Neuromarketing Congress 2013, Part I: Age Marketing

Munich, BMW Welt, April 25th: the 6th Neuromarketing Congress was organised by Haufe Verlag and Gruppe Nymphenburg. And the sold out congress was as informative and enlightening as in the past years. Not only because the issue of the congress “Creating Changes – Answers from the Marketing to the Trends of the Future” is kind of related to our company slogan “Creating Business” but because of a lot of useful information, we want to share a couple of interesting aspects gathered from the lectures.

First of all: Age Marketing with aspects from Prof. Dr. Lutz Jäncke (Neuropsychology, University of Zurich) and Dr. Gundolf Mayer Hentschel (CEO Meyer-Hentschel Institut).

What are the best methods to prevent the process of brain aging? According to Prof. Dr. Jäncke it is constant mental and physical activity and social contacts. Both medical “miracle cure” and the nutrition play only a minor role in preventing brain aging.
In this connection, positive changes in brain function can be measured already after 5 hours of “brain strain”. So, use it or lose it!

“Politeness in Marketing” – this is the key in Age Marketing according to Dr. Gundolf Mayer Hentschel. The requirements are: intelligent, quiet and user-friendly packaging, well-designed products and businesses that have been designed for clients of all ages and can withstand the higher demands and the differentiated judgement of this target group. With simple modifications to the products tremendous effects can be achieved in the section of older customers – without using the message “you’re old”!
The social function of shopping is especially important in the older group. These include: the human quality of customer contact, friendliness is more important than expertise and a sufficient degree of patience.

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MPV (My Personal View): I’m always annoyed that the inscriptions in the hotel shower for shower gel, shampoo, conditioner, etc. are written so small that I can barely decipher them. It would be quite simple to solve this in an age-friendly way.

Interesting link:
“Top Hotel” article “HRS market senior friendly hotels” (in German only)

In the next blog articles we will pick up the aspects of Gender Marketing, Trust Marketing and Global Marketing.

The information gathered by Martin Suiter were compiled and formulated by Daniela Leonhard, Social Media Coordinator MARTIN SUITER – Consultancy.

Free WiFi in hotels? Results of a constructive discussion

Weeks ago we’ve started a discussion concerning the necessity of complimentary WiFi in hotels. The response to this discussion was tremendous and extremely constructive. More than 65 industry professionals from arround the world shared their thoughts on this matter.

© Orlando Florin Rosu – Fotolia.com

What we’ve learned: Most of the participants think that complimentary WiFi is definitely a must-service in a hotel and that they don’t book a hotel without complimentary WiFi. Even most of the hotel industry professionals said that in these times complimentary WiFi is an essential need and had become an expected commodity.

But: It’s important to summarize the results regarding the two different perspectives that crystallized during the discussion: the “guest perspective” and the “hotel perspective”. So we’ve tried to create a pro-con list considering the different point of views.

Perspective	PRO	CON
Guest	- staying in contact with family & friends - checking business mails, facilities nearby the hotel, other business information - business travel: less costs for company	- if it’s slow, it’s worse than paying for a fast internet access
Hotel	- marketing tool I: sign in page to gather customer information (email, etc.) - marketing tool II: promote new services, specials etc. on the welcome page - marketing tool III: guests advertise indirect for the hotel by posting that they are there - attract the local business market (for business meetings with F&B) - reduce the overall cabling to the rooms and public areas = huge stock of savings - attracts more business guests - customer service in general - fullfilling guest expectations & increase satisfaction - otherwise disadvantage to other providers in this mobile & connected world	- high costs to provide high bandwidth and accessibility - danger for property’s public network security (e.g. illegalities on the net)

Some of the participants in this discussion suggested compromises such as:

• Free low bandwidth WiFi, fast WiFi with fee
• Not a must for budget hotels, but for 4 stars hotels upwards
• Free WiFi for Loyality Program Members as reward (example IHG)

So, what do you think? Complimentary WiFi in hotels: Yes or No? And Why? More Pros or Cons? Let us know!

Social Media: Review & changes

Social Media is getting more and more important. Not only the steadily increasing number of users on Facebook shows this: In Germany, more than 24 million people are using Facebook. And approx. 1 billion people connect via Facebook worldwide.
Connection is one of the key issues in these times. This was impressively presented through our question on the business network LinkedIn “Is complimentary WiFi in hotels a must-service?” that was answered by more than 60 industry professionals from around the world who shared their thoughts on this matter.

So, what happened through our Social Media efforts in the last months? Compared to September 2012 we’ve increased our visitors, fans, friends and followers:

Facebook: +72%
Twitter: +25%
Blog: more than 5.000 readers so far
Website hits: +19%
LinkedIn connections: +30%
Xing contacts: +23%

What’s new since our beginnings?

Facebook made a couple of changes since we’ve started. Starting with the restrictions concerning the usage of cover photos for fan pages (only 20% text allowed) or performing competitons only through third-party applications. A new timeline and newsfeed, promoted posts and promoted ads… just to name a few changes.
You see: being and staying up-to-date in the “Social Speedia” world is not so easy if you don’t pay adequate attention and invest professional efforts.

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Conclusion: Do Social Media professional! Not only me, but marketing experts worldwide agree that Social Media Marketing for businesses regardless of size is becoming a more and more central issue, and thus it is an absolute must for every company!

Complimentary WiFi – a hotel must-service?

Recently, we’ve published the “Free-WiFi Hotel List” on MARTIN SUITER – Consultancy Facebook page. This list shows a collection of 4 or 5* hotels that provide complimentary WiFi for their guests. Reason for the list: It bothered us that on our business or holiday trips still many of the hotels do not offer complimentary WiFi. And we want to show alternative hotels that have this service included! – well we know that at the end it is not really free, but it feels better if we automatically get access and do not have obviously pay for it.

Two points that hotels ignore by charging for WiFi: many men and women on business trips do not have a budget to pay extra and the company won’t pay fot it, so they do not use WiFi – which means hotels distract these people from their families!! These travellers will then not use FaceTime or Skype to stay in contact with their beloved ones at home. 78% do say that being away from the family is the most negative point being on business trips. Second is that the hotels welcome their guests, but – hey – do not tell anybody!! by using Facebook, Foursquare etc. They leave out the chance to use guests as their ambassadors.

Another point away from WiFi is breakfast. In German hotels breakfast needs to be named as such as an extra on the invoice, which entails that breakfast is not deductible but I found a smart hotel – they used not breakfast as a term they wrote “business package” on the invoice. That makes everybody happy – exept the tax authority.

Some critical comments have already reached us, which we’d like to take up and would like to discuss here.

Jamie Rogers on LinkedIn: “It’s never truly complimentary, we pay for all the amenities one way or the other at hotels. I recently stayed at the Omni in Providence RI and was ‘given’ free WIFI. Except the WIFI was down the entire time I was there. Great perk.”

Chuck Hicks on LinkedIn: “In this day and age, it should always be provided, and free if you are a repeat customer of the brand.”

Let’s discuss!

Hotel booking – Alternatives to HRS, Booking.com & Co.?

When booking a hotel room most people visit the websites of HRS, Booking.com or other internet platforms to inform themselves about the hotel, prices, etc. and read reviews from other guests to decide which hotel might be the best for their stay. But the purpose of these website providers is not only to inform but also to bring the user to the point to make a booking through their website. Simple reason, because with every booking over their website the providers gain about 15% fee of the room costs.
For hotels it is a loss of money and, furthermore, an opportunity less to get directly in contact with their guests and show them how valuable they are to them. And for hotel guets? What are your advantages booking your room through HRS and Co.? And wouldn’t there be more or other advantages, even discounts, by not using the big platforms?

So, are there alternatives out there? YES, there are! Apart from booking or reserving directly through the hotel website or by phone (yes, by phone!) here are some alternative concepts:

A smart, but only in the US available concept is provided by Guestmob. You choose not a hotel, you choose a hotel collection, a group of 4 or 8 hotels in the neighborhood of your destination. Specify by choosing the star rating that fits the best to your budget. Then book your hotel collection and one of the hotels in that collection is guaranteed for your stay. So it is possible to save up to 50% of the Best Available Rate.

Another newly developed platform is Roomkey. Founded by the world’s leading hotel brands like HILTON Worldwide, HYATT or Marriott, this searching and booking platform with offers from hotels worldwide provides lowest rates guaranteed. And as guest you earn loyality points with every booking that you can redeem in upgrades or special treatments. And: You book the best rooms direct from the hotels.

Following, you’ll find more links to interesting hotel booking platforms. If you miss a platform or service, feel free to comment and suggest the missing platform to us.

HotelHub: Over 275.000 hotels for business related travel

HotelClub: Over 74.000 hotels in 141 countries worldwide. Best Price Guarantee. Members get up to 7% back on every booking.

reise-10%.de: No commission to a provider – instead, 10% discount for the guests who book directly at the hotel (in German and hotel offers in Germany only)

Solheim Cup major chance?

GC St. Leon-Rot in Germany will be the host golf course for the 2015 Solheim Cup. Why? Anybody else wanted it? Well, the Ladies European Tour struggles with their attractiveness. Plus the European economy has put pressure on former hosts of LET events in general. Portugal, Spain, Italy are “dead”, but also for the European Tour it is a huge challenge to be a European European Tour. Therefore it was relatively easy to bring the Solheim Cup to Germany, specially when the organisers are well experienced and with the backing of such strong main sponsors like SAP and Allianz and in addition it is no finance (LET gets the money) and organisation (Germans are world champions in that field) question in Germany.

But still it was hard work for Eicko Schulz-Hanßen, GM of St. Leon-Rot to get the backing for that event. Ladies European Tour is not a TV super star and the efforts of the players are still not respected well enough in the world of sport. So why? I think they took it as a challenge and they are aware that this jubilee Solheim Cup could be bigger than everyone before. This goes together with the strong believe to achieve something big and the believe in the organisers own power. Specially St. Leon-Rot was always a pioneer in bringing golf closer to the people, to support young players (even with a major indoor facility), not only till they are on the Tour, but since this year far beyond with their own management strategies for Rookies. Later I am sure even Rory McIlroy could become a client.

This determines that you do not cry for help and damn your customers for not succeeding enough like Günter O. Reiter, chief editor of GOLF Inside, did this week with his newsletter and the announcement that the german GOLF Inside magazine will only issued every two month from now on. The only one (except natural disasters happen) to blame for not being able to keep yourself on any market is you! Specially in the print business the alarm clock rings since 1-2 years and I hold every bet (symbolic) that within the next three years 50% of the daily newspapers will not exist anymore in a printed version. And another bet that 30% of all monthly magazines will disappear (whether no existance or transferred to digital versions).

Conclusion: So think of your own strenght, capabiliteis and ambitions and no one will be able to stop you! To me it is no question, if all are aware that a host like St. Leon-Rot needs every support to be succesful in staging that major event. Cause so many people will be winners if they succeed.

Watch the powerful video review on the 2011 Solheim Cup.

Kitzbühel – once in a lifetime

The famous Hahnenkamm Ski Race in Kitzbühel is a once in a lifetime must see. In many ways you will be surprised, shocked and pay tribute to the men without heads. You arrive at this more or less sleepy village by car or train and wonder what the fuss, caused by this world famous race, is all about. Everything seems to be super quiet on the night before the first race – the Super G.

In the morning, you will be waked by the speaker in the only for the races built stands. The whole valley is treated by his voice. The ski stars are already on the slope and exame every centimeter of the mountain to be prepared and to find the fastest route through the slalom posts. Walking to the race track makes your heart beat faster, more and more fans with huge cowbells (Swiss) or with flag colours painted faces (Austria) scream, shout and sing. The Swiss fans even cook their traditional cheese fondue right at the piste. I strongly recommend to walk up to the “Hausbergkante“, the last big ridge that the racers have to manage before the “Traverse” and the finish section. Only than you will be able to capture the steepness of this run and you will shake your head and say to yourself: it is impossible to survive this knowing that at this point of the race the skiers are already 1:30 min on their way and the legs are already burning.

11:30, the first of the heroes comes down. Much faster than any TV camera can capture the speed and the virtuosity to get around the posts. 15.000 cheering their stars and the roar of the crowd drowns the speakers voice. After the race the village is filled with the masses and the party starts right in the center. In the evening there are many functions from glamourous to boozy session. But the best is yet to come – Saturday the Downhill race. Same procedure but even more tremendous. Now 50.000 (!) attack the hill to cheer the stars. Also the VIP stands fill with the Schwarzeneggers, Eccelstones and Scherzingers. Top speed will be around 140 km/h. Overall time of the winner 1:57:56 and the steepest slope grade is 87%.

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Conclusion: The “Streif” race is the most important event in Kitzbühel to proof its quality as a holiday destination, special in winter time, but is that enough? I talked to friends from Hamburg and they had no idea about the race, the hype and the destination. To anchor a destination in peoples minds, specially if your are just known for one event (I know they have tennis too, but only third class), the destination has to do a promo tour to give people a feeling of what it means to be there and how many more emotions people can experience only if they are on site.

Video of Hahnenkamm Downhill Ski Race 2013

Video of Swiss fans at Hahnenkamm Ski Race 2013