Choice Hotels Picks Cohorts
Choice Hotels International Inc. signed a three-year agreement yesterday to use Cohorts' consumer segmentation tool.Choice Hotels will use Cohorts to better target promotions to guests of its Comfort Inn, Comfort Suites, Quality, Sleep Inn, Clarion, MainStay Suites, Econo Lodge and Rodeway Inn hotel brands.
The deal follows a test involving e-mail and direct mail marketing. Members of Choice Privileges, Choice Hotels' guest rewards program, and other guests at Choice Hotels brands received promotional offers that differed based on the Cohorts segment to which each guest was assigned.
When applied to the Choice Privileges group, Cohorts segmentation produced an overall response rate boost of more than 40 percent compared with the control group, which was not selected by Cohorts. Among guests who were not Choice Privileges members, the overall response rate more than doubled in the Cohorts-treated group versus the control group.
Choice Hotels will use Cohorts to target Choice Privileges members and guests who have not joined the program.
"We plan to synchronize our database marketing strategies and tactics with our seasonal national promotions using Cohorts," said Bill Carlson, vice president of consumer marketing for Choice Hotels. "This ongoing effort will ultimately result in Choice Hotels' ability to retain and grow the lifetime value of our customers through more effective communications and promotions."
