Timothy Hou, Director of Internal Communication and Social Media at Marina Bay Sands Pte Ltd, spoke (18 September) about the Marina Bay Sands content marketing strategy, for the content strategy module in COMM 346 social media strategies.

In his lecture, Mr. Hou introduced effective content and delivery strategy in social media and brand ambassador strategies with celebrities, star chefs, and public figures.

A Q and A session and fun activity for the class were held regarding MBS Singapore Tennis Evening at Marina Bay Sands partnered with BNP Paribas. Group 2 (Tang Jingfang, Tan Wan Ling Elizabeth, Lim Jin Yang Mark, Juliane Benedict, Jeannie Teo Jin Min) won the fun activity competition with a sponsorships/partnership building idea pitch for MBS.

To maximise the sponsorship deal between MBS and BNP Paribas, Group 2 suggested three factors: legal (whether there is a binding contract), physical (that MBS has no tennis facilities), and image alignment (that the image of both MBS and the tennis athletes are aligned). In conceptualisation of a social media strategy for the inaugural “Singapore Tennis Evening at Marina Bay Sands”, Group 2 had focus to highlighting the lifestyles that tennis athletes-celebrities have and will enjoy at MBS.

Jeannie Teo Jin Min in Group 2 said “this social media strategy will involve a collaboration with the athletes’ current sponsors. Collaborating with these brands would bring the sponsors’ attention to the brand of MBS and put MBS in the spotlight through the lenses of the sponsors, e.g., Adidas for Ana Ivanovic. Also, the premises and services provided by MBS would be featured and marketed overall as a luxurious and refined place to be and congruent with the lifestyles of the athletes. Scenic venues in MBS such as the SkyPark are also good locations for photoshoots or media features.”

The group’s ideas were well received by Mr. Hou as they come up with fresh ideas instead of using conventional strategies. Mr. Hou applauded all the groups’ efforts in this brainstorming activity, and especially said “Group 2’s work was very commendable as their ideas are something we have thought about and continues to be a challenge to implement.”

As a winning team, the group was awarded small prizes.

During the guest lecture session, MBS’ remarkable achievements in social media and content marketing were presented. Especially under Mr. Hou’s leadership, MBS has seen dramatic success in social media campaigns as it averaged a 60% year-on-year increase in followers across social media. He shares hands-on experience in directing celebrity marketing using various social media platforms and achieving a 50-million-plus reach over Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube, Weibo, Youku and blogs. MBS won two Marketing Magazine awards – Gold for Excellence in Social Media and Bronze for Best Use of Social Media at Events. And MBS tripled the number of its LinkedIn followers (31,361) and won the LinkedIn Award as most engaging brand 2014 for SEA/HK region.

We hope that Marina Bay Sands will continue to provide cutting-edge industry insight to academia and COMM 346 will be looking forward to solid relationship building and active engagement of MBS with the SMU community.