case study melia hotels

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• What Accenture Did
• Value Delivered
• Related Capabilities

With brands like Paradisus Resorts, ME, Innside and Sol Hotels & Resorts, Meliá Hotels believes in providing guests with a memorable experience. So when they decided to launch a new digital experience for their customers, it had to be something special.

Personalization was rapidly seen as a strategic lever to improve customer experience and differentiate Meliá Hotels’ direct channels offering from its main competitors. Accenture helped design and implement a new comprehensive digital marketing strategy, delivered a full range of digital customer capabilities, digitized the loyalty program and implemented a digital content management system, all to now make direct sales channels a core component of their business. Analytics helped uncover insights that improve the customer experience, from providing trip planning recommendations to offering exclusive experiences to loyal members.

With a growing number of customers coming through digital channels, Meliá Hotels International knew that implementing a full customer-centric digital strategy would be critical to their long-term success. As the company expanded globally, it sought a new strategy to enhance its activity through digital channels and call centers; improve customer satisfaction, loyalty and sales; gain greater customer insights; and reinforce its digital marketing capabilities.

By 2018, Meliá Hotels intends for 40 percent of total company profits to come from direct sales channels, particularly from MeliáRewards loyalty program members.

What Accenture did

Accenture helped Meliá Hotels International implement a new digital transformation strategy that sets customer personalization as a top priority for all digital sales channels. The updated strategy touches every stage of a customer’s experience—from booking to staying with the hotel group and beyond.

Through the partnership with Meliá Hotels, Accenture creatively utilized the data to deliver relevant interactions between Meliá and its users at each step of the customer journey:

• Advanced analytics to identify high-profile prospects. Programmatic marketing and the use of advanced segments created through a combination of navigation, CRM and third party data have been key to identifying high-value prospects that impact them at the right time and with the most relevant content. Accenture also used advanced analytics models to find lookalikes and impact them through email marketing, doubling previously measured ROI.
• User search insights. By analyzing and segmenting user intents in paid search, Meliá has been able to deliver, in an industrialized way, thousands of dynamic landing pages which match user intent and advertising copy 100 percent.
• Testing for the best user experience. Through analysis of their online sales funnel, Meliá has been able to raise hypotheses of creative and UX improvements, tested through multivariate testing. The strategy paid off, raising many opportunities to offer different onsite experiences to specific user segments (based on location, traffic source, campaign, etc). The redesign of the landing pages, together with the optimization of the experience through multivariate testing, has increased online conversions by 30 percent.
• Data driven insights to raise loyalty. Data-driven product segmentation and the use of advanced analytics models helped to define which clients should receive each of the loyalty campaigns, and to define new campaign opportunities. Accenture helped redesign and relaunch Meliá's Loyalty Program, MeliáRewards , complementing existing monetary incentives with a bet for emotions and experiences to attract and engage members.

"We are achieving outstanding results. Accenture has assisted us with digital content production, marketing campaign management services and advanced customer analytics, all integral to building strong one-on-one relationships and nurturing loyalty." — JOSÉ MARÍA DALMAU , Global VP Sales & Marketing – Meliá Hotels International

Value delivered

Customers get personalized content to build stronger one-on-one relationships, nurture loyalty and drive an increase in direct sales at every digital touchpoint.

In just one year, direct sales channels, like  Meliá  and the Meliá app, increased 27 percent, and this trend is being maintained over time. The loyalty program has added more than a million new members, and the Meliá Rewards program now accounts for 80 percent of total direct sales.

Communications created to support an annual new customer segmentation strategy.

New landing pages custom designed to each customer’s individual preferences.

Increase in ROI as a result of the personalized programmatic marketing strategy.

Related capabilities

Travel consulting.

How Meliá Hotels wins at social media customer care

With more than 400 hotels in 40 countries, Meliá Hotels International is the third-largest hotel group in Europe and the world’s most sustainable hotel chain.

• 133,202 total resolved conversations in 2022 (average of 3,100 per week)
• 48% decrease in response time (from 24hrs to 12.4hrs)
• 330 booking enquiries per week through Hootsuite Inbox

The hotel group looks to Hootsuite Inbox to serve its customers better, faster and more authentically

Meliá Hotels is no stranger to social media. The company has long approached its business in a social-first way and is one of the leading global hotel chains with a strong influence on social media. 

A Hootsuite customer since 2014, Meliá has established a social media ecosystem that works at every level of the organization—and over the years, they’ve seen exponential growth in inquiries and booking requests coming through from public and private social messaging channels. 

“When we started to realize how many people wanted to book hotel rooms through social media, we realized we hadn’t capitalized on the business potential coming through direct and public messaging,” says Santiago Garcia Solimei, Global Head of Social Media & Brands PR at Meliá Hotels International.

The hotel group oversees over 500 social accounts on the global, regional and local level. But with external agencies or local hotels managing individual social accounts for marketing and customer service, Meliá didn’t have a common tone or unified response protocol for the growing number of inquiries coming through social media, let alone detailed reporting of social customer service activities. 

Meliá knew it needed to focus on building an in-house social care team,  and use the right tool to centralize its social media activity while also providing detailed reporting and analytics on its social customer service activities.

Let's do this

Products used in this study, creating an in-house social customer care team.

Meliá already had a global social team handling global strategy, social media, and influencers and PR functions, but didn’t yet have a dedicated social care team. Building on its established social-first approach, it added a new social customer care group to the global social team.

“Prior to using Hootsuite’s new Inbox feature, we didn’t have a social care team,” explains Garcia Solimei. “Now we have dedicated resources answering users through social media accounts, allowing us to be unified in our brand voice across the board.” 

Bringing the social care team in-house allows Meliá to have more control over responses, be agile in responding within one platform, and have true visibility of all social accounts across the business. The team uses Inbox to respond to private and public messages across Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, with a priority system in place to manage Meliá’s online reputation and sentiment accordingly.

 “The Social Care team is using Hootsuite Inbox as the social customer care unique solution. We follow a consistent social care protocol for all of Meliá hotel brands and specific guidelines for hotels that standardize the way we answer our users. It’s more efficient for the company, and it of course provides a better service for the users.”

Reducing response time with smart automation

Building an in-house social care team and managing all social channels within one platform was a game changer for Meliá. It not only gave the internal teams more control over responses, but it also helped to decrease response times across the board.

With the social care team working business hours, Monday to Friday, both in the American and European time zones, Meliá has implemented an auto-responder to communicate with customers about their hours and how to contact them if needed. The team also uses the Inbox knowledge base to save and share responses to some of their most commonly asked questions. By implementing these tools, Meliá decreased its response time from 24 hours to 12.4 hours.

Meliá’s goal is to also be proactive in capturing business opportunities coming through direct messages. The team has added a virtual assistant, which uses Artificial Intelligence is enabling customers to book rooms directly from social networks, making it easier for customers to self-serve directly on social channels.

Using analytics to better serve customers

Enabling the social care team with tools to help decrease response time is a great start, and the team is using analytics and reporting to uncover data that they’re using to further refine their strategy. Using Inbox topic assignment features, the team assigns a topic to every conversation, which helps them understand the volume of certain inquiries. They take these metrics to their monthly meeting with the overall social team to review resolve times, volumes per topic and conversations. From there, the team can create new content to address trending topics, build it into their workflows and knowledge base, and even develop different case studies for their virtual assistant. 

For example, one of the most common questions they receive is about influencer collaborations. “We get a lot of requests from influencers to work with us,” explains Garcia Solimei. “We have such a high volume, that we’ve realized we need to work on automating this, which will free up time to focus on higher-value interactions.” 

Building lasting relationships

Meliá’s customers are at the heart of everything the company does. And although many of the questions fielded by the social care team are around standard topics like bookings, amenities, and influencer collaborations, some are a little more fun and surprising—and these moments give the team a chance to shine.

In one case, a customer reached out after staying at a hotel, asking about a specific song that their children had heard and loved. The care team was able to quickly get back to the customer with a link to the song, and the family were delighted with the quick and helpful response. Another customer messaged from Madrid airport about a shuttle that hadn’t arrived; the team replied right away with the exact time and pick-up point, helping him get back on schedule. 

Thanks to Inbox, Meliá can deliver the same quick and friendly service through digital channels that its customers have come to expect in person at its hotels. Its digital customer profiles also ensure team members know whether the person they’re chatting with has contacted them or stayed at the hotel before, giving them the context and information they need to deliver the right response right away. 

What's next

Since getting started with Inbox, Meliá has centralized its customer service across its social channels, established a common tone across its hotel brands and decreased its response time. With 133,202 conversations resolved in the past year, Meliá is connecting with hundreds of customers every day, resolving their inquiries and building lasting relationships.

What’s next for Meliá? A strong focus on adding more social networks into Inbox, while also increasing the virtual assistant functionality for both private and public channels to continue automating common service request needs.

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When we started to report on how many people wanted to book hotel rooms through social media, we realized we hadn’t capitalized on the business potential coming through direct and public messaging.

How Meliá Hotels International Scales Influencer Marketing Across 7 Brands and 4 Continents

How Meliá Hotels International scales influencer marketing by sharing best practice and tailoring its influencer approach to fit each brand.

Traackr has partnered with Scott Guthrie for the following interview, as part of our new global series “Influencer Marketing at Scale”.

Listed on the stock exchange (Part of the IBEX 35 index) and still family-run Meliá Hotels International is one of the largest hotel companies in the world.

This house of brands operates over 90,000 rooms across 377 hotels worldwide under its seven brands: Gran Meliá Hotels & Resorts, Paradisus Resorts, ME by Meliá, Meliá Hotels & Resorts, Innside by Meliá, Sol Hotels & Resorts and TRYP by Wyndham. Its portfolio is complemented by its international shared vacation membership Meliá Club.

I spoke with Santiago Garcia Solimei , Global Director of Social Media, Meliá Hotels International to better understand how this resort and city hotel operator works with influencers globally at an enterprise level.

The interview explores how the firm has built an influencer system robust enough to optimize investments, improve efficiencies, comply with regulations and share best practice across 43 countries on four continents. At the same time, it's a system sufficiently flexible to adapt its approach to meet the differing needs of its seven brand identities.

[SG] What drives Meliá Hotels International to use influencer marketing?

[SGS] About 11% of traffic to our booking website Melia.com comes from social. More and more people are reaching out to social media channels to discover new hotels and to discover destinations.

So not only do we need to be present on social, but we need to be present with really good content and the way to ensure we have amazing and varied content is through influencer marketing.

We used to operate a company-wide PR and social media strategy that was well established by brand and region but lacked a system approach and specific methodology to influencer marketing.

In January 2017, we made the switch to a system-based approach. The move was a response to the increasing number of influencer requests being received at the hotel, regional and global levels, plus the amount of time needed to evaluate, consider and respond to all those requests.

Our systematic approach, driven by Traackr, has given us the benefit of a consistent method to identify, validate, respond and report on influencer related proposals.

[SG] Can you give me an idea of the scale of influencers Meliá Hotels International works with?

[SGS] We categorise influencers at three stages: identified, engaged and advocates. We only keep relevant influencers in our Traackr database. So far we have identified 896 relevant influencers. This gives you an idea of the size we’re talking about. Of those 896 influencers, 150 are engaged. That means they’re doing something with us. A further 75 we classify as advocates.

Overall about a third of our influencers are associated with the ME by Meliá brand. But, every year each one of our seven brands runs a global campaign which contains an influencer marketing component.

[SG] How does Meliá Hotels International identify the most appropriate influencers to work with for each brand?

[SGS] The brand marketing department creates a persona of an ideal influencer for each brand. These profiles cover the ideal interests, age, and trends that these people follow, along with brand configurations, and reach. We have a very clearly spec'd out map of what an influencer should be for each of our brands.

It is really important for us that we do not share influencers across different brands. Each brand has its own specific targets and profiles.

We engage with influencers on an exclusive basis. We look very carefully at the values of that influencer and our brand, the message the influencer is portraying to his or her audience; what type of audience it is and where they are located.

We really want authentic content which amplifies all of the fantastic stories we have in each of our properties. We're transitioning our approach towards having a lot more culture and art-based influencer engagement.

[SG] Which team within Meliá Hotels International 'owns’ influencer marketing'?

[SGS] The Global Social Media department is responsible for the influencer marketing vision, strategy and program, plus the way it’s implemented by the regions and hotels.

We have created a methodology called the MHI Influencer Best Practice Guide. PR and social media agencies engage with influencers based on our methodology. They use Traackr as the influencer database and reporting framework.

RELATED: A Blueprint for Scaling Enterprise Influencer Marketing

We devise the framework strategy centrally. We then present this strategy to our PR agencies, social media agencies and hotels worldwide. Given our geographical spread we rely on PR agencies and social media agencies - our specialised resources - to conduct local training with hotels. They take the strategy down to a property level. So for example, if a general manager received a request from an influencer, he will know what to do and who to contact. This entire workflow is included in our Influencer Guide.

[SG] How does Meliá Hotels International allocate resources to its influencer programs?

[SGS] We have a central influencer budget allocated to each brand that covers travel, hosting and related expenses. As part of our global campaigns, there is also a budget for influencer marketing-related actions specific to each campaign.

We want to engage with influencers who fully connect with our brands at an emotional level so we invite them to an unforgettable hotel experience where all expenses are covered. We only pay for the influencer participation on specific ad-hoc activities (for example for DJing, art interventions, or Ted Talks). We believe this approach will result in more effective and authentic content as well as a long-term relationship of brand advocacy.

[SG] How do you measure the success of your influencer marketing?

Part of proving the ROI of social is via a data-driven approach. Through Traackr, we're able to generate a report of every relevant influencer campaign. Within the report, we can see all of the coverage generated plus the mentions and interactions. We can see which content has worked best for us on each social network and by specific influencers.

We're also putting together internal business cases which show results on all the different campaigns. Globally, about 11% of traffic to our booking website Melia.com comes from social. In some countries, social media drives 15% of traffic to the booking site. Through business cases and reports we show our hotels’ general managers how much coverage has been generated and how much traction was achieved.

[SG] What barriers need to be overcome to effectively scale influencer marketing within an enterprise and how do you overcome them?

[SGS] The main barriers are taking the strategy to all markets, on all four of the continents that we operate. Each market has its own specific rules, regulation and different digital behaviours.

We’re grouped by regions. Each region has its own annual conference. Social media always has a slot at these conferences. So at least once a year, we have the opportunity to get in front of the general managers of any particular region and really give them an update on trends, strategy, and different projects. Then the general manager is responsible for passing on the information to their team.

Face-to-face knowledge sharing is augmented with online training and a social media ambassador scheme. There are also bootcamps and there's a company online portal where employees can share their ideas with their peers.

Providing updated training is a challenge given how quickly social media is evolving. So, we're looking into providing full online training which covers our influencer marketing methodology.

[SG] What influencer marketing activation are you especially proud of?

2017 marked the 10th anniversary of ME By Meliá. To commemorate this landmark we devised an always-on, year-long global campaign across all the ME by Meliá hotels and markets. Our aim was to educate audiences about the brand and to celebrate the first decade in a way that reflected the ME vibe. We held events at ME Miami, ME Madrid, ME London, ME Mallorca, ME Ibiza, ME Cabo and ME Milan. These events drove traffic to the brand channels and web content hub where all event-related content is hosted.

Campaign results for the 10 Years of Me were phenomenal on social media. Content created from the Milan event, for example, generated a 30% engagement rate. For that event held last December we combined the glamour and exclusivity of ME by Meliá with the distinctive values of Milan: Fashion, design and gastronomy.

Influencers were given makeup and hairstyling make-overs by specialist stylists. They were then offered branded accessories to complete their new look.

We also showcased the city's architecture and gastronomy legacy before hosting a party on our rooftop bar giving influencers the perfect opportunity to take and publish pictures of the sun setting behind the Milan skyline.

The campaign was a success. The hashtag #10YearsofME was used 1,346 times throughout the year on Instagram. It generated 1.36M likes and comments on the platform. In total we achieved 3.5M content engagements on all promoted posts.

About Scott Guthrie

Scott is an independent influencer marketing consultant. Previous roles include overseeing influencer relations at leading agency, Ketchum, and serving as the newswire product manager, EMEA at PR Newswire. Follow him on Twitter . Read his  influencer marketing blog , or watch “ My Influencer Marketing Philosophy ”.

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Meliá Hotels boosts social following to 6.7M

• Meliá Hotels International, the hospitality chain whose properties include 380 hotels in 43 countries and whose social media presence includes more than 400 accounts managed across operation multiple organizational levels and regions, boosted its social media following 15% to more than 6.7 million people in the first half of 2018 with several strategies, per a case study that social media dashboard Hootsuite shared with Mobile Marketer . The overall goal was to centralize content management without hindering each group's communications with customers and followers.
• Recognizing that travel is a major source of user-generated content on social media, Meliá worked to capture images of its products and services taken by guests. The brand used that imagery in email marketing, digital advertising or as widgets on its website, along with a feature to let guests make reservations with a single click from user-created content.​
• Meliá also collaborated with influencers to generate 1.7 million interactions among a potential audience of 74.7 million social media users in 2018, including 40 influencer marketing activations for its Me By Meliá luxury brand . The visual strategy leaned towards mobile-friendly and interactive content.

The Meliá Hotels case study underscores the challenges faced by multinational brands in efficiently executing a social media marketing strategy when there are numerous brand accounts managed independently across different locations. Because the chain has more than 400 social media accounts, including 165 social media profiles for individual properties, centralizing content management was a significant challenge. Meliá worked with HootSuite to develop a library of pre-approved content that a central team could distribute globally or locally while ensuring messaging and branding were consistent.

While the chain worked with influencers to raise its social media profile, Meliá CEO Gabriel Escarrer helped to humanize the brand with a higher-profile presence on Twitter and LinkedIn. He uses the platforms to engage with followers and to answer questions about travel and tourism in posts that show the #AskCEOMelia hashtag. Letting social media users have direct contact with a CEO can help boost consumer perceptions of brand authenticity, which is important in the hospitality industry amid competition from Airbnb. The home-sharing pioneer aims to differentiate itself from hotel chains by offering guests a unique experience that doesn't feel generic or fabricated .

As part of making the brand more authentic for customers, Meliá also urged its employees to act as brand ambassadors by engaging with people on social media. Employee advocacy drove more than 142 million impressions on social media in 2018, attributed to more than 61,000 posts shared by company ambassadors. The strategy helped to increase the number of applications the company received per job posting, per its case study. Hotel chain Hilton last year started using a similar strategy to make its properties more inviting to prospective guests. The company added a feature to its Hilton Honors mobile app to give the hotel chain's loyalty members access to employee suggestions of restaurants, attractions and neighborhoods to visit.

Tech-savvy young adults especially want experiences they can share on social media, a phenomenon that Hotels.com once described as "travel bragging." Hotel chains like Meliá are responding to that trend with a focus on social media. Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants this year started expanding its interactive Room 301 experience based on a pilot program that included a hotel room transformed into an "Instagrammable space." Its Kimpton Stay Human Project consists of guest rooms in 20 cities designed around the idea of "staying human," with local themes and activities.

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Case study: Meliá Hotels International

Headquartered in Palma, Majorca, Meliá Hotels International in-house display advertising production is complex, with even basic campaigns containing thousands of ads.

The in-house team at Meliá produces display campaigns for 7 brands and 2 loyalty programmes, across 43 different countries, and engages millions of customers every year in 9 different languages.

Download the Meliá Hotels International Case Study

The main challenge for Meliá Hotels International was to optimise ad production across markets worldwide. Display ad production was split by region, each with its own agencies and freelancers, making it difficult to control ads, reduce costs, and achieve brand consistency.

Furthermore, the creation of dynamic creatives was too complex and tedious to carry out in-house, meaning Meliá was forced to outsource production to an agency.

By using the Bannerflow platform, Meliá’s in-house team was able to centralise display ad production. The in-house team in Palma now has full control over all design assets and is able to quickly build, approve, and optimise both global and regional display campaigns.

The Meliá team were also able to move the production of dynamic creative optimisation (DCO) advertising in-house.

Not only can Meliá’s in-house team quickly produce thousands of brand consistent display ads, across multiple languages and markets from one platform, but they are now able to produce personalised DCO ads with enriched designs.

This has improved Meliá’s display ad performance and enabled a greater return on investment (ROI) from its display advertising.

“We are able to build better creatives with Bannerflow: showing the right message to our audience, boosting our CTR, and therefore increasing our ROI.”

Melia achieved

“Bannerflow allows us to perform DCO using much richer and personalised ad designs. This helps our ads stand out, which is in contrast to other more rigid template-based solutions.”

Sergio Fernandez Digital Design and Production Specialist

A reduction in agency costs

Meliá produces ads for four global regions: Spain and Portugal, EMEA, APAC and America. Using Bannerflow, Meliá’s entire ad production is now in-house and done via one platform.

The in-house team is more efficient, benefiting from production synergies between the different regional marketing teams. Thus enabling Meliá to cut down on duplication and agency costs.

Enriched and non-template DCO

With many products, brands and markets, as well as constantly changing prices, producing easily updatable and personalised dynamic advertising was key for Meliá. Instead of using an agency, Bannerflow enables the Meliá in-house team to control the ads themselves.

They are now able to perform enhanced DCO using richer and tailored ad designs, helping their ads to stand out – in contrast to other more rigid template-based solutions.

Efficient in-house production

Using Bannerflow’s unique features, such as smart scaling and translation management, Meliá’s in-house team is now able to quickly create the 1000’s of display ad variations needed for global campaigns and DCO.

Furthermore, they have achieved a 50% reduction in the time it takes to build all their display campaigns. Collaboration is easier too with all editorial teams using the same platform – there is no longer the need for email threads and zip files.

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MELIÁ: PREPARING FOR THE FUTURE OF HOSPITALITY

How Meliá Hotels International leveraged the expertise of Financial Times and world class educators to overcome uncertainty.

How Meliá moved from uncertainty to future planning

2020 was a dramatic year for hospitality. Businesses across the sector had to be agile and innovative to stay afloat.

Being informed about the situation and staying objective whilst having the ability to anticipate post-crisis scenarios have been crucial to navigate through the crisis.

Meliá Hotels International, a global chain with 374 hotels in 40 countries, reached out to Headspring to find a program that could better prepare their management for how to lead through uncertain times, and ultimately, prepare them for the future of hospitality.

“ Headspring is for us a guarantee of quality. We have worked with them for many years and they have never failed us. The quality of their professionalism is excellent together with their listening skills and willingness to offer us the best service. Faced with a challenge like the one we had a few months ago, we had no doubt that going to Headspring was going to be the best option.”

Luisa Espinar Vila, Employee Experience Director

Emphasis on customisation

As customisation was key for Meliá Hotels International, Headspring developed Stay Safe with Meliá , a program focusing on three different leadership audiences: HR, Hotel Management and Guest Experience, each with a different program stream featuring tailored content.

“Customisation is one of the aspects we consider most important nowadays. It is not “one size fits all” for our executives. Each group of leaders has its own needs given their unique profiles, professional circumstances, and the different challenges they might face”, says  Luisa Espinar Vila, Employee Experience Director.

Three Learning Streams

“Our top priority, with the different training and development programmes we undertake, is to cover those needs.  The Stay Safe with Meliá training program was targeted to three different audiences and its contents and methodologies were customised to each group”, adds Luisa Espinar Vila.

Human Resources Teams

HR teams explored topics such as influence, managing conflicts and difficult conversions, as well as self-transformation.

Hotel Management Teams

Hotel directors and managers explored important topics such as Leadership, Wellbeing & Resilience, and Critical Thinking.

Guest Experience Teams

Guest experience teams explored topics such as influence, managing conflicts and guest experience in critical times.

HEADSPRING’S METHODS AND EXPERTISE COMBINED WITH THE MAGNIFICENT FACULTY WERE THE MAIN REASON FOR CHOOSING THEM. Luisa Espinar Vila, Employee Experience Director at Meliá Hotels International

A Global Bilingual Program

The program started with a kick-off session led by André P. Gerondeau , the COO of Meliá Hotels International, and Tom Robbins , Travel Editor at the Financial Times. Each program stream had multiple groups of 35-40 participants per group. Each session was also delivered in two languages (English Spanish) and in three different times zones (Asia, Europe, Americas).

A New Mindset

Participants across the different streams remarked that the program re-shaped their thinking on how to tackle challenges of a post-COVID world.

Thanks to the program, a high percentage of Melia’s collaborators say they have more and better tools to face the current situation with greater stability, resilience, listening skills, etc., all of which are key skills for facing an unprecedented situation where uncertainty is an aspect we must live with on a daily basis.

“The delivery of the program exceeded expectations. The quality of the Headspring faculty, the content which has been adapted to the current situation, the tools provided, and the closeness demonstrated by all the trainers, despite the fact that the program was 100% online, were all highly valued aspects”, concludes Luisa Espinar Vila.

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How Meliá uses Magnolia as the center of all its digital channels

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“In just over a month, we trained more than 350 hotels and 500 users. In a week, they had already created 40 landing pages.”

José María Tomás Llompart

Digital Channels and Distribution Manager, Meliá Hotels

Meliá Beyond Cloud

Meliá is a hotel company with more than 60 years of history. It owns 384 hotels counting 97,000 rooms, and 8 brands in more than 40 countries. 70% of Meliá's reservations come from its own online channels.

In 2015, Meliá committed to evolving its digital channels by launching a new web and mobile app. This despite continuing to have a monolithic application based on Java and a proprietary CMS (content management system). To evolve further, Meliá needed a fast and flexible CMS that would give them the shortest possible time to value.

From this need, Meliá Beyond Cloud was born, a project based on the adoption of an Open Source approach to achieve faster time to market and an improvement in scalability, performance and flexibility, to support a vertical growth of the company.  

Meliá Beyond Cloud relies on four pillars:

• Open Source  as the main element of transformation to enhance innovation, flexibility, transparency and community.
• Team transformation:  to achieve   agility and software quality.
• Micro services:  development agility, implementation flexibility and precise scalability.
• Migration to the Cloud:  scalability, elasticity and efficiency.

Hospitality & Travel

www.melia.com

The Challenge

The solution, replacing an old monolithic platform.

Despite the great commitment to its digital channels, and the improvements in usability, personalization, customer data management and process automation, the backend of the application was still holding back Meliá's digital transformation.

So, in order to achieve the pillars of its transformation, the hotel company was looking for an open source CMS to replace its customized monolithic solution.

The new CMS had to meet the following criteria:

• Ease of use and simplicity (to enable all regions to use the tool)
• Flexibility and extensibility
• Open source
• Development speed (short time to market)
• Cloud friendliness
• Vendor support
• Relevant references and powerful network of partners
• Built on J2EE technology

Magnolia successfully fulfilled the list of requirements and the objective was to place it at the center of all of Meliá's digital channels in order to attract customers via its owned channels. Magnolia would enable editors to design templates, publish landing pages for events, all while providing efficient time to market and access to external data sources.

A flexible and user-friendly CMS

The selection of Magnolia as a new CMS for Melia.com had a greater impact than powering the web and mobile channels, as it also became the foundations of Meliá Content Hub where all the company's content is stored.

For Meliá, Magnolia is quick, safe, easy to use, and provides editor autonomy for creating landing pages. This streamlines the publishing processes and reduces the time to market. Additionally, Magnolia allowed easy integration with external systems based on REST API.  

Integrations

• Salesforce Marketing Cloud for digital marketing
• DAM for unification of multimedia assets
• Meliá Content Hub unified all content from all Meliá hotels (Intrastay, btandHub, etc.)
• Flows built on Jira to migrate to advanced flow implementations
• eCommerce integration via REST API

Migration to the Cloud

A high-availability infrastructure could be set up in Amazon Web Services in a quick fashion, being accessible to external sources and based on scalability of public nodes.

The project went live in March 2018. In the first months, Meliá achieved the following outcomes:

• The team was trained in just one month: more than 350 hotels and 500 users.
• It was possible to carry out roles and permissions for hotels and corporations in different geographical areas.
• An excellent time to market.
• Decoupling of the back-end from front-end.
• Needs that emerged throughout the process could be successfully covered by Magnolia. 

Landing pages a week

templates, based on 40 components

“In just over a month we trained more than 350 hotels and 500 users. In a week, they had already created 40 landing pages.”

“It is a very intuitive tool, well designed and intended for the contributor. We also think that it is a flexible tool that adapts much better than other CMS we have had.”

Raquel Pérez

Web Content Strategist, Meliá Hotels

“Magnolia's great contribution is that it has allowed us to create a template and module system. It gives us agility, freedom, the power to eliminate many questions to the systems team. The contribution team now creates their landings in a very short time… Now they are making landings in a jiffy.”

Jordi Ribas

Front-end developer, Meliá Hotels

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CERTIFICATION

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Meliá Hotels International

Excellence, sustainability, and responsibility, ghg emissions, *these average annual savings are based on the annual figures for meliá properties that are registered with the earthcheck certified program. the figures use savings from up to 10 years of historical data, to give a yearly average for a member of the meliá group..

Excellence, sustainability and responsibility is the essence of culture and values for Meliá Hotels International (Meliá).

Founded by Gabriel Escarrer, in Palma de Mallorca in 1956, Meliá is now one of the largest international hotel groups, employing more than 45,000 people and managing over 380 hotels in more than 40 countries across four continents.

Hospitality is more than a business – it’s an attitude towards life, something that comes from the heart. That is why we are as deeply committed to our guests’ enjoyment as we are to our excellence in business. Mind and heart in agreement to achieve trust and success

- gabriel escarrer, vice chairman and chief executive officer, the journey.

Meliá promotes responsible tourism with innovation and technology as the drivers behind an efficient management system that is designed to reduce the use of natural resources and minimise social impact and environmental footprint. 

The partnership between EarthCheck and Meliá began in 2001, and almost two decades later there are 82 properties in the EarthCheck Certified program.

“Tourism certification programs, such as EarthCheck Certified, play a key role in defining the components of sustainable tourism and in adopting the critical elements of management, which for us as a company offers us an important added value” says Tomás Franquet Elía, Director of Corporate Responsibility. 

“Our main purpose is to integrate responsible tourism criteria into our hotel’s value chain whilst ensuring economic viability.

We want to lead the fight against climate change, contribute to preservation of the environment and landscape and foster a culture of sustainable tourism.”

Strategic Approach

The United Nations 2030 Agenda is one of Meliá’s key guiding principles that has helped to shape their strategic approach and align different initiatives with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). 

To advance education and equality in host communities and improve environmental protection, Meliá have prioritised five SDGs they consider to be most relevant:

“There are other objectives that Meliá promote to engage more deeply as a strong and positive influence on society, but always linking back to the SDGs, given the interrelation between them.

We keep in mind that our customers have an increasing motivation, concern and sensitivity for aspects related to the environment. On our way to advancing sustainable tourism our clients play an essential role and, to make them participants, we involve them, and we involve them in the achievement of our objectives.

Our strength as a company, together with our contribution to the three main pillars of sustainability (economic, social and environmental), will also allow us to raise awareness and build capacity across the global markets we serve.”

Our main purpose is to integrate responsible tourism criteria into our hotel’s value chain whilst ensuring economic viability. We want to lead the fight against climate change, contribute to preservation of the environment and landscape and foster a culture of sustainable tourism.

- lourdes ripoll, vice president, corporate responsibility.

Meliá’s approach to sustainability is supported by their corporate social responsibility strategy with projects designed to enhance employability and workplace integration of people at risk of exclusion. Providing economic opportunities for local communities is helping to reduce social differences with a focus on the most disadvantaged groups.

“We aim to contribute to and support the sustainable development of the communities in which we operate and the people that form part of those communities, leaving a legacy to be enjoyed by future generations.

There is a genuine commitment to the conservation of cultural heritage of the communities in which Meliá operate – integrating the cultural, culinary, and artistic characteristics of each location as well as respecting and protecting the historical heritage as if it were their own.

“We will also be a catalyst for local development, protecting the roots of society and encouraging our guests to be involved in the discovery and conservation of the rich cultural wealth in each destination.”

In a bid to meet two fundamental criteria – sustainability and excellence – Meliá has eliminated straws, coasters and bottles in their hotels and resorts.

In addition, Meliá has removed all single-use plastic bathroom amenity containers and replaced by eco-pump dispensers to reduce at least an estimated 45,000kg of plastic per year in bathroom amenities, avoiding more than 29,000kg of C02 emitted into the atmosphere.

Achieving EarthCheck Certification has a trusted reputation that objectively shows our guests that our hotels are accountable and committed to year-onyear improvement. Working with EarthCheck reinforces our commitment to promoting SDG 17 in developing key partnerships to achieve the objectives of the 2030 Agenda.

- tomás franquet elía, director of corporate responsibility..

We keep in mind that our customers have an increasing motivation, concern and sensitivity for aspects related to the environment. Achieving EarthCheck Certification has a trusted reputation that objectively shows our guests that our hotels are accountable and committed to year-on-year improvement.”

“Being recognised as a world leader in excellence, sustainability and responsibility is our ambition and part of our Vision 2020.

- meliá hotels international.

To reduce energy consumption and CO2 emissions, Meliá has connected charging points for electric vehicles, installed high performance condensing boilers and chillers with heat recovery and established R&D projects such as solar-powered streetlamps.

For Meliá, corporate responsibility is an essential element of a business strategy that allows the organisation to move towards a more responsible, sustainable and wealth-generating hotel model for society as well.

“By achieving EarthCheck Certification, each hotel has a positive impact within the business, not only from a reputation perspective but also operational efficiencies. We understand the contribution of value from a holistic perspective in its broadest sense.”

As Meliá embarked on a sustainable journey with EarthCheck, they introduced training to encourage strong commitment from all teams including:

• Educating about the role of sustainability
• Sharing an understanding of responsibilities
• Learning and improving operational practices
• Continued learning to develop the potential of each team member.

By achieving EarthCheck Educating about the role of sustainability Sharing an understanding of responsibilities Learning and improving operational practices Continued learning to develop the potential of each team member. Certification, each hotel has a positive impact within the business, not only from a reputation perspective but also operational efficiencies. We understand the contribution of value from a holistic perspective in its broadest sense.

- ingrid de la fuente technical services senior manager.

The EarthCheck Certified program empowers each Meliá property to take ownership of its sustainability goals and build on local initiatives. The program recognises the benefits of an organisation working together to achieve sustainable outcomes and can be used to underpin a clear vision for the property, as well as focusing on sound policy and action plans to help achieve the vision.

EarthCheck assists the Meliá portfolio in addressing key global environmental, cultural, social, and economic (ECSE) concerns and deals with environmental regeneration and environmental improvement as well as the conservation of existing natural heritage assets.

The partnership also assists the group and its properties recognise culture as one aspect of place management as well as targeting important social concerns such as education, human rights, and the contribution of a tourism enterprise to building social capital and management of community services. 

What’s next

“More than future plans, we prefer to talk about consolidating progress. Corporate responsibility is an essential lever of our business strategy that allows us to move towards a more responsible and sustainable hotel model that also generates wealth for society.

Being recognised as a world leader in excellence, sustainability and responsibility is our ambition and part of our Vision 2020. 

Our public commitments and the improvements we have been demonstrating year after year have led us to build a strong position in the hotel sector nationally and internationally.”

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Acknowledgement of Country

There are more than 476 million Indigenous Peoples, found in all regions of the world, from the Arctic to the tropical forests. They make up more than 6 per cent of our global population.

In the spirit of reconciliation, EarthCheck acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout the world and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Indigenous Peoples today.

EarthCheck acknowledges that Indigenous Peoples are guardians of the forests and biodiversity hotspots we all depend on. Research shows that lands managed by Indigenous Peoples, with secure rights, experience lower deforestation rates, store more carbon, hold more biodiversity, and benefit more people than other lands — including protected areas.

We recognise and support the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), the most comprehensive international instrument on the rights of Indigenous Peoples. The Declaration is a positive document that maps out a path for Indigenous Peoples to be free from discrimination and secure in their identities and life choices.

EarthCheck Certified: Aligned globally

EarthCheck science and products were developed by the Australian Government Sustainable Tourism Co-operative Research Centre (STCRC) over ten years. Our science is reviewed annually to ensure that it meets international standards relative to greenhouse gas protocols, responsible tourism, and certification.

EarthCheck products and services are built on the Agenda 21 principles for Sustainable Development endorsed by 182 Heads of State at the United Nations Rio De Janeiro Earth Summit in 1992 and aligned to the SDGs.

EarthCheck Certified provides a framework for organisations to achieve the desired outcomes for sustainable development as set out in the final report of the World Summit for Sustainable Development held in Johannesburg in 2002.

EarthCheck Certified complies with the Mohonk Agreement (2000), which outlines the guidelines and principles for an international sustainable tourism certification program. It is also a Recognised program of the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC).

EarthCheck Certified is a verification standard accepted by CDP. It is also an approved program of the Certification and Accreditation Administration of the People’s Republic of China (CNCA), London & Partners, the Mexican Secretary of Tourism (SECTUR) and the City of Sydney.

EarthCheck Certified is an approved program for meeting the EU Energy Directive for the Federal Office for Economic Affairs and Export Control (Bundesamt für Wirtschaft und Ausfuhrkontrolle – BAFA) in Germany and the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy) in the Netherlands.

EarthCheck partners with international research organisations to maintain the currency of EarthCheck science and our benchmarking systems.

The EarthCheck brand signifies scientific excellence, better environmental, economic, and social performance, improved community interactions, and savings through more efficient use of resources. It provides recognition and promotional support to a global consumer market.

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Meliá Hotels International Gains File Transfer Stability and Confidence with GoAnywhere MFT

Industry: hospitality.

With more than 380 hotels in 40 countries and four continents, Meliá Hotels International is the largest hotel company in Spain, Latin America, and Europe, and is the 10th largest lodging company worldwide.

Up until 2018, the company used a file transfer solution developed in house more than 20 years ago, which transferred files through MQ queues. The chronic stability problems, daily incidents, and inability to quickly diagnosis issues made it clear they needed to find a better way.

Furthermore, their homegrown system did not allow them to connect with external companies, such as American Express or Iberia, or to integrate with the main cloud platforms and their file repositories, namely Amazon S3, Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, Azure, Box, and Dropbox. This lack of functionality forced the hotelier to use other tools, making the overall operation more complex than it needed to be.

GoAnywhere MFT Eased File Transfer Complexities

Adding GoAnywhere MFT to their IT environment for secure file transfers was the remedy Melia needed. Antonio Ramos Elías, Integrations Architect at Meliá, explained how the change improved his day-to-day work life. “GoAnywhere MFT has given us a lot of peace of mind. Apart from the stability, the logging system saves everything that happens, so it is very easy for us every time there is a problem or incident, to search the logs for an explanation of what happened. Usually, if there is an incident it is not motivated by GoAnywhere and, thanks to the fact that we can trace things, we have the evidence to prove it,” said Elias.

Quick Implementation and Solution to Stability Problem Delivered

To identify and select their new MFT tool, Meliá drew up a catalog of requirements and evaluated 10 providers with the help of a specialized consultancy. GoAnywhere MFT was selected as the file transfer tool that best met Meliá's specific needs.

From there, implementation was very fast. In just two months, the software solution was installed in the entire infrastructure and the pilot file transfer project was put into production.

File Transfers Now Automated 98 Percent of Time; Cost Savings Result

Today, Meliá uses GoAnywhere to transfer files between their headquarters and all their hotel properties worldwide, streamlining and automating:

• Reservations and availability of rooms in hotels and restaurants
• Guest and customer information
• Backoffice data, such as SAP billing and accounting
• Employee information

Although the primary users of GoAnywhere MFT is the organization’s IT team, there are some file submission processes performed by other business users and some of their partners. "Compared to the previous product, GoAnywhere delivers multiple efficiency advantages as the system management is centralized in a single point," noted Elias.

GoAnywhere manages information to and from IBM mainframe servers, SAP, and ERP and securely sends and manages all kinds of file types, including XML, JSON, Excel or plain text. And due to the needs for immediacy and confidentiality of the data files are sent encrypted and protected, both at rest and in motion.

Around 10,000 files are exchanged daily through the network of more than 130 Meliá hotels, and nearly 98 percent are done unattended using GoAnywhere  File Monitors . The monitors detect the presence of new files in folders and automatically execute the corresponding process, reducing human error and increasing efficiency. More than 40 processes are executed approximately 3,500 times per day.

These operations are carried out through  GoAnywhere Agents  installed on-premises in each of the chain’s hotels. The agents allow the organization to deploy and manage the execution of file movements with all hotels from one central location, with real-time visibility and automatic alerts in the event of any failure. In addition, when using GoAnywhere agents, there is no need to program or update scripts locally at each hotel, as GoAnywhere allows for automations to be configured via an intuitive, dashboard-style user interface. Centralized management and ease of configuration without the need to program scripts has resulted in significant cost savings in system maintenance for this hotel chain.

“The main benefits obtained with GoAnywhere MFT include saving time and effort in the resolution of incidents, as these have been reduced by 99%, with consequent cost savings in the areas involved,” added Elías.

Third Party Data Exchanges are Easier with GoAnywhere MFT

In addition to transferring information internally between the hotel network, Meliá also needed a secure way to exchange data with their strategic partners, such as American Express and Iberia. Before implementing GoAnywhere, they made these file transfers using an unmanaged SFTP server or solutions that were developed on an ad-hoc basis.

GoAnywhere allowed them to integrate these third-party exchanges into the same tool as the rest of their transfers, without making any protocol changes, and with added security through its built-in  SFTP  and Secure Forms capabilities.

Using  Secure Forms  allows Meliá to create personalized secure forms and publish them in public or private links, so that its partners can send them information securely. They simply need to connect through the GoAnywhere web client, load the data into the form, and the information is  encrypted  and sent immediately.

High Availability Ensures Continuity

Due to the large volume of transfers and their importance to the lodging business, Meliá needs GoAnywhere to work at all times. For this reason, it installed a  High Availability  scheme that helps guarantee the continuity of all its functionalities.

The architecture includes an active/active cluster (2 MFT servers + 2 Gateways), accessible both from the Meliá network and from the Internet. It has a MySQL database on RDS, an EFS shared filesystem mounted on the machines that make up the cluster, and two network layer balancers (one in front of the Gateway, one between the MFT cluster and the private network).

Future Plans for Incorporating GoAnywhere Into The Organization

Elías, leader of the GoAnywhere MFT project, is very satisfied with the results obtained. Since the implementation of GoAnywhere, he has resolved the incidents caused by the old platform, saved money and, above all, gained peace of mind that all his organization’s file transfers go smoothly, and can be controlled and managed with fewer complications.

Going forward, Melia plans to continue implementing file transfer processes to get even more value from GoAnywhere.

We Solved Their Problem, Now Let's Solve Yours.

We're committed to giving you a better way to automate, secure, and streamline your business processes. Schedule a demo with one of our product specialists today to see if GoAnywhere MFT is the right fit for your organization.

Meliá London Kensington Meliá Collection

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• Excellent 134
• Very Good 25
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" If you one to be like in home,, this is the hotel ( near restaurants, and hop on & hop off right in front have a stop/ "

" 1st floor facing Gloucester road will give you a lot of natural light in the room "

" If trying to trim costs, check for morning dining options on or near Gloucester Road. "

" Book breakfast in advance and save 4 pounds "

" The hotel is expensive and the attention not worthy. Find another one, there are plenty in the area! "

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Idaho judge considers whether to hold quadruple murder trial in small town or elsewhere

By rebecca boone, associated press | updated - aug. 29, 2024 at 8:09 p.m. | posted - aug. 29, 2024 at 6:50 a.m., attorneys for bryan kohberger, the man accused of fatally stabbing four university of idaho students, say the pressure to convict is so severe that some latah county residents are predicting lynch mobs or riots if he is acquitted. (ted s. warren, associated press).

Estimated read time: 6-7 minutes

BOISE — Attorneys for the man charged in the 2022 stabbing deaths of four University of Idaho students asked a judge to move the trial to a larger city during a hearing Thursday, citing the widespread media coverage of the case and the impact that coverage can have on potential juror bias.

Bryan Kohberger's defense team says strong emotions in the close-knit community and constant news coverage will make it impossible to find an impartial jury in the university town of Moscow, Idaho. They want the trial, set for June 2025, to be moved from Moscow to Boise or another large city. But prosecutors say any problems with potential bias can be resolved by simply calling a larger pool of potential jurors and questioning them carefully.

Kohberger, a former criminal justice student at Washington State University, which is across the state line in Pullman, faces four counts of murder in the deaths of Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle, Madison Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves.

The four University of Idaho students were killed sometime in the early morning hours of Nov. 13, 2022, in a rental house near the campus.

Police arrested Kohberger six weeks later at his parents' home in Pennsylvania, where he was spending winter break.

The killings stunned students at both universities and left the small city of Moscow deeply shaken. The case also spurred a flurry of news coverage, much of which Kohberger's defense team says was inflammatory and left the community strongly biased against their client.

Defense attorney Elisa Massoth's first witness was James "Todd" Murphy, the president of media tracking company Truescope. Murphy testified that news coverage of the case has been more saturated in Latah County, where the university town is located, than it has been in other parts of the state.

Latah County has about 3% of the state's population, but the media exposure to the case was measured at about 36%, Murphy said. That compares to Ada County, where Boise is located, which had about 34% exposure and roughly 26% of the state's population.

'Pictures with these ominous headlines'

Amani El-Alayli, a professor at Eastern Washington University who researches social cognition and bias, told the judge that studies have shown that people who are exposed to publicity about a case are more likely to render a guilty verdict at trial because of the way the human brain processes information.

That's partly because people are less likely to think critically about information when they are just casually consuming the news, she said, and partly because of "classic conditioning," a type of unconscious learning where the brain creates associations between certain stimuli and responses. Conditioning can happen when people repeatedly see the defendant's name or photo next to words like "murder" or "students killed," she said, or when they hear a name connected to something they had an emotional response to — like the fear that another crime might happen, or sadness that someone died.

"We've seen the pictures with these ominous headlines — that connection can't help but be created," El-Alayli said. "People aren't trying to be biased. It's just that when we're in a mood, those moods filter the information that we take in."

Seeing authority figures like a police chief or even someone with a commanding presence say that a person is a suspect can also create a bias, she said, particularly in small towns where potential jurors might personally know the authority figure making the claim.

There's no known method to undo that bias once it is created, El-Alayli said, and carefully questioning jurors or giving them instructions to ignore things they have previously heard or read about the case generally isn't very effective.

'There would likely be a riot'

Defendants have a constitutional right to a fair trial, and that requires finding jurors who can be impartial and haven't already made up their minds about the guilt or innocence of the person accused. But when the defense team hired a company to survey Latah County residents, 98% percent of the respondents said they recognized the case, and 70% of that group said they had already formed the opinion that Kohberger is guilty. More than half of the respondents with that opinion also said nothing would change their mind, according to defense court filings.

Bryan Edelman, a trial consultant and the cofounder of Trial Innovations, which conducted the study, also testified for the defense. He said that since November 2022, there have been roughly 440 articles published about the case in Latah County's local news outlets — including The Moscow-Pullman Daily News, The Lewiston Tribune, and the University of Idaho's student newspaper the Argonaut. The local population is about only 40,000 people, he said.

The defense attorneys provided more details about Edelman's survey in a court document filed earlier this month. Some of the respondents made dire predictions, saying that if Kohberger is acquitted, "There would likely be a riot, and he wouldn't last long outside because someone would do the good ole boy justice," "They'd burn the courthouse down," and "Riots, parents would take care of him."

Prosecutors told the judge that the survey didn't provide strong enough evidence to justify moving the trial. Special assistant attorney general Ingrid Batey said the survey data showed that at some points, Ada County actually had higher levels of media coverage than Latah County.

'Media coverage everywhere'

"The fact is, your honor, this case has media coverage everywhere," Batey said, suggesting that bias and pressure could be handled by calling larger jury pools and by barring the public from some parts of the jury selection process and other hearings. The court can summon 1,800 potential jurors in Latah County just as easily as it can in Ada County, Batey told the judge.

Moving the trial across the state would be expensive and force court staffers, witnesses, experts, law enforcement officers and victims' family members to make an inconvenient trip to the new location, she said.

But Taylor reminded the judge that Kohberger's constitutional rights are at stake.

"His right to a fair trial is as important to our right to free speech, our right to bear arms, our right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures," said defense attorney Anne Taylor, "and the right to a fair trial cannot happen in Latah County."

The judge said he would review the law and all of the evidence before making a ruling, saying it would likely be one of the hardest professional decisions he will ever have to make. "I'll do my best," the judge said. "It's a challenge."

"There was some really important things to think about on both sides," he said, "and that's what I'm going to do."

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