HB Exclusive: Meyer Jabara Hotels Doubles Down on Digital

BY HOTEL BUSINESS ON OCTOBER 2, 2019

DANBURY, CT—As 2019 nears its end, Meyer Jabara Hotels (MJH) is setting its sights to 2020 with an emphasis on the digital space. With the initiative, MJH is equipping all of its properties with digital marketing specialists. 

Justin Jabara, VP of development, Meyer Jabara Hotels, said that because of this shift toward digital, MJH finds an opportunity to grow within the marketing segment.

According to Jabara, at one time, its in-house call center took up a large portion of the office. Over the years, call volumes have dropped and the way customers book continues to change, along with the ever-evolving social media landscape.

“It is our plan to take this department from best-in-class to industry leading. In order to do that, there is risk but with risk come opportunity. We are finding that a lot of that opportunity can be learned from companies and services outside of our industry,” he said.

Currently, the digital marketing strategy is led by a property in coordination with a digital marketing specialist whom is also supported by the brand and vendors. “It is our opinion that this structure is cumbersome and complex; it leaves opportunity for efficiency and capability,” Jabara said.

Now, Meyer Jabara properties will be equipped with a digital marketing specialist, a professional with knowledge all things digital, with a hands-on approach.

“It will look very similar to the structure no different than how you revenue manage a hotel. There’s one revenue manager to every five hotels, so, there will be a digital marketing specialist,” Jabara explained.

“To achieve this, we are growing the team of specialists and diversifying the talents within that team. Now a digital marketing specialist will have a small number of hotels and they will handle all things digital marketing in coordination with the property. By increasing the size and resources dedicated to this department, we also plan on reducing the number of vendors thus streamlining the process.”

In coordination with this, MJH is also rewriting its digital marketing protocols and scopes. According to Jabara, this will continue to provide digital marketing functionality and support to its full-service hotels while also delivering a level of complexity among select-service hotels.

“This wasn’t broken, but this was something that we said there’s a huge opportunity for us to really lead,” he said. “Good is not good enough, where we are today is great, but we want everything we do to be best in class. I think this will be a good case study for that.”