3 Ways the Hospitality Industry Can Take Advantage of LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a powerful social network for creating connections between industry professionals. And while it may seem more logical for hospitality industry business owners to focus more on other social networks, they could use LinkedIn for excellent results as well. Here are five ways the hospitality industry can take advantage of LinkedIn:

1. Set up a Company Page

Make sure you should set up a company page for your business. They work similarly to Facebook business pages, with a couple of differences. On your company page, you can set up different Showcase pages. These serve to highlight a brand of your company or a business unit. For example, hotel chain owners can set up a showcase page for each of their hotel locations. The company page is the place where you’ll want to post company-related updates and where most of your customers will try to interact with you.

2. Communicate with Customers

By definition, social networks are online places of communication and connection-building. But even though LinkedIn is mostly used for forming B2B connections, it doesn’t mean your customers don’t use it. It especially holds true for the hospitality industry, as business people tend to travel a lot for work.

Of course, they might not use LinkedIn to decide which hotel they’re going to stay, but having a well-developed LinkedIn presence can make you more visible to them as an option. Additionally, you’ll want to get the attention of meeting planners on LinkedIn for sure, as 60% of them state they prefer LinkedIn out of all the social media platforms. You can use the platform to engage with your customers, answer their questions and respond to their comments.

3. Observe Your Competition

Take a look at who your most viewed competitors are, and start learning from their LinkedIn pages. What are they doing right? What’s making them so popular? Even the way they interact with others in groups could be a point to study if you see they’re exceptionally successful at creating new connections. But don’t copy what the competition is doing – make an effort to figure out why their approach is working and then apply those insights.

As a social network that connects professionals, LinkedIn can have substantial benefits in many industries. With our tips, you can use it in ways that facilitate connecting with the right people and gaining the right kind of attention for your brand.

About the Author

Perry van Beek is a pioneer in social selling with LinkedIn. He founded Social.ONE and together with his team he has been assisting companies throughout the EMEA and North American region with LinkedIn positioning, lead generation, and social selling since 2009. His company's free LinkedIn Profile Cheat Sheet is a very popular resource to quickly help people create powerful LinkedIn profiles for themselves. Perry conducts training and presents keynotes at sales conferences throughout the world. In August of this year his book LinkedIn Sales Navigator for Dummies will be published. Feel free to connect with him on LinkedIn with a personalized connection request.