Successful hospitality marketing regards the customer as the focal point of business. In the hospitality business, selling is often misunderstood as marketing. Personal selling, although important, is only one of many tactical areas of marketing and one of the five elements of promotion mix.

Promotion mix in the context of the marketing mix

Most 'front of house' hotel staff, especially the ones attached to the sales department, front office, banquet office, and food and beverage outlets, are involved in selling. Basically selling is a micro function which means offering existing products at an agreed price. Often sales people do not control (although they may influence) the production level or quality.

Marketing is a macro function, which, in addition to selling, is involved in many other tactical areas, such as:

Adjusting existing products and creating new products to suit the changing customer needs.

It is the combination of the other P strategies in the marketing mix which Positions an establishment in people's minds. As it is the market's perceptions and expectations which have a towering influence over its choice of products, great care of required to Position the establishment and its products.

Product growth strategies, which are generally aimed at producing a better or different products to expand the establishment's opportunities for increased market potential by attracting new or different customers. The corporate objective of a growth strategy is to improve its sales figures or to achieve greater profit contributions.

Selecting suitable channels which can be used as 'pipelines', either to distribute the products to customers or attract customers to the products/services. (in the case of the hotel and restaurant business, are channels such as travel agents are often used for attracting potential customers, rather than actually distributing manufactured goods, as is done in most other industries.)

Image and reputation are the result of positioning strategies; hence the information feeds of good Promotion make a major contribution to an establishment's Positioning. Information feeds are the means of getting messages to people, such as talking, writing, broadcasting, putting up signs, displays and many other forms of advertising.

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Approximate Word count = 1787
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)