Hotel Social Media Tip: Don’t Get Lazy! Travel Research Happens on the Weekend, Too

When I’m planning travel, especially leisure, I steal away random bits of time throughout the week, and at various times of day, to create the trip.  On my laptop when I’m taking a breather from a work project, on my mobile while I’m waiting in line for coffee, on my tablet after my kid goes to bed. And there’s no magic day of the week. It’s fluid. I make travel decisions based on random moments of research that happen over the course of a week or two. I build. Constructing idea on idea until I have a whole picture. I see a lot of different social media messages during that week or two, and those messages make a difference.

So why do I hear crickets when it comes to hotel social media on the weekend? Well, that’s not entirely true; a few big brands have the volume turned up really high on the weekend, and everyone else is… sleeping? I’m not sure why this is. There are easy apps that allow hotels to pre-load social media messaging and schedule the exact delivery times. Though, honestly, social media reputation management is so critical at this point, it’s best to have someone available to respond to guest messaging on the weekend, but I get that for many hotels staffing is too limited to allow for this.

It’s worth remembering that travelers are spreading their research and booking around on multiple devices, and that means throughout the week, too. According to an article on TNOOZ, mobile phone research on destinations is happening within two days of travel, while tablet users are researching more than 20 days out. Travel planning and booking has more to do with how many days out from travel we are than a specific day of the week. It pays for hotel social media to be turned on and turned up seven days a week.