TravelDailyNews is organising the three-day Athens Hotel Branding Seminar scheduled for September 22-24, 2005…
TravelDailyNews is organising the three-day Athens Hotel Branding Seminar scheduled for September 22-24, 2005. The objective of this event, the first of its kind to be held in Greece, is to educate hoteliers about the different options of branding their hotels and the alternative choices such as franchising, management contracts or hotel consortia membership.
The Athens Hotel Branding Seminar has been endorsed by two global tourism organisations. Both the World Tourism Organisatiom Business Council and the Hospitality Sales & Marketing Association International (HSMAI) are supporting the event, thus recognising the importance of branding as a necessary marketing tool in today`s competitive market conditions.
According to Antonio de la Morena, CEO of the World Tourism Organisation Business Council, In an environment of ever increasing international competition where globalization is an everyday reality, all tourism enterprises, and hotels in particular (due to their employment capacity), must project a solid and distinctive product image in order to differentiate themselves from competing establishments. Tourists come to know a country through its hotels. Hotels therefore carry a large part of the responsibility for building up the tourism image of a country by ensuring that their guests have a pleasant stay. The travel experience at the hotel and in the country in general is often the factor that determines whether or not visitors decide to return to the establishment or destination. And this, after all, is the point of image-building: to tip travel decisions in favour of the destination.
The major hotel brands make it possible for their affiliated establishments to improve their quality of service through an integrated policy that addresses human resources training, marketing, publicity, online advertising and business-excellence processes, Morena says.
The brand is a statement to the world about who you are, what you do and how you do it. It derives from your organization`s mission, products and services, promises, performance, and values. Branding has become more important than ever, says Ingunn Hofseth, President of HSMAI Europe.
The impressive line-up of speakers includes experienced hospitality industry experts such as Berno Feuring of the German consulting firm Feuring Hotelconsult, Sven Gade of Dubai-based Middle East Strategy Advisors and Marco Peter Nijhof, Director of Operations & Development at Serena Hotels, a division of the Aga Khan Fund for Economical Development. Dr. Dimitris Koutoulas, Tourism and Hospitality Consultant and Lecturer at the Greek Open University, is the Scientific Chair of the event.
The Athens Hotel Branding Seminar is organised by Travel Daily News, the leading and most influential tourism industry publication of Greece. Travel Daily News produces a daily e-newsletter both in Greek for the Greek and Cypriot markets TravelDailyNews Greece & Cyprus (http://www.traveldailynews.gr) and in English TravelDailyNews International (http://www.traveldailynews.com) for the International market. The Greek edition is read daily by 8,000 senior travel and hospitality professionals. The readership of the international edition is even larger, with 15,000 professionals from throughout the world receiving the daily e-newsletter. Travel Daily News also operates a separate consumer site and e-newsletter aimed at the Greek public under the travelforall.gr brand.
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Theodore is the Co-Founder and Managing Editor of TravelDailyNews Media Network; his responsibilities include business development and planning for TravelDailyNews long-term opportunities.
