Marriott International has today announced the relaunch of its Arabic website to enhance the online customer journey of the Arab traveller.

With nearly 400 million Arabic speakers in 22 countries, the company is now providing an end-to-end solution for a seamless Arabic booking experience.

The relaunch follows the recent announcement detailing the company’s ambitious growth plans for the Middle East and Africa region where it will expand its current portfolio by 50 per cent, and as a result, add 30,000 jobs. With such an emphasis placed on the region, the relaunch of its Arabic website is the next step in an exciting growth story.

To mark the occasion this Ramadan, Marriott International hosted a Majlis panel joined by Aida Al Busaidy, director, C2C Marketing & Campaigns at DTCM, Talal Al Rashed, co-founder Contourage and Hospitality Consultant and Vladimir Dabbah, vice president, Global Sales MEA at Marriott International. The esteemed panel discussed the importance of catering to the Arab Traveller, who often have a fierce sense of pride and remaining true to their identity.

Arab travellers generate more than double (up 162 per cent) room revenue per stay compared to other travellers, and annual revenue per Arab customer is 38 per cent higher than other travellers. In order to cater to the traditional customs of the Arab travellers, symbols of Arab culture should be demonstrated in both communication and on hotel properties.

“To date, we have over 110 million loyalty members around the world across Marriott Rewards, The Ritz-Carlton Rewards & SPG. As the world’s largest hotel operator, we aim to cater to every traveller on the planet, and with the majority of the world booking travel online we continue to enhance our end-to-end customer booking experience,” said Alex Kyriakidis, president and managing director at Marriott International Middle East and Africa.

The revamped website has launched today as a phased approach where over 5,000 Marriott and The Ritz-Carlton Rewards properties globally will be available and bookable in Arabic. Marriott International will continue to add localised in-language content and will further improve site’s functionality for the Arab online traveller. SPG properties will be progressively added to the new site between August and year-end (until then, they remain available for bookings in Arabic at www.spg.com/arabic). - TradeArabia News Service