The digital age is no barrier for the cruise passenger

In the first of a series of articles, we asked Simon Law, the voice behind Cruise & Maritime Voyages‘ social media channels, to offer us his advice, tips and insight into how to connect with customers, promote a brand and even handle complaints. In the next few weeks he will explain why a post on LinkedIn is not suitable for Facebook and what the difference is between Pinterest and Instagram.

Let me first of all introduce myself, I’m Simon Law, marketing support manager – online at Cruise & Maritime Voyages. The cruise world was a step into the unknown for me, with my background being in luxury travel where I’d previously had success with social media.

We have all heard about the rise of the ‘silver surfer’ but I was particularly intrigued as to how this crossed over with cruise travellers. After plenty of research, and some reading, I developed a social media strategy for CMV that has helped us see enormous growth.

The essence of the strategy is to be fun, reactive, engaging and do all we can to ensure that followers log back into their social media to check CMV’s activity. We have an active presence on Twitter, Linkedin, Pinterest, Youtube and even Instagram and each platform serves its own purpose. However, we quickly established that Facebook was the favourite medium of our customers and we have set out to target these specifically.

In my future columns I will explain the subtle differences between the various social media platforms and how you can engage with your audience. These will include why Twitter is good for getting a quick reaction, why LinkedIn is perfect when you want to say something more professional and the difference between Pinterest and Instagram.

Simon Law
Cruise & Maritime Voyages, Digital Marketing Manager
Twitter- @sijlaw