Is Your Hotel Facebook Nearby Ready?

Facebook Nearby is picking up momentum. It raises some important questions for hoteliers.

Does your hotel have a Facebook Page optimized for business? Can people ‘check-in’ to your hotel on Facebook? How important are guest reviews to your business? Do you actively manage your reviews? And seek new ones? Will Facebook ‘Nearby’ be able to pick up your location? Is your site mobile ready?

Below are a couple of excerpts on a post from Revinate (via Are Morch) on new features from Facebook that will be vital for hotels.

“What Hotels & Restaurants Should Know About Facebook Nearby Upgrade Yesterday, Facebook announced upgrades to . . . → Read More: Is Your Hotel Facebook Nearby Ready?

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Additional Revenue Model for Hotels

Catwalk

Catalin calls this hotel strategy The Catwalk Concept. It is fundamentally an additional revenue model for hotels that uses the concept of sponsoring brands that may be used within the hotel.

Excerpt from Catalin at Cain:

“A branded hotel can take three specific steps to capitalise on this opportunity:

First, conduct research to identify specific brands of other products and services that appeal to their guests, for example, one such brand could be a particular type of flat-screen television whose design and price tag has been targeted to a specific type of customer. Second, explain to the companies identified the . . . → Read More: Additional Revenue Model for Hotels

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5 Stages of Choosing Travel

5Stages-choosingTravel

The travel outlook is positive, and with the rise of mobile, social and video behaviors, we are now seeing seeing travelers move through five key stages of travel. Here are some insights within each stage: Dreaming: 68% of business travelers watch travel-related online videos. Among them, 68% are thinking about a trip. Planning: The average traveler visits ~22 travel related sites during 9.5 research sessions prior to booking. Booking: 37% of leisure travelers report that the internet prompted them to book, up from 28% two years ago. Experiencing: 70% of business travelers check into their flights/hotel with their . . . → Read More: 5 Stages of Choosing Travel

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Tips for Planning a Vacation via Trip Advisor

Playa Del Carmen, Riviera Maya, Mexico

Travel sites like Trip Advisor, have become one of the most essential social networking and travel planning sites for travelers and for businesses in travel, leisure, and restaurant industries. Monitoring and participating to keep Trip Advisor reputations as favorable as possible may be the most vital online function any travel and leisure-based business can practice. Smart businesses tap into what their customers are telling them to improve their product and neutralize negative experiences. Stay Tuned! In a future blog, I’ll review how businesses can use Trip Advisor to make their business soar, but let’s start today with simply planning a . . . → Read More: Tips for Planning a Vacation via Trip Advisor

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StringHub –Where Educators, Students and Startups Meet

StringHub graphic

Article first published as StringHub –Where Educators, Students and Startups Meet on Technorati.

As a guest writer, Technorati published my first article last week, which is shown below. I found it a great compliment to be asked to write for Tehnorati. After all, Technorati, the very first search engine for blogs, is considered the gold standard, with an index of more than one million blogs. Let me know what you think…

I always get excited about finding cool new ways to help small and medium-sized businesses solve one of their greatest challenges – lack of resources. Introducing… StringHub.

StringHub is . . . → Read More: StringHub –Where Educators, Students and Startups Meet

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Do Accountants Really Save You Time and Money?

Can you really save your company money with an accountant? Quite simply the answer is yes, if you take the time to find the accountant that best suits your company’s needs. When you find the best accountant for your business you will be saving your company not only money but also time.

photo credit: alancleaver_2000

The ideal accountant for your firm should be familiar with all of the in and outs of the financial side of your business. It is an accountant’s job to be an expert on tax legislation and to be able to successfully pinpoint areas . . . → Read More: Do Accountants Really Save You Time and Money?

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Cuckoo for Cacoo, Free Flow Charting for Entrepreneurs

It is always tricky envisioning how the various pieces of a startup business will fit together and interact. Cacoo (https://cacoo.com/) is a cool cloud-based application that can be used for project envisioning, flow charts and mockups. Cacoo offers free and reasonably priced product tiers that will fit into those very tight budgets. For entrepreneurs that think ‘visually’ this may be the right tool to add to your small business toolbox. Another great feature is Cacoo’s online collaboration tool for projects ‘on-the-fly’ and for times when the team just can’t meet.

Here’s what they say:

“Cacoo is a user friendly . . . → Read More: Cuckoo for Cacoo, Free Flow Charting for Entrepreneurs

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