Sunday, September 28, 2008

Another CEO Blogger: Bill Marriott


After discussing CEO bloggers last class, I decided to do a little search for other CEOs of large companies that are blogging. One that I encountered was the CEO of the Marriott hotels, Bill Marriott.


http://www.blogs.marriott.com/

While the blog seems a little bit on the formal side, it seems very helpful to customers and organized. In my opinion a hotel is a good candidate for a blog because you can get customer feedback on their experiences at the hotel easily, but this idea could have its downside. Negative comments from customers could be seen by potential guests and stray them away from staying at the hotel. But, that aside, hotel companies are very big on customer service, or they should be, and a blog is one good way to get information out on new resorts, new amenities, or apologies for recent issues or problems at the hotel.

Bill Marriott has recently used the blog to inform people of a tragedy that occurred in the Islamabad Marriott Hotel in Pakistan when a car bomb killed or injured many Marriott employees and destroyed the front of the building.

Overall, I think that he is an effective CEO blogger, when I looked back at his first post he seemed very honest about the fact that he didn't know much about blogging, but he was going to give it a shot, and honesty is always a good way to start a successful blog.

2 comments:

Royal Raven said...

I checked out Bill Marriott's blog and found it respectable. When the bomb went off in Pakistan it was updated repeatedly and efficiently. Great picture too! I think it’s an accomplishment that he knows what the Internet is.

bradleyf said...

I am also proud that the CEO of Marriott has a blog. That actually shocks me a bit but I think that it is a great idea for a hotel. People always want to know what people are saying about hotels that they potentially want to stay at. I agree with you, Sheri, that there are both negative and positive effects to a hotel blog. Obviously people can always write bad comments about their hotel stay so that makes it dangerous to Marriott to have a blog but I also think that with how great Marriott hotels can be, there is a very positive side to the idea of a blog.