Exploring Factors Related to Benefits of Social Media Marketing (SMM): An Opinion of Selected Hotels of North India
Keywords:
Social Media, Social Media Marketing, Hotels, North IndiaAbstract
Marketing activity is associated with buying and selling of any product or service. After Liberalization, Privatization and Globalization (L.P.G) the entire prospective of buying and selling has become very challenging & to remain competitive in today’s cut throat competition social media marketing has emerged an effective tool for marketer. The hospitality & tourism is one of the fastest growing sectors and is always adaptive to the new technologies. Currently it accounts approximately 10.2 percent of the Global GDP and in India it account 9.6 percent of the Indian GDP (WTTC, 2016).
India is one of the fastest growing economies of the world, due to rapid development the usage of internet has also grown many folds over the years this is also visible from IAMAI-IMRB report (2016), clearly depicts that internet usage, which was 137miilion in 2012 in urban India, has jumped to 462 million in year 2016. On the other hand in rural India, internet usage was 111 millions in 2012 & has augmented to 426 millions in the year 2016. The usage of internet has open new doors for Indian as a result they have become more adaptive to modern technologies. This implies to hospitality & tourism sector too. This is foreseen, that adaption of technology exclusively internet, social media and mobile applications in the tourism and hotel sector has increased in India for marketing and sales and building and managing relations with current and prospective customers. The present paper tries to explore various factors of social media marketing in Indian hotel industry keeping the hotelier perspective in mind.
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