Getting on the Social Media wagon may seem like a viable tool of sustenance for most F&B outlets in hotels recently, but with the tide shifting towards the millennial diners, is ‘tech’ really the ‘get on it or lose them’ option? BY MADHULIKA DASH
Circa 2013: Taj Mahal Palace announces the opening of Canadian Food Festival. Disguised within what seemed like yet another food festival, was a surprise – the launch of Starboard Music 101 live chat, where every Wednesday guests could enjoy good music with gourmet fine dining. But that wasn’t the only differentiating factor. Guests attending the event were given free access to high speed Wi-Fi and the hotel hash tag to tweet as they enjoyed the casual brunch and networked.
In a few hours, the hotel tweeter and Facebook page had given the hotel a real time feedback of how the festivals and their initiative had turned out to be, and referrals too. In fact, recalls former grand executive chef Hemant Oberoi, “That event was a benchmark when it came to tweaking services on a tweet. We could ensure that the table moved as per what the guests wanted at the time, and when.”
A few weeks later, Waterstones Hotel and Gordon House reinstated the effectiveness of social media with their new guest engagement initiative. Here each guests was asked to use instagram to showcase the dishes they love (and don’t) in the restaurants. Recalls Saket Gupta, GM marketing and sales Waterstones Hotel (Mumbai), who was spearheading a change of menu offering in their various outlets, “The exercise worked better than the menu index at designing a workable menu. Plus, it worked as an effective PR and communication tool.” True to Gupta’s verdict, the next two years saw an explosion of social media exercises in hotel space. Tech became the buzz word for success as each hotel tried exploring every possible platform that could give them that stay on social media, and that edge to beat competition. Four Seasons’ launched Gourmet by The Four Seasons Hotel, a virtual patisserie and delicatessen where a guest could place take-away orders via email. Having a facebook, twitter, instagram, tumblr account became a necessity, as social media emerged as an effective tool to communicate.
It was a case of you are on it or you are losing it. But by 2014 end, social media as the only effective communication tool did a volte face. Platforms like Zomato and others, which once gave the restaurant the visibility and credential, turned into the proverbial albatross around the establishment’s neck, and managing it a constant challenge.
Confesses Rohit Bajpai, GM, Radisson Blu, Paschim Vihar, Delhi, “No one doubts the kind of outreach that social media platforms provide an F&B brand, we are accessible to a large number of potential diners with a click. But there is a flipside to the happy story, too, which shows itself in form of a bad review or two. And in an industry where the diners are spoilt for choices, this could mean a death nail, albeit temporarily. By the time, the hotel has found the real cause and sets out for damage control; the post has been read, re-tweeted by a few more and reached multiple users.”
Facebook for instance has nearly 45 million users in India, 90% of which are at the age group of 13-34, the prime audience of any F&B outlet. Now multiply this figure by two with each potential diner being on at least four of the many social platforms. In other words, a post, according to a study, especially a negative one gets tweeted seventeen times in 10 seconds.
The realisation of this while on one hand has left F&B extremely cautious; it has also increased the need to find alternatives that work just as effortlessly and effectively. Or as Dharmesh Karmokar, director Aureole Hotel, Mumbai’s first in-room service focused hotel, puts it, “amping their tech quotient.”
Karmokar in his hotel follows the age old principle of service by profile, where the service is custom-made for each guests as per their needs and requirements. “What we do is closely observe an in house guest to study his little needs like what temperature he likes to have his tea to the kind of fruits or section he likes to revisit on the first day. And we try and replicate it by the next meal he has with us. This helps in relationship building where a server can suggest them what to eat, or even where to go,”
Seconds Mukta Kapoor, marketing and communications head, Old World Hospitality. “Take The Manor for instance, which has only one dining space, Indian Accent. So it’s a given that guests will move out to explore other places during the stay. So instead of holding it back we try to create an equation with the guests where we can suggest them laces, and their feedback becomes our sounding board to better our offerings.”
This could perhaps explain the reason why The Park Calangute, Goa, has a ‘cook for you’ initiative where guests – especially patrons – are allowed to ask for a dish that is not on the menu, or was on an older menu, and it will be created. The idea, says Saurabh Khanna, GM-operation of the hotel, “is to give that little extra personalised touch to the guests, which will help him decide why chose our restaurant over the other 50 outside the property.”
Clearly the need to change the communication style in F&B is a need of the hour especially with millennial as new diners, who while being tech savvy and big spenders are also food conscious, making them the most complicated diners to pamper and pander.
The need of getting the word right while has made F&B team to go back to the traditional ways of communicating like mailers, flyers, food boards in lobby and note about the F&B outlets in the welcome kit of guests with social media helping in its outreach, the on-floor presentation of some of the older initiatives have changed.
Take the example of food festivals, says Chef Paul Kinny, culinary director, St Regis. “Once considered to be an ace at bringing business to a dying establishment, it’s today more of a platform to showcase a restaurant potential, and enhance it skills. So for instance, when I do a Japanese food festival, I will first make it niche to give it that outreach and then will fly a sushi masterchef, who while giving the festival that real ‘authenticity’ also trains us in improving our ability to present better fare. So a diner can come back in anticipation of a similar.”
The need to add that infotainment value, adds Bajpai, “has become key to F&B success today. Like in our Awadi Food Festival recently, we had a menu that was prepared by a Unani doctor in milk. This coupled with a daily menu really worked well in ensuring a good turnover and referrals.”
Agrees Betty Remedios, director sales and marketing, Grand Hyatt Goa. “Guests today want to see something different; they want to experience new flavours and are open to experimenting. That is where our home style casual dining outlet Chulha comes to play. An interactive, open kitchen along with rustic serving crockery has been a deliberate attempt at keeping the guest interested. This along with interactive cooking classes with the chef has enabled us to get referrals and diners by sheer word of mouth.”
Interest-based F&B concepts are back in vogue too. Like the Wine Days in Sofitel BKC Mumbai. An initiative that began in 2014 as an art meet wine meet food diner engagement, this new initiative revolves around the concept of wine popularity with the pairing done by renowned sommelier Enrico Barnard.”
Among the other things that the F&B segment seems to have gone back to, is the personal touch. Be it the old style telly calling to wish birthday or anniversary to a guest or Shangri La Delhi style welcoming the guest with a personalised chocolate photo frame of the guest. Even the information boards that go out as Push Notification mailers have been customized for the target group. Hyatt Pune for instance has come up with customized communication strategies like employee news boards and company intranet to keep their target audience – mostly IT professional – updated with various F&B initiative, which are custom-designed for them regularly.
Says Anjori Kumar, marketing and communications head, Shangri-La Hotel, New Delhi, “Such initiative gives us the opportunity to break the ice with the guest right from the word go. And helps us serve them better, which turns into a guest repeat and referrals. And when it comes to calculating ROI, nothing beats the simple world of mouth.”
An excellent incident of this was the initiative by HHI Pune in 2012. The hotel would leave the mini bar empty with a list to be filled by the guest, which a staff would politely insist on filling. And by the time the foot massage, a complimentary add on with the room, was over the mini bar was stocked as per instruction. Result, in spite of the odd location of the hotel, the service garnered them guests who finally explored the multi-cuisine restaurant EYE, which is now one of the best places for casual get togethers and family dinners.
Yet another example of in-room to F&B initiative is started by Aureole Hotel, which has introduced the concept of designing the in-room tea pantry, right down to the temperature they want the water in and tea accompaniments. The idea, says Karmorkar, who is in the process of making the facility available via an app, “is to remain in tune with the guest’s changing habit, while lending that personal touch.”
Radisson Blu Paschim Vihar brought the personalised touch with the “one touch satisfaction” calling button in their in-room facility and in the lobby. This initiative not only saves the guests – diner and in-house resident- from the effort of calling different departments for things like reservations, offers and others, it also ensures that can put a face to the name and that often becomes a reason for guests returns.
The short attention span of diners has also led to the re-discovery of how brevity and interesting content can be a key to success. Says Joy Bhattacharya, executive chef, Trident, Mumbai, “Given the mobile reading habits of diners, it makes a lot of sense to keep it short and snappy. So a lot of impetus is on the use of pictures and punchlines than old style writing, and this is in case of blogs as well.”
Concurs Aroop Chatterjee, F&B manager at Four Points by Sheraton Hotel & Serviced Apartments Pune. “A simple example of this is that we follow and has worked for us is The Sunday Brunch at The Eatery our all day dining signature restaurant. Here the Sunday Brunch is called the FUNDAY LUNCH, giving it the unique identity and also conveying the idea of fun,” says Chatterjee, who believes that it is the phrasing that has helped a concepts like the Wow Table from Groupon and others become so popular.
Given the wider reach, there is little doubt that social media presence will continue to play a crucial role when it comes to the success of F&B outlets. But that hasn’t stopped hotels to find newer pastures for effective communication like Snapchat and Whatsapp. “Once considered rather low tools for communications, says Shahrom Oshtori, Director of Food and Beverage, Sofitel BKC Mumbai, “they have now become important in-hotel tools to keep the various departments connected as good vehicles to update guests and members of the hotel – whether individual or as a company.”
Aila Diwa Goa for example uses Snapchat to popularise their youth centric events through circulation of specially designed e-posters and photos. Whatsapp is yet another tool that is being used to reach out to guests.
This, says Gupta, “In addition to the special royalty programmes that hotels across have introduced to get more walk-ins ensures that the hotel had a more in person reach to guests.”
That may explain the mushrooming of various hotel apps, cross branding with different platforms like Zivago and softwares that enable guests to check in online and even order their meal on the go, says Khanna, “When it comes to the Indian guests, there will have to be always be a face to the service. And that’s where tech will always play the backend to a concept.”
An excellent example of this is the Starwood Preferred Guests by Westin. Essentially a card, which not only allows the hotel to custom make your stay, red care style, but also earn discounts for dinning and other activities. While for hotels it works as a source to find newer referrals for their F&B unit, it allows the F&B outlets to establish personal rapport with these guests, say Kapoor and Bajpai in agreement, “It also takes care of the price sensitive market that still decides a regular based on three things, a good discount being one of them.”
