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Four Seasons Embraces Digital Marketing, Virtual Experiences

Posted By: Stevens & Tate Category: Ad Agency| Advertising consultants| Chicago Ad Agency

16 Jan 2012

Before they arrive, visitors to the Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts are enticed by a slew of virtual and real experiences. There are wine tastings on Twitter, the mobile hot-chocolate bar in Chicago and the opportunity to release floating lanterns at a Thai property’s tropical festival of lights.

“We create personal experiences,” said Susan Helstab, a 25-year veteran of Four Seasons. Named VP-marketing three years ago, she oversees global sales and marketing from the company’s Toronto headquarters.

Ms. Helstab spends two-thirds of her time visiting the 35 countries where Four Seasons operates. Traveling to exotic destinations like Bora Bora is simply part of the job.

With half of Four Seasons’ marketing budget devoted to digital channels, its launch of a revamped website this month is a milestone. It will incorporate user-generated reviews — still somewhat unusual for luxury brands. Marketers in the category have historically guarded their brands and trademarks closely.

“We’ve taken a leading position in creating different kinds of engagement opportunities,” Ms. Helstab said.

One example is the Twitter wine tastings. Introduced two years ago, the event attracted 14 of Four Seasons’ 86 hotels last year. “You can get the wine yourself, and taste it and listen to the description and evaluations [on Twitter], or you can go to the participating hotels,” Ms. Helstab explained.

By: Frederic Colas

Have you ever wondered who was the builder of your home? And I also am betting that you know more about your car than the biggest purchase of your life. Why is that? Branding the American Dream isn’t any less important as your disposal car. You probably have researched your flat panel television maker more than what insulation was used in your home.

Here is an interesting fact. General Motors spends THREE BILLION dollars on media every year. Chevrolet spends close to ONE BILLION. Homebuilders spend between 80- 90% less in marketing dollars to help brand their offerings. Typically everyone buys a car within their lifetime, probably 50% buy a new car, yet SEVEN MILLION new homes were built last year in a terrible economy and I am betting again, you can’t name four builders in your area.

In my opinion this is a HUGE opportunity for any homebuilder to take hold of America and brand itself so its top of mind when you are searching for your next home. Yes, it takes capital and heavy marketing. Which reminds me of this story about cutting your loses:

GM had invented the first electric car. When doing the math, they came to realize they would lose 200 million dollars if they released that car. They were so proud of figuring out how the battery compartment fit that they overlooked of how the board would scratch the project. Toyota heard about this advancement in transportation technology and went to town inventing the Prius. Of course they knew they were going to lose 200 million dollars the first year, however, that did not stop them. They realized that year three and four would be when America would catch up to the idea and Toyota would be the FIRST to own the brand of ELECTRIC. The president wanted electric and Toyota to be synonyms. The rest is history.

Today when you think of Electric do you think General Motors?

When you tell people about your car, you know the brand, everything in that brand, features, history, and brag about the service department. When you buy a house you simple buy a house. Do you see the opportunity?

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LOMBARD, ILL., October 28, 2011 – Stevens & Tate Marketing, a full-service advertising agency offering award-winning marketing strategies, has published a white paper titled “The Power of People: Social Media for 2011 and Beyond.” This white paper addresses several aspects of the new social media mix including: social environment, consumer behavior, benefits of being social, social involvement ladder, valuable ways to use social media, and how to measure results.

According to Dan Gartlan, Stevens & Tate president, the social media white paper is the latest educational tool the company has employed to assist marketers by providing them with valuable insights. He believes that every executive looking to move their business forward—not just marketing professionals can benefit from learning more about this rapidly growing and changing media vehicle.

“Companies are still struggling to understand how to monetize social media,” he said. “The key is to treat social marketing like any other corporate initiative—establish a business and messaging strategy that elevates the brand and execute on it.” Read the rest of this entry »

During a recent webinar from Covario, over 100 digital marketers were asked what the main goal of their Facebook page is. The results aren’t surprising. In general, driving sales is the No. 1 priority of digital marketers’ social media programs. However, 45 percent of the respondents said driving engagement and brand awareness is their top priority.

This is important because as much as we’d like to be able to benchmark advertisers based on their ability to drive sales via Facebook, that data typically isn’t available to the public. Therefore, competitive benchmarking must be done on advertisers’ behalf to drive soft metrics like fans and engagement relative to their overall brand presentation on Facebook. Read the rest of this entry »

Social Media Marketing: 5 Ways Social Media Can Improve Client and Customer Interaction

21 Oct 2011

All organizations strive to earn their clients by providing a good product or service. The next step in the process is to provide exemplary customer service. They recognize that once you have a client, you can lose them if you aren’t able to maintain a relationship.

True commitment to customer services comes from the top down. You can’t expect your employees on the front line to offer the best service when they know that the executive suite isn’t backing the effort.

Social media can be the key to building this relationship. It can also be the way to finding cracks in your organization on who says they want to provide good service but doesn’t truly have the customer’s best interest at heart. Read the rest of this entry »

Why Estimate a Return?

You use the return and the ROI to compare the efficiency of marketing campaigns; for an in-house team, you can use these numbers to negotiate budgets with your management; for agencies, you can use estimated numbers to land prospective clients and to retain current clients. The numbers are used in conjunction with social and web metrics to analyze and optimize current and future campaigns.

Last but not the least, a primary reason for using the return and the ROI is social media financial accountability. As social media initiatives become mainstream, executives are holding them to the same accountability as other business initiatives, demanding financial returns and ROI on social media investments. Read the rest of this entry »

Retail Marketing News: Generation Buy

13 Oct 2011

Older consumers have money, and they’re spending more of it online. E-retailers are adapting to this growing boomer demographic.

Gearheads may account for many of the buyers of electronics and computer components at Newegg.com, but they’re not the only consumer group the e-retailer is focused on. Newegg has observed the percentage of consumers on its site who are 55 and older grow from 16% in 2008 to 18% last year, and it’s making changes to accommodate the greyheads as well as the gearheads.

That includes featuring less techie and more mainstream products on its home page, changing the way it describes products and offering more assurances of the e-retailer’s reliability, an important concern for older consumers. Read the rest of this entry »

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