact on Hyatt Revenue
Source: The GDPR College
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7. FIGURE 2: GDPR Impact on InterConti-
nental Hotels Group Revenue
RENUEVE
PROFIT
GDPR FINE
USD 1,7
BILLON
USD 68
BILLON
USD 68
BILLON
GDPR has strongly affected the hospitality,
travel, and leisure industry due to the
availability of huge amount of sensitive
personal data collected by hoteliers,
companies, and agencies. Personal data
plays an important role in hospitality, travel,
and leisure industry as larger volumes of
personal data from guests are processed
together with large number of payment card
and/or loyalty card details. Precisely due to
its sensitivity, the data used can have a major
impact on guests if it falls into the wrong
hands. In addition, the travel companies
are also affected due to the personal and
sensitive data they gather and process. For
example, personal information collected
as part of the booking process, including
‘special category’ (that is, sensitive) data
such as health and medical data.
Just imagine... The GDPR impact on revenue
of some of the Hospitality industry could be:
• In 2017, Hyatt went through a cyber-
attack and reported that around 250
hotels across 50 countries were affected.
Now, imagine the same cyber-attack under
GDPR. The maximum GDPR fine is 4% of
the global revenue or €20m (whichever
is greater). Hyatt made USD 4.4 billion in
2016, with a 4.6% profit of USD 204 million.
That left them with a GDPR penalty of up
to USD 175 million.
• In April 2017, the InterContinental
Hotels Group announced that 1,200 of its
hotels had undergone a Credit Card cyber-
attack. In 2016, sales of USD 1.7 billion, a
similar attack that affected EU citizen data
could expose InterContinental to USD 68
million in GDPR penalties.
1.2 GDPR Impact on Revenue
Source: The GDPR College
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8. ty to improve their data security as they en-
gage with prospects and consumers.
• Focus on Social Media: Since email mar-
keting strategies are shifting towards GDPR
compliance, giving marketers an opportu-
nity to focus on areas, which are not highly
impacted, such as social media, SEO strate-
gies, and content creation.
The GDPR regulation’s key aim is to protect
people’s online experiences. Marketers should
not consider this regulation as a restriction to
their brand, but as an opportunity to provide
enhanced service and interactions with their
customers. GDPR has created a significant
shift, but it’s one that businesses and brands
need to embrace. Brands need to focus on
marketing to people, specially to individuals,
rather than marketing to audiences. This
is expected to result in, improved user
experience to serve user preferences better.
GDPR is not revolutionary or groundbreaking,
though it simply supports the preference of
the consumers.
With the shift in focus from audience
to customer, individualized marketing,
businesses are enforced to think about
marketing in an innovative way. This includes
creating marketing campaigns that are catered
toward an individual, reaching them with
the appropriate message, at the right time
and using the right medium. This involves
investment, but once the people-centric
strategy is integrated, marketers can
unlock stronger results from their
marketing than ever before.
A marketer’s aim is to gain credentials, such
as email, name, phone number, birthday, and
others, of a customer to further use it for
the promotional activity of a good or service,
whereas GDPR’s goal is to protect the iden-
tification information through data subjects
control over their personal data. Though
GDPR has some challenges for the marketers
and many are intimidated by its implications
for marketing, compliance also has several
benefits.
Certain benefits of GDPR for marketers are as
follows:
• Customers Trust: GDPR compliance is
an opportunity for an organization to pro-
vide secured and trustworthy service, and
rebuild the trust that many digital consu-
mers have lost. This eventually results in
greater sharing of data.
• User Experience: Rising GDPR enforce-
ment and its data privacy controversies,
companies such as Facebook, Wells Fargo,
and Uber create advertising campaigns that
attempt to put the user experience first.
• Improvement in Data Security: GDPR
compliance gives marketers the opportuni-
IMPACT OF GDPR
1.3 GDPR Impact on Marketing results
8

9. Data is a valuable asset in today’s world,
and though GDPR does create challenges in
businesses, it also creates opportunities. In
general, GDPR is expected to prove positi-
ve for the internet, transparent, and more
careful about collecting, storing, and using
customer’s data. According to the Direct
Marketing Association, the GDPR reduced
outdated marketing data by 75% in 2017,
and around 54% of companies felt the need
for its adoption. In addition, before a year of
the GDPR’s implementation, approximately
24% of businesses had no plan to deal with
its implication.
GDPR is forced for good, for marketers, and
their agencies by bringing back creativity
and creating content. This implication is ex-
pected to root one’s back to what the brand
is for. The main element to impact creative
1.4 Is Being Creative
Going to Pay Back?
agencies and their clients will be the collec-
tion and handling of data. This is critical for
agencies that are, both working on current
projects with existing clients and sourcing
new instructions from potential clients. It
may include a range of data on who they
are and their particular needs. The clients
that eventually handle a substantial amount
of consumer data are expected to witness
the biggest impact of change. The creative
agencies must ensure that they are entirely
compliant with the handling of data, parti-
cularly when any work or feedback that they
receive from a customer may unintentiona-
lly contain sensitive consumer data. GDPR
aims to ensure the hotels, travel, and leisu-
re industry to be more effective and run on
factors such as trust, real relationships, and
authenticity.
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10. At present, communication plays an important role as it is used not only for business purpos-
es, but also majorly used in our daily life. Moreover, in hospitality and tourism sector, com-
munication is not only used between customer and staff, but also used within the staffs in the
organization. The communication can be stated as transmitting information or exchanging
message between two or more persons. The communication process can be done by using
the method of performing word, tone of voice or body language from one to another person.
Hence, it is important that a good communication process is carried out while corresponding.
With the increase in mobile devices in the workplace and the compulsion that hotels maintain
GDPR compliance, Bring your own device ( BYOD) policies have to reflect these GDPR com-
pliance requirements. It is particularly important for the hospitality sector spreaded work-
force, who will gradually rely on internal communications through a mobile team application.
COMMUNICATION
1.5 The Most Used Communication
Channels With Customers In The Hotel Industry
BY TYPE
Managers require complete and accurate
information to perform their functions effi-
ciently and effectively. If communication is
not done properly, it can hamper the man-
agement of the whole organisation. For in-
stance, business planning, requires infor-
mation on available resources, strength of
competitors, government policies, and other
external factors. Such information provides
very important inputs for management to
be able to formulate the right objectives and
strategies to achieve its goal. To achieve all
the above parameters communication plays
a vital role.
The most common forms of communication
used in hospitality industry by type are:
• Auditory Communication:
Auditory communication includes messages
that are received via hearing sense. It com-
prises of music, words, sounds, and noises.
In the hospitality industry, auditory commu-
nication can be established through differ-
ent media related to activity and objectives
such as: by face-to-face communication, by
phone call and radio broadcasting.
• Visual Communication:
This includes messages received through
sight. Sign, gesture, and images play a major
role while communicating. It also contains
mediums, such as complaint forms, letters,
invoices, contracts, labels, and leaflets.
• Tactile Communication:
This comprises of messages perceived
through touch sense. Through tactile
sensation, affection is conveyed. Shaking
hands or tapping someone’s shoulder may
show some positive or negative effects, so
it is essential to be respectful in this context
and be aware of cultural conventions.
For example, greetings at meetings and
negotiations are amongst the different
mediums involved in it.
• Multichannel Communication:
These messages are received through
various senses at a time. Television, video,
and computer are few mediums through
which this is possible.
10

11. BY ROI
Return on Investment (ROI) varies from
company-to-company and from region-to-
region. Unvaryingly, the final decision de-
pends on the company’s gearing and the
investor’s risk profile. The average internal
rate of return (IRR) for hotel investments in
Europe ranges from 12.4% to 16.1% with an
average of 14%. The majority of marketers
believe that social media communication
channel as a whole has helped their busi-
nesses though they cannot quantify its ex-
act impact.
The benefits of incorporating a social media
strategy include:
• Increased exposure
• Growing website traffics
• Developing fan following
• Generating sales leads
• Rise in business partnerships
• Advancing sales
According to a survey of CMOs, the
businesses are spending around 12% of their
marketing budgets on social efforts. This
number is expected to increase around 20%
over the next five years. This is attributed to
growing brands and their presence across
multiple platforms.
This survey stated: around 28% of market-
ing agencies state, they struggle to meas-
ure social ROI, 55% marketing agencies can
measure social ROI, and around 17% mar-
keting agencies agree that they can accu-
rately quantify the revenue impact of social
media.
The major
challenges related to
ROI are:
• Inability to tie social to business out-
comes
• Lack of analytics expertise and/or recourses
• Poor measurement tools and platforms
• Inconsistent analytical approaches
• Unreliable poor/data
BY SPENT
Currently, the hotels technology spending is
particular due to shrink in hotel’s IT budg-
et. Hoteliers currently are focused to spent
more on technology as compared to previ-
ous years, approximately 3.5% of overall
revenues were allocated to IT spending in
2016, a decrease with 6% in 2015. Hotels are
now focused on enabling digital consumer
engagement, with 52% aiming technology
as their priority. Around 56% aims at driv-
ing more direct reservations, and 56% con-
centrating on improving guest analytics, as
a top Business Intelligence goal.
According to a 2016-2017 Gartner Research
study, the companies are now spending
around more than 12% of annual revenue
on overall marketing. It stated that larger
companies (more than 5 billion revenue)
spend 13% of revenue on marketing, while
smaller companies (USD 250 million to USD
500 million revenue) spend roughly around
10% of annual revenue.
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12. COMMUNICATION
1.5 The Most Used Communication
Channels With Customers In The Hotel Industry
BY ENGAGEMENT
Globally, the number of mobile device sub-
scriptions is growing exponentially over the
past period. In 2016, there were around 4.8
billion unique mobile subscribers, and 65%
of the world’s population. It is estimated
that there will be 5.7 billion mobile sub-
scribers, representing a mobile phone pen-
etration rate of 73%. The increase in usage
of mobile device has transformed the travel
and tourism industry, as travel bookings
are majorly done through mobile devices.
Consumer engagement has begun to shift
towards mobile platforms, and global inter-
connectivity of mobile devices makes them
a suitable platform for commerce.
Similarly, social media usage is rising. It is
observed that, digital consumers are spend-
ing more time on social networks and mes-
saging platforms than ever before. It is thus
important for hotels to have a brand pres-
ence and a marketing effort on social me-
dia channels, especially since social media
marketing has proven to be more effective
than traditional marketing (when utilized
correctly). Social media marketing allows for
two-way communication between consum-
ers and customers. This interactive element
helps companies hold a long-term customer.
Moreover, social media marketing supports
the real-time promotion of new products
and services, all while processing consumer
data that can be further used to target, en-
gage, and grow a base of consumers.
BY CONVERSIONS
As the travel industry is growing continu-
ally and becoming increasingly more com-
plex, hoteliers are focusing for more inno-
vative ways to engage and retain their best
potential guests. According to Google, the
online travel customer is exposed to over
38,983 micro-moments in any 60-day time-
frame, through which they visit an average
of around 18 websites via multiple devices
in eight sessions before booking a hotel.
The major factors
impacting hotel
website conver-
sion rates include
market parity, rate
parity,and quality
of website and user
experience due
to growing com-
petition between
the OTAs and Ho-
teliers. On other
hand, factors such
as risk/investment,
increase in choices,
poor platforms, confusing offers, and ancil-
1400
1200
1000
800
600
400
200
0
NoofUsers(Millons)
Q1 2014 Q3 2014 Q1 2015 Q3 2015 Q1 2016 Q3 2016
Source: HospitalityNet
FIGURE 3. Daily Active Users on Social Media Channels over time
Snapchat
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
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13. The travel industry has below
average conversion rates, ac-
cording to data from Smart
Insights. For travel and hospi-
tality, the average conversion
rate was 2.4% as compared to
2.6% for the retail. Though, for
travel websites that depend
heavily on affiliate metase-
arch traffic, conversion rates
are a bit higher, approximately
above 4%.
The factors influencing book-
ing conversion rates include:
• Price: this is a major factor,
having competitive rates and providing better
rate to book directly on website
• Traffic Source: more appropriate the
traffic, the higher is the conversion rate
• Conversion rates by devices:
approximately, 11% of bookings are made
from mobile for brand-site, and 61% of
bookings on mobile are through OTA mobile
site
• Conversion rate by location
• Conversion rate by ADR and Rate Strategy
• Website user experience
• Conversion assistants: Widgets, A 15%
increase in conversion can be expected
• Trust: Reviews can help in growing the
conversion rate
• Service: Better service will encourage
conversions, particularly if something unique
is offered on website
lary services are hampering the hotels con-
version rates.
The average hotel website conversion rate
(bookings divided by unique monthly visi-
tors) is typically below 2%. For example,
imagine 100 people visit your hotel web-
site. Out of which, less than two will make a
booking, and more than 98 will look around
before leaving to make a booking some-
where else either with your competitors or
with the OTAs. In addition, hoteliers are
spending dollars on SEO, online media, paid
search, PR, and social media to bring users
to the hotel website. Though, 98% of them
are not converting. On balance, it’s easier
and inexpensive to generate more revenue
from the existing traffic than to get more
viewers to the site. Furthermore, attaining
even a slight conversion rate increase can cre-
ate a huge impact on a hotel’s bottom-line.
1,55% 1,67%
2,05%
2,34%
4,17%
SEO TRIVAGO PAID
SEARCH
TRIP
ADVISOR
GOOGLE
HOTEL ADS
Source:Ecomeye
4,50%
4.00%
3.50%
3.00%
2.50%
2.00%
1.50%
1.00%
0.50%
0.00%
6%
2 34%
Source:Criteo
FIGURE 5. Share of Bookings by Device
80%
60%
40%
20%
0%
-20%
-40%
SMARTPHONE
TABLETS
(Mobile Excluding Apps) - Q4 2016 VS Q4 2017
DESKTOP
SUPPLIERS OTA
Source:Ecomeye
DIRECT LINK SEARCH
SEM
DISPLAY ADS
SEO
OTA
1528
136
91
80
75
FIGURE 6. Bookings by Display Advertising
(FASTBOOKING study of 2,000 Hotels Worldwide)
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14. interactive relationship with their customers
and obtain client email profiles. For example,
approximately 192 million North Americans
are active Internet users (Nielsen) and around
37 million have purchased travel online. The
Internet offers a massive interactive, con-
tent-rich media, and highly growing distribu-
tion channel for the hospitality market.
Email gets the most attention of any hospi-
tality eMarketing effort owing to creation of
direct revenue opportunities with past, pre-
sent, and future clients. The email marketing
strategy in hospitality makes competitive sen-
se due to factors such as:
• Personalization: offers personalized
interactive relationship with clients, for
example, with personalized video marke-
ting.
• Reach: functions as a sales force by rea-
ching tens of thousands in seconds.
• Protects brand integrity: enables
promotion of the latest specials on a one-
to-one basis to a pre-selected audience
without broadcasting to the world the
newest discounts.
• Low cost: is an inexpensive form of acti-
ve marketing.
• Instant Gratification: people can
receive, respond, forward, and print email
almost immediately.
• Rich Media: email marketing comes in
various styles, such as e-Newsletters, text,
HTML messages like a postcard or survey.
The hotel gets its message across with
Email marketing is an important element of
hotelier’s direct online distribution and emar-
keting strategy. Email marketing is used for
both, direct response, and as a branding tool
(short term, long term, and strategic goals).
Email marketing helps the hoteliers to enga-
ge their customers in a strong, personalized,
and mutually beneficial interactive relations-
hip and is an inexpensive form of traditional
marketing.
Major trends in email marketing in 2019:
1. Respecting personal data will change
the email marketing strategy
2. Mailable ‘Microsites’ are adopted by
more companies to increase customer
research, engagement, and retention
3. Conversational tone is adopted for more
personal interaction with audience
4. More business push for mobile-friendly
design
5. Testing and deliverability need addres-
sing further
6. Personalization and segmentation
remain a high priority to continue sharing
dynamic and engaging content
EMAIL MARKETING AS A MAJOR
COMMUNICATION CHANNEL
Email marketing is amongst one of the vital
components of the hotel eMarketing and on-
line distribution strategy. The swing toward
online buying, indicates that the website is
becoming a key point of entry to establish
IMPACT OF MARKETING
1.6 Trends in Email Marketing
14

15. color, sound, perso-
nalized video, animation, whate-
ver is most appropriate based on business
goals.
• Results: outcomes based, from knowing
who opened the message, clicked on
which links, how much time spent viewing
each page, completed a transaction, or
forwarded the email.
CHANGES IN EMAIL MARKETING
Email Marketing guidelines:
• Have clear, explicit language a child could
understand on the opt-in pages. Don’t hide
consent in legalese. Dennis Yu recommends
incorporating this language throughout the
landing page, rather than trying to hide it.
• Use GDPR compliant
opt-ins. MailChimp has added GDPR
boxes. LeadPages now has a GDPR consent
check box.
• Document you opt-ins. Screenshots
could be your lifesaver if you ever do have
to prove compliance.
• Clean up your list. GDPR has an obli-
gation for “minimization.” You can only ask
for the minimum amount of data you need
to provide your good or service, and you
should only keep the data as long as neces-
sary. Cleaning up your list is a good habit
regardless. Dead leads give you inaccurate
open rates. Go for an engaged list rather
than a large list.
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16. Establish how your organization deals with loyalty data
The GDPR is a great opportunity for one’s company to review the way it processes
and store data. Auditing the current methods is one of the best ways to prepare for
GDPR. Under the current EU Data Protection Directive, only data controllers are
liable for data protection compliance though, the GDPR places direct obligations
on data processors too. Hence, it is important to know whether your organization
is a data processor or a data controller, bearing in mind it could be both. For loyalty
programs, it is necessary to document what personal data is being held, the source
of the data, and who is it being shared with. It needs to maintain records of all your
activities related to data processing from your loyalty program. GDPR’s accounta-
bility principle requires organizations to be able to demonstrate their compliance
with the principles of data protection imposed by the regulation.
Know your existing customers consent
It is mandatory to review how you record, seek, and manage consent and if any
changes are required. In addition, one should know how a member signed up to
a loyalty program, what are their permissions for communication, and if it is clear
and transparent. If they do not meet the GDPR standard, existing consents need
to be refreshed. Consent must be specific, freely given, informed, and not ambi-
guous. A positive opt-in is required and consent cannot be implied by inactivity,
pre-ticked boxes or silence. The consent section has to be separated from the rest
of the terms and conditions. Simple methods need to be provided for individuals
to take back consent.
Loyalty programs are the most effective way of collecting consumer data, and acts as a result
factor mainly in the new GDPR regulation.
These programs are a source of data collection, which allow new functions and communica-
tions to be used. Though, there is no need to completely revamp the program due to strong
connection between loyalty and data. One can keep compliant by adjusting in current com-
munication and opt-in and opt-out policies. This resulted in ensuring that members can only
become (or remain) members of a loyalty program if they have given explicit consent for both
your own organization and any third parties to process their personal data.
LOYALTY
1.7 How Are Loyalty Programs Changing?
16

17. Examine your privacy notices
Know individual rights
One of the key takeaways from GDPR is the strengthening of rights for individu-
als, including the right to be forgotten and data portability, which means you
could be required to provide data to an individual that can then be taken to a
competitor. Businesses are grateful to promote these rights, so it is important
to ensure there are procedures in place to make this possible.
This is particularly important when it comes to one’s loyalty program being
compliant with GDPR. It is important to review the privacy notices currently in
place and put in a plan for making any required changes before GDPR imple-
mentation. When personal data is being collected for a loyalty program, one’s
need to provide specific sets of information such as information pertaining to
your identity and how you propose to use that information. This is generally
done with a privacy notice.
Know your requirements around privacy by design
The GDPR requires you to provide some additional information in your privacy
notices. This includes information, such as the exact provision in the law that
permits asking for that data and retention periods for the data. It is important
to specifically list that people have a right to complain to s Data Protection of-
fice if they believe there is a problem with the way their data is being handled.
The GDPR requires the information to be provided in the notices is easy to un-
derstand, concise and clear. The GDPR turns privacy by design into a concrete
legal requirement under the roof of “data protection by design and by default”.
In some situations, it also makes “Privacy Impact Assessments” into a compul-
sory requirement. The regulation defines Privacy Impact Assessments as “Data
Protection Impact Assessments. (DPIA).” A DPIA is required whenever data pro-
cessing has the potential to pose a high level of risk to individuals such as when:
• New technology is being put in place
• A profiling action is happening that can significantly affect people
• Processing is happening on a large set of data
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18. Hoteliers, airlines, and tour
operators have been leading in
many aspects of marketing.
Hoteliers, airlines, and tour operators have been leading in many
aspects of marketing as they are promoting loyalty programs, gen-
erating apps, and storing data way before many. For hotels, it is
important to offer their guests a personalized service. However,
the OTAs can also personalize the experience of the hoteliers. The
major marketing and sales channel of OTAs is online booking plat-
forms and hence it is crucial for the hoteliers to match their profiles
to their general strategies. One such example include, booking plat-
form Bidroom.com. It doesn’t charge the hoteliers commission for
bookings. Instead, the company asks them to offer a discount to
the travelers. On the hotel’s profile, the administrator can actually
choose the discount percentage and change it any time, even after
it has been set. The hoteliers can also add and delete pictures, write
their own descriptions and change the number of extra benefits,
making their profiles more personal and adjusted to their business
model.
MAJOR REASONS FOR USING MARKETING INDIVI-
DUALIZATION AS A STRATEGY
The purpose of using marketing individualization strategy
is for improving the customer’s experience and meeting his
needs more effectively and in a lesser time. Thus, interactions
between the company and the buyers are easier and the sa-
tisfaction of the latter is increased. Currently, online retailers
are increasingly seeking to offer targeted content to individual
users, and personalization is becoming extremely important
in the travel industry, owing to combination of vertical sec-
tor and customer experience optimization expertise; hence,
retailers are looking forward to help their clients to provide
personalized offers to individuals for the long-term benefit of
their customers and their marketing efforts.
STRATEGY
1.8 Marketing Leaders using Marketing
Individualization as a Strategy
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20. Flight Centre Travel
Group
Flight Centre Travel Group accelerates its
sales process by using personalized video
marketing powered by Pirsonal. Every time
a lead requests information, the brand
automatically creates a personalized video,
personalized landing page and custom in-
video call-to-action based on the information
provided by the lead such as name, reason
to travel or destination, which makes these
videos and emails totally relevant to each
individual. This increased engagement
moves leads to buy more and faster. Every
personalized video is then instantly sent by
email, which increases customer engagement
and builds stronger relationships that
translates into more revenue also in the mid
and long term. This strategy is aligned with
the personal touch of the company towards
its customers through all communication
channels.
KLM
KLM is a travel brand offering personalization
across most of its digital marketing activity,
such as it uses personalised emails to retarget
customers that abandon carts online,
allowing them to carry on the user journey
from where they left off. In addition, one of its
most innovative displays of personalisation
has been iFly 50 – an interactive anniversary
edition of its brand magazine. Though iFly
usually provides reviews, inspirational stories,
and general travel tips, but the 50th edition
offered readers the chance to pick their five
favorite destinations for the chance to win
the trip of a lifetime. Striking imagery with an
interactive user experience, is one such way
of how to personalize content marketing. By
giving the reader a reason to interact with the
brand (instead of passively scrolling), it meant
people would be more likely to invest and
engage.
EXAMPLES
Of few brands adopting marketing
individualization as a strategy:
20

21. Since, personalization can be effective
during active processes, such as booking,
researching, and travelling, Expedia’s
campaign showed that it can also be a way
to drive social engagement. For its ‘Travel
Yourself Interesting’ campaign, Expedia
gave Facebook users the chance to create
a unique info graphic based on their own
travel experiences, including information
such as ‘total miles travelled’ and ‘number of
countries visited’. The campaign followed on
from a previous example that allowed users
to create messages from luggage tags, thus
with the help of such marketing strategy with
around 15,500 people creating their travel
profile in eight countries, the results speak
for themselves. For Expedia, it was a chance
to capture unique social data, which helped
the brand to better understand its customers
and inform re-targeted advertising.
Virgin Hotels
Virgin Hotels Virgin Hotels Chicago focuses
on personalisation, with the brand using
mobile technology to enhance the customer’s
experience throughout their stay. According to
the research study, more than 40% of travelers
remain connected via their smart phones while
on holiday, with 29% using it to stay in touch with
loved ones and 24% using it to locate local area
information. On this basis of this data, Virgin
wanted to create a platform that would allow
guests to personalize their hotel experience
through their existing device. This resulted in a
new app name ‘Lucy’ that allowed guests to do
things like adjust the temperature in their room,
stream content on hotel TVs, make external
dining reservations, and so on. Apart from the
typical rewards program, Virgin Hotels also
launched ‘The Know’ – a preference program
designed to create exceptional experiences.
By filling in a questionnaire online, guests can
choose what they’d like in their mini bar, discuss
allergies, and even select a cocktail that will be
waiting on arrival. This type of personalisation
is hard to beat – and it means that hotel
brands are able to compete with the intimate
experience offered by the likes of Airbnb. By
treating guests as individuals rather than a
homogenous group, it also means customers
are far more likely to return in future.
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22. STRATEGY
1.9 When not to use marketing
Marketing is amongst important element of all businesses
today as it creates interest among potential customers for
a product or services , and is crucial in today’s fast-paced
digitalized world. There are several modes of marketing
available, and has both, advantages and disadvantages. The
primary disadvantage that can be attributed to marketing
is money investment. It is not difficult to waste money with
the wrong marketing plan. Not doing proper research before
starting a marketing campaign involving advertising, using the
wrong medium and thus trying to target the wrong section of
people, can be an expensive mistake. Keeping low cost and
doing extensive research earlier is thus extremely vital. With
its low costs and large audiences, it’s easy to get carried away
when using social media in any business.
Marketers need to monitor trends that may impact the success
of their marketing efforts:
• Demographic shifts (aging population, the rise of millennials), and
socioeconomics (cultural changes, economic decline/growth)
• Political, economic, and geographic changes (emerging or declining economies)
• Trip purpose (growth of multipurpose trips)
• Psychographic changes (special interests, healthy lifestyles, sustainability)
• Behavioural adaptations (free independent travel, decreasing brand loyalty)
• Product-related trends (emerging niches)
• Distribution channels (online travel agencies, virtual travel)
Effective services marketing in the tourism and hospitality industry requires
marketers to attain a solid understanding of the differences between the
marketing of goods and services. Marketing is not recommendable without having
a knowledge of the preferences and behaviors of their key customer segments.
22

23. STRATEGY
1.10 Customer Engagement Challenges for
Marketings Professionals in the hotel industry
Companies are increasingly recognizing
the value of establishing close customer
relationships. In the past, industry has gained
a rapid growth and, at times, over-expansion
of tourism industries. Currently, the hotel
industry destinations have to address
and overcome the challenges and threats
resulting in the market developments and
business environmental changes. Marketing
in the fields of tourism, travel, hospitality and
leisure industries is one of cutting edge and
most challenging trend of recent years. Within
the framework of “Experience Economy” in
overall business environment and consumer
behavior in particular, the task of offering
unforgettable tourism experiences to visitors
and guests is the most critical priority for all
tourism-related businesses and destination
marketers.
The key challenges marketing
professionals face for customer
engagement are:
1. Customers are increasingly distracted:
Customer distraction is the first major
challenge that the hotel industry is facing
repeatedly to convey the value of their
business. The primary strategies to meet
the challenge of customer distraction
are persuasion, simplicity and relevancy.
Simplicity is achieved by focusing the efforts
on the customers’ scarcest resource. For
example, one customer segment might be
time, for another it may be mental effort.
Individuals tend to find things simple that
they do over and over again, if marketer can
allied an already existing customer routine
the chances are they are more likely to
engage them. Relevancy is vital: Marketers
need to be able to create customer-specific
messages that are unique according to
who every customer is, likes and expects.
Personalization and multimedia play and
important role to achieve a marketing that
makes customers react.
2. Customers are focusing on new models
of authority: To build trust in old forms of
authority, such as politicians, academics,
businesses, scientists , among others, have
continuedtodeteriorationandintheirplacenew
models of authority have risen. Encyclopedias
are replaced by Wikipedia, Bank Managers
are replaced by MoneySavingExperts and
Travel Agents are replaced by Trip Advisors.
The common element in many of these new
authorities is building relationship and trust to
offer long term value.
3. Increased expectations of Customers:
If improved quality and new offers are not
been provided, nowadays the likelihood is
that their customers will quickly find someone
else. Switching goods and providers has never
been so easy for the customers. Although the
importance of post-sales support is growing
dramatically as the ability to augment
discontent is now just one click and a
Facebook group away. So meeting customers
expectation is a real task for marketers.
4. Establishment of new Communities:
Through the new sources of authority come
new ways of connecting. The challenge for
marketers in customer engagement is how to
join the discussions within these communities
without approaching across as outsiders
coveting to disrupt the conversation. The
language of customer-to-customer exchange
is frequently difficult to learn and tough to
meet business needs through.
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24. 24

25. OVERVIEW
Branding plays a major role for
companies of all sizes due to the increase
in market competition as it establishes
a meaningful, differentiated presence
that enhances an organization’s ability
to attract and retain loyal customers
and improves their market place. Big
brands can lead to financial advantages
through the concept of brand equity
that the brand itself becomes valuable.
In hospitality industry, reputed brands
bring a lot of benefit to individual hotels,
such as increased income, powered by
brand recognition. Thus, resulting in
high brand value along with increase in
hotel value and have loyal customers.
In the competitive hospitality industry,
setting your hotel stand out in the
crowd coupled with strong customer
base is crucial for small, independently
owned hotels as well as national chains.
This can be achieved by making smart
choices related to product type, branding
activity, and a marketing relevant to the
individual, not only to a general.
STRATEGY
1.11 Marketers that use
Marketing Individualization
Vs. those who don’t, from
an ROI perspective
Currently, with growing innovative technology,
almost any type of media can be personalized,
from homepages to email copy, sales funnels
to personalized video, recommendations to
loyalty discounts, depending on the objective
and amassed data points. Across the customer
lifecycle, a savvy marketing personalization
strategy may deliver an unmatched ROI that
makes a major impact on the bottom line.
For example, in-house marketers who are
personalizing their web experiences see on
average a 19% uplift in sales, email marketing
regularly sees a whopping 440% ROI when
implemented effectively, or 44 dollars for every
dollar spent, and personalized videos deliver a
CTR that is higher than that of generic video
by 164% as well as a 116% uplift in conversion.
In addition, 94% of customer insights and
marketing professionals across multiple
industries focus on meeting their current
marketing objectives. Individualization plays
a major role: Around 88% of U.S. marketers
reported seeing measurable improvements
through personalization with more than half
reporting a lift greater than 10%.
Customers now expect a personalized
experience and consciously line up their brand
loyalty with the extent to which they feel ‘known’
and valued as a customer. Communicating
content that is not targeted is a waste of time
and effort since irrelevant content generates
83% lower response rates. If personalization
marketing is not done, you are spending your
time and effort on initiatives that do not work,
and will create a negative impact on customers.
1.12 Branding in the
Hotel Industry
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26. GUEST ARTICLE
All that glitters is not gold for Hotels on Digital Content.
30 minutes before the meeting, Frank's team
was proud to deliver a keynote presentation
with top-notch content polished for weeks.
Frank worked extra hours with them giving
vision and expertise to the new Digital Content
Strategy plan. But this little splinter in his mind
that didn't let him sleep now has become a
tingling.
He entered the meeting room with confidence
and introduced everyone the new plan.
In Pattterns, we have observed that most
hotels make critic decisions based on intuition
and past experiences. There is an obsession
with the most viral publications, campaigns,
and influencers of the industry.
When it comes to extrapolation, who gives
guarantees?
- Nice job with the presentation, Frank, but I
have some questions for you- said Burns, CFO
of the brand.
Which is the ROI of this? How could all
this push online reservations? How can we
measure attribution? How could...
- Yeah! And first of all, what part of this will
make us different from any other hotel? This
trend is what every competitor is doing now or
is about to do- interrupted McLure, the GM.
Frank's tingling is now a cold drop of sweat in
the back of his neck.
The underlining and essential question is:
What's the foundation of your
strategy?
In Frank's opinion, there's nothing that could
prove wrong his plan, but for the committee
that is not enough. Are you relying on
something solid or just intuition?
Increasing Content Strategy budgets need
bigger assurances. We are in the era of
information, we need to make data-driven
decisions.
It's been two weeks since the meeting, and
Frank has no answers yet. The new deadline
is in five days. He overlooked his Social Media
and web analytics dashboards. It only gives
him a cold feeling, but not a clue about where
His hands began to sweat an ocean. He moved his head from one person to another
reaching for allies, but even his better options were looking at their own papers, not
wanting to pick a side. All the executive committee of the hotel had questions. Legiti-
mate questions. And each one could kill his career in the brand.
26

27. is the heat coming from. Every statistic seems now superficial when he
thinks about creating something new to confront the committee.
Their questions are continuously tolling in his head, formulating
new ones.
What if I could identify variables, trends, and behaviours?
What if I could trace down our potential guest digital
journey? What if I could transform all our data into tactical
evidence?
Sure, turning Data Analysis and User Behaviour
Analysis into easy visual information will
help us make decisions and discover new
opportunities, but that's something that goes
beyond the traditional industry analysis and
superficial rankings of the competition.
We’re Pattterns, a creative research team
located in Spain. We’ve been more than 6 years
creating digital content for international brands
at agencies, and for a long time, we have seen
how many companies invest in Digital Content
having only superficial knowledge about their digital
competition landscape. That is why we came together
as a dedicated team with the purpose of going deeper.
After a lot of experimentation, we pride ourselves on
developing unique and professional reports based
on Content Mining and Data Science.
We want to introduce to you 'Instagram for
Hotels.' Thousands of Instagram pictures
published by hotels analyzed with Image
Data Science. Build your Content
Strategy based on the most
extensive and powerful research
on Instagram of the U.S. Hotel
Sector.
Let’s change how we see
Business Intelligence.
Improve today with
data.
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28. TALK TO SALES:
US +1 (914) 336-4549
EUROPE +34 (912) 485-775
sales@pirsonal.com
For more information, visit pirsonal.com
Pirsonal makes hospitality's marketing communications relevant to the individual
to accelerate sales and increase engagement. We provide a state of the art
personalized video marketing platform that helps hotels evoke a reaction from audiences
of one, automatically. Named in the Top 10 Martech Startups 2018, Pirsonal is a trusted
personalized video marketing partner to enterprise brands and SMBs, combining the
power of multimedia personalization and marketing automation.
ABOUT US