ITC Hotels won HOTELS’ 2015 Social Hotel Award for Best Use of Twitter, Brand.
For the fourth straight year, HOTELS is honoring the best of social media in the hotel industry with the Social Hotel Awards. The awards are presented in seven categories ranging from Best Facebook Page to Best Digital Video Campaign, and for each category, both a brand and a property are honored.
ITC Hotels is one of the first Indian hotel chains to embrace Twitter as a real-time communication channel. Its dedicated customer service Twitter handle, @ITCHotelsCares, engages and services guests 18 hours per day, seven days a week. Additionally, ITC’s corporate handle, @ITCHotels, was created to spread brand awareness and leverage the company’s presence among consumers.
ITC has also used Twitter to hold regular contests to reward followers and drive brand buzz. One of its most successful campaigns was #MyTravelColours around Holi, the Indian festival of colors. Followers were asked to share their most memorable travel moment and ITC transformed them into colorful caricatures. ITC also conducts weekly Twitter chats focused on cuisine and wine.
“ITC Hotels has taken a 360 degree approach to social media marketing and has cemented its presence on all traditional and new-age social networking channels, including Twitter,” says Baldev Dhir, head of digital marketing, distribution and brand operations for ITC.
@ITCHotelsCares handled more than 4,000 queries in under 65 minutes, making ITC one of the fastest and most efficient luxury hotel Twitter handles in India. ITC also received more than 50,000 unique brand mentions on Twitter, a rise of 284% from 2014 to 2015.
For a complete list of the 2015 Social Hotel Awards winners as well as a rundown of the judges, see the October issue of HOTELS.