Radisson Blu has swept the board at this year’s Hotel Marketing Association Annual Marketing Awards, taking top honours in four of the six categories.
The Radisson Blu Edwardian Manchester won the Best Partnership Marketing Campaign and Best Media and Public Relations Activity for teaming up with the Halle Orchestra to celebrate the hotel’s tenth anniversary. The hotel also topped the Best Use of Social Media in Marketing category for their Pride Campaign, for various social media activities around the sponsorship of the Manchester Pride Weekend. A campaign praised by the judges for having the ’wow’ factor.
Other award winners this year were: Dormy House Hotel in the Cotswolds for Best Website & SEO Marketing while Radisson Blu won the Marketing Innovation (Wild Card) award for The Experience Meetings Roadshow.
Young Marketer of the Year: Sookie Shuen
Sookie Shuen of The Hotel Collection has been named ‘Young Marketer of the Year’ 2014. The award, in its ninth year, recognises a talented young marketer in the hospitality industry aged under 30 years. Sookie, Media and Content Executive at The Hotel Collection, is responsible for all aspects of digital marketing at the company including the development of the company’s website when it was rebranded.
The judges commented that Sookie demonstrated “a very mature attitude to change…a combination of skill, passion for her art, resilience and a can do approach that you wished you could bottle…a great young marketing talent”. In addition to her award Sookie receives a one-day course at the Chartered Institute of Marketing at Moor Hall in Cookham, Berkshire.
Dormy House Hotel
The judges praised the Dormy House Hotel, www.dormyhouse.co.uk who won in the Best Website & SEO Marketing category for producing a website that demonstrated “a refreshing tone of voice and compelling imagery to deliver a young audience”.
Also Highly Commended in this category was Yotel for www.yotel.com which the judges described as “a great example of addressing a business issue and designing a site for a specific audience.”
Best Media and PR Activity and Best Partnership Marketing
Radisson Blu won the Best Media and Public Relations Activity and Best Partnership Marketing categories with the same campaign. The hotel, housed in the former Manchester Free Trade Hall partnered with the Halle Orchestra, its famous former occupants, commissioning a specially written piece of music and video to celebrate the hotel’s first ten years. As well as achieving good media coverage across multi platforms, the judges singled out the campaign as “a great example of how to partner with another local organisation with truly aligned brand values.”
Marketing Innovation
Radisson Blu, corporately, also completed their clutch of awards by winning the new category for 2014 for Marketing Innovation (Wild Card). In this category the judges decided to make an award to an outstanding campaign, which did not fit any of the criteria for the other awards. The Radisson Blu Experience Meetings Roadshow saw the company kit out a truck as a meetings venue and take it around the country for key clients to sample its meetings product.
The judges described it as a “bold and innovative approach from a challenger brand in the market. They knew they had to be different and delivered their brand to the time poor B2B customer.”
About The Hotel Marketing Association Awards
The Hotel Marketing Association Awards are the only dedicated recognition scheme, which celebrate good practice in hotel marketing and are judged by industry experts.
The HMA’s membership comprises sales and marketing specialists and operators of independent and chain hotels, hospitality companies and agencies.
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