91 – Year in Review with Dana Singer

Suite Spot: A Hotel Marketing Podcast

In 2021’s edition of the Suite Spot, we welcome Travel Media Group’s President, Dana Singer, to the podcast. Host Ryan Embree reflects with Dana on the challenges and successes of this past year. Dana reviews some of the adjustments that Travel Media Group has continued to make in response to the changing landscape of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the digital marketing landscape for hotels. Ryan and Dana discuss innovations launched by the Travel Media Group product development team and the role TMG played in hotel recovery. Dana also shares what she is most excited about and hopeful for in 2022 as the hotel industry continues to bounce back. Suite Spot Podcast · 91 - 2021 In Review with Dana Singer Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio. Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to the Suite Spot. This is Ryan Embree, your host, and happy new year. We've got a great first episode of 2022 for you. We've done this on an annual basis, and it's one of my favorite episodes that we do every single year. As we enter a new year, we're closing out 2021, but we're excited for the prospects of what 2022 has to offer. We've seen a lot of great momentum going in after a busy, busy holiday, according to some of the STR data out there. And with me today, I wanna bring in the president of Travel Media Group, Dana Singer. Dana, welcome to the Suite Spot. Dana Singer: Thanks Ryan. It's fantastic to be back with you. Ryan Embree: Yeah, and we're bringing you on again because we did this last year, and we got such a great response from it. And I think it's just so important as we move into this new year to not only, obviously, look towards the future in 2022 and, and what's on the horizon for the, the hotel industry and Travel Media Group, but also reflect back on 2021 and look at everything that we've been able to overcome and accomplish. So that's exactly what this episode is about. So I'm gonna kind of start us off in, in a very similar situation where we were last year, Dana, just to reset. You know, we started this, this episode last year, talking about adjustments that Travel Media Group made in response to the pandemic. Can you talk about how those adjustments kind of evolved in 2021? Dana Singer: You know, while 2020 was all about pivoting to respond to the pandemic, 2021 shifted to how we could best support our clients and partners in the recovery. We all know the pandemic hit the hospitality industry hard. Stay at home orders and the fear of the virus kept so many from, from traveling and it negatively impacted so many businesses that rely on travel, especially hotels. So in 2021, with the rollout of vaccines, optimism began to prevail. We began thinking in terms of both the recovery and innovation mindset and how we could help hoteliers transition and effectively capture the renewed travel demand that was building throughout the year. And one of the ways that we adjusted during this time was by hosting seasonal digital workshops. And our goal was to connect with hoteliers through these one-on-one sessions and provide insights on, on how they could capture market share faster than their competition by leveraging digital marketing tools to really put their best foot forward with their online reputation and social media. Ryan Embree: Yeah, I think that's well said. I mean, any hotelier that's listening to this podcast right now can probably agree with me in saying that from Travel Media Group to the hotel, this is not the same business or hotel that came into 2020. We've had to adapt and shift and really be versatile. And the industry has, has had to do that as well.