The story behind how Diego Sartori helped citizenM Hotels increase Facebook fans 4x in 12 months and reach the top of TripAdvisor

Over the past month I’ve been working with Diego Sartori to understand how the strategy he helped build at citizenM Hotels helped them:

• Increase Facebook followers by over 400% in the past year
• Double Twitter followers in 3 months
• Reach the top of review site rankings like TripAdvisor

…among other accomplishments. In a new case study on the ReviewPro blog, you’ll read interesting insights, such as….
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“The traveler of today travels in jeans, a cheap t-shirt, an expensive watch, drinks champagne, and takes public transport” – Michael Levie

On involving others in the content creation process

“We invite bloggers to our hotels that share the same lifestyle. And then we ask these people to share something that represents the lifestyle of our brand.”

On creative publishing

“Instead of having a blog, we created a digital magazine to share brand information and curate lifestyle content for everyone.”

On getting guests to share their experiences online

“People only share online if they have a terrible experience or if they have a very good experience. If it’s just ‘okay,’ they see no value in sharing with anyone. But our rooms are very innovative and our concept is very different. We try to always exceed expectations creating a WOW factor that gets guests talking.”

“You have to deliver good service and create clear expectations of what people can expect. This is what encourages more reviews. We get people saying, ‘I usually don’t write a review, but my stay at citizenM was so special because you did this specific thing that made me think WOW.’ So that’s why we always try to set the right expectations, deliver excellent service and then surprise guests with something unique.”

On setting expectations with guests

“We respond and say we created a specific hotel concept that is not for everyone. We are honest with what we offer. Other people will read about our amenities and say, ‘Wow – this is really special!’”

On why they chose ReviewPro

“I started looking for tools, and came across ReviewPro among others. I had demonstrations from many different tools, and ReviewPro was the one that fit our needs best: it is the most complete and has shown more reliability than the others. That’s the reason we started working with ReviewPro. It’s a great product that offers exactly what we need, and has some helpful features like social media tracking, task assignments, and so on.”

I’m fascinated by the citizenM brand on many levels – including their product development, design, service, and approach to social publishing. I think you’ll enjoy reading this story as much as I enjoyed putting it together.