What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas… and on Twitter, and on Facebook Fan pages… forever.
This week’s poll attempts to identify the Las Vegas casino hotel that does the best job with social media. Las Vegas is always on the cutting edge of new trends in hospitality and entertainment, and it is no different in social media. A number of properties are constantly experimenting with a wide variety of strategies and promotions to engage, remain relevant and deepen relationships with their players and hotel guests.
Counting the number of Twitter Followers or Facebook Fans is not a valid measure of quality, or even true popularity, as neither metric accurately tracks the degree of engagement with the community. The results of this poll will reflect the “Socularity” of the casino hotel that respondents feel are most effective in engaging their communities through social media.
Below is a list of Las Vegas casino hotels (plus a small number of non-gaming properties and one brand with dedicated Twitter accounts) that are engaged in social media. If you are interested in following these properties, I have created a Twitter list: lvcasinos for the 48 properties with Twitter accounts.
Remember, as you only have one vote, only one property may be selected, so which casino hotel does the best job with social media overall?
[polldaddy poll=”3062398″]
Try this link if you do not see the poll embedded above.
Full disclosure time, there are a few stretches included here… The Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental and Platinum properties are all non-gaming, but all are high profile properties that are active in social media, so their efforts are very similar to the gaming properties. The Station Casinos corporate Twitter account has been included – that’s for those who can’t decide on their favorite Station Casino property…
I did not include a link for the Trump International Hotel – not just because it is non-gaming, but the Twitter account is the corporate Trump account (which is currently buzzing about the opening of their new hotel in SoHo.) As there is not a specific Facebook Fan Page for the property (although the hotel spa does have a fan page) they have been excluded from the list due to the absence of specifically targeting the Las Vegas customer.
In the interest of keeping the list size manageable, spas, ultra-clubs, shows, restaurants, VIP services, concierges, booking sites, etc. that are heavily engaged in Las Vegas and travel-related social media have not been included in the list. This poll is only for operations that offer sleeping accommodations for overnight guests.
Interestingly, three properties listed do not have Twitter accounts – Bellagio, New York New York, and Palace Station. The poll links to their Facebok Fan Pages instead.
This is a fairly comprehensive list of the Las Vegas casino hotels. If a favorite casino was excluded from the initial list, please drop me a note using this link and I will consider adding it to the list. The scope is limited to properties that also have guest rooms.
Voting will remain open until Friday morning, April 23, 2010 at 7:00am US Central time. Sorry, only one vote per person, so alert your social network to support your favorite.
Many challenges face the global travel industry. New business models, competitive marketing strategies, emerging mobile technologies, interactive customer engagement and the constant need to drive profitability create complexities that were never previously imagined by hotels, destinations, airlines or online travel companies.
Each week, RockCheetah and the Views from a Corner Suite blog will present a new poll to gauge the sentiment of the travel industry, and of course, allow respondents to comment on the issues at hand.