Booking a flight? Go on Facebook.

Running late to the hotel? Send a tweet.

Compared with other industries, the travel and hospitality sector is clearly ahead of the curve in engaging social media. Mainly because there are so many choices for hotels, and there is so much concern about consumer perception.

Airlines are maintaining a presence on YouTube and offering deals through social-mapping networks such as Loopt. Hotels are promoting their properties through bloggers, and they’re using social-networking sites to gather feedback, monitor trends and provide concierge services.

“I definitely think that social media is about to change the way we do things entirely,” says Jill Fletcher, social media and communications manager for Virgin America. “We’re able to admit over social media if we’ve made a mistake or if there’s a weather delay. So we’re able to communicate much faster and more effectively.”

Social media are being incorporated at a rapid rate into every part of a journey, from making the reservation to finding out where to eat. For instance:

- As of August, Delta passengers can buy tickets on Delta’s Facebook page.

- Southwest has three staffers dedicated to monitoring and responding to queries made through social-media channels.

- Marriott is launching its Marriott Courtyard Facebook page Tuesday to issue messages about the chain and related information that might interest customers.

- Hyatt Hotels launched a Twitter account last year to serve as a virtual concierge. Staffers, based in Omaha, Australia and Mumbai, are instructed to respond to requests and questions within an hour, and are fielding queries ranging from where to find good sushi to alerts that a guest will be checking in late. The account has 12,000 followers. Hilton has a similar Twitter account.

Compared with other industries, the travel and hospitality sector is ahead of the curve in engaging social media, says Carl Howe, a director with the Yankee Group, a telecommunication market research firm.

It’s “mainly because there is so much concern about consumer perception,” he says. “There are a lot more choices for hotels than there are for cable providers, and the same is true for airlines.”

Seeking return visitors

A key goal of staking a claim in the social-media space is to build a base of devoted followers who will keep coming back.

“Most travel organizations are actually looking for something more than a transaction,” Howe says. “They’re looking for loyalty, and that means a long-term engagement.”

Still, deals, incentives and freebies offered on social-media channels are a way airlines and hotels cultivate new customers.

United, for instance, has “twares,” fare specials offered exclusively through Twitter, the micro-messaging channel. In July, AirTran introduced its “Facebook Friday Fares,” which give its Facebook fans unique deals.

Joe Palma, a chef at Westend Bistro by Eric Ripert at The Ritz-Carlton in Washington, D.C., uses Twitter to send messages about specials, restaurant news and holiday hours, and to ask fans what they would like to see on the seasonal menu. Last year, he held a contest to select a new fall dessert menu item, and the winner received dinner for two.

LuxuryLink.com and FamilyGetaway.com, which sell hotel packages, have launched “mystery auctions,” in which customers bid for hotel packages at discounted rates without knowing the property’s identity. To increase followers, the sites began issuing clues about the hotels only through their Facebook and Twitter pages.

Travel businesses are seeking out social-media mavens and bloggers to sing their praises.

As Country Inns & Suites By Carlson prepared to open its 500th hotel in College Station, Texas, earlier this year, it offered free seven-day trips to three bloggers active in social-media sites.

Aurora Toth, vice president of marketing for Carlson Hotels, says the bloggers and their families were assigned to drive to College Station in vehicles with Country Inn decals, stop in seven states, blog and post messages on Facebook and Twitter along the way. Country Inn received local news coverage, and the bloggers helped spread word of the new hotel to their followers. “We learned the power of what we can do,” Toth says.

Marriott is launching a campaign in October that will invite loyalty program members with large Facebook and Twitter followings to help spread the word about its SpringHill Suites chain. They’ll get free stays and other incentives in return for positive messages sent to followers.

To replace convention business that shrank during the recession, Westin St. Maarten is contacting wedding bloggers and offering their readers a sweepstakes drawing for a ceremony or honeymoon at the resort. “We couldn’t have found those people any other simpler way,” says Karen Gee-McAuley, whose public relations firm Blaze helped the hotel develop the strategy.

Social networking and mobile technology are a new advertising frontier, and it makes sense for the travel industry to jump on board, some say.

“We’re a traditional advertising company, and looking at venturing out into social media and mobile phone applications wasn’t really something that we were considering,” says Toby Sturek, president of Clear Channel Airports. “But with the needs of the traveler, we felt we needed to continue to innovate.”

Read more at USA Today