Retail Bite Mariott GoPro | Retail inspiration, user-generated content, GoPro, Mariott, Retail strategy · Kega

Mariott blows away millennials with User Generated Content

Marriott Hotels has launched a clever campaign that is conquering the Millennial Generation. How? By letting the Millennials collect all the content themselves and do the marketing for them.

A holiday is always a great inspiration to show the outside world just how fantastic life can be by posting spectacular photos and videos on social media. Marriott Hotels decided to give its guests a helping hand.

In every room at Marriott Hotels in the Caribbean and Latin America there’s a GoPro HER04 camera for guests to use. It’s free for the entire duration of their stay. The pleasantly surprised guests are encouraged to take the GoPro along wherever they’re going or whatever they’re doing and to share their adventures on social media using the hashtags #GoPro and #travelbrilliantly.

All images containing these hashtags are also shown on the hotels’ TV channel and on the travelbriliantly.com website, so that new guests are inspired not to take cliché holiday snaps, but original, spectacular, adventurous or iconic photographs. There are Marriott Champions in every hotel who know everything about the GoPro and can help guests get the most out of the camera.

To show the world what it’s all about, Marriott Hotels organised the #CancunChallenge: A week filled with events at the JW Marriott Cancun where 10 social media ambassadors talked about their GoPro experiences with their many followers. A very successful kick start to the campaign.

The example has been set with the #CancunChallenge. Satisfied and happy guests have turned into valuable brand ambassadors. The number of Millennials reached via social media currently stands at 13.5 million. With this enormous amount of valuable user-generated content, Marriott Hotels has not only reached the unreachable Millennial, but has also convinced them of their appeal.