Dragonfly Media Curacao

A few minutes ago the new and improved curacao.com went live. Contrary to popular belief here in Curacao we did NOT design this website. The new curacao.com is completely the work of the TIG Global Destination Marketing team. DGF has been involved with the content and defining the ways of advertising on the site, but that’s about it for our work.

Note: if you still see the old website, don’t fret. It takes a while for the ISPs around the world to update their caches. This should not take more than 24 hours.

The first thing you notice when you see the new website is that it’s big and bold. The colors are vibrant, the font is large and the buttons are big. The new design captures not only part of the spirit of the island, but it also speaks to what people expect of a Caribbean island. No classical symphonies and sipping grappa in a garden here; this is salsa and cocktails on the beach.

Besides a great design and tons of content, the new website also has some interesting features. With the booking widget tourists can instantly book their trip through Travelocity, with the Vacation Matcher they can get hints about what to do on Curacao, with the discussion boards they can give each other tips and the list goes on.

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This week Washington is the scene of HSMAI’s Leadership Conference. At this conference chapter leaders from around the world come together to meet each other, discuss common issues and invite renowned industry leaders to share visions and best practices on key hospitality issues.

At last night’s “Best of the Best Awards” Gala HSMAI Curacao’s Director Steven Damiana and President- Elect Rosann Jansen were awarded with the best Small Chapter in the categories of Websites, Communications & Customer Interaction Program.

We are very proud of the HSMAI Curacao Chapter for this superb achievement and we’re doubly proud because DGF built the website and our own Bo Loefstok-Schillemans is VP of Communications at HSMAI Curacao.

As an internet marketing agency, we search the web on a daily basis, looking for information that could help our clients and us, to gain more exposure on the web. One of the sources we frequently visit is the website for Hotel Marketing. This website provides tons of information about online marketing for the hospitality.

The times are tough, although Curacao is still a very popular vacation destination for various markets (Royal Dutch Airlines KLM is adding 30% capacity to their flights to Curacao!), we need to stay alert.

We highly appreciate this article posted by Hotelmarketing.com on February 20th, ‘Top 12 Revenue Management Initiatives for 2009!’, the 4th initiative reads:

Treat your third party Internet partners as an extension of your revenue team.
Strategic relationships with your third party Internet partners are important, now more than ever. In bad times, as in good, treat your third party partners as an extension of your revenue team. Good market managers have their fingers on the pulse of the overall market and can provide great insight into broader trends that you may not see.

• Share need periods, discuss production targets and how you can work together to achieve agreed upon goals.
• when those targets are met and have open discussions when there is a shortfall.
• Re-evaluate your distressed/last minute channel strategy based on feedback from your market manager and the needs of your hotel.
• Research if there are any sites that can drive business into your market with which you do not currently work.

Bo came across this insightful strategy brief for hospitality marketing people on how to best use your marketing dollars in 2009.

The financial crisis is already having an effect on the hospitality business and this effect is sure to last well into 2009 so marketing people will be forced to become more creative and cost-efficient in their marketing. This strategy brief by Hospitaly eBusiness Strategies discusses these challenges and gives some footholds for 2009. (more…)

The Adrian Awards Gala was held yesterday evening. Regretfully we could not go, but Steven Damiana of CHATA and HSMAI Curacao could and he received the award, partly, on behalf of us. Below is the press release CHATA gave out and if you want to get an impression of the evening then you can watch this video on YouTube.

On behalf of the HSMAI Curaçao Chapter and strategic partner Dragonfly Media, Steven Damiana received a Silver Adrian Award for website design at the prestigious 18th annual Adrian Awards Gala of the Hotel Sales & Marketing Association International (HSMAI) thanks to the support of American Airlines at the New York Marriott Marquis. (more…)