In 2022, W Hotels rebuilt its digital identity with a refreshed visual language, tone, and creative point of view. With that foundation in place, the next challenge emerged: evolve from visibility to leadership. As we entered 2025, our goal was to position W Hotels not only as a participant in digital culture but as a social-first luxury brand shaping culture through narrative franchises, creator collaboration, and platform-native storytelling.
To achieve this, the strategy centered on three global priorities:
The objective was not just to grow channels, but to build an ecosystem where W Hotels acts with agility, humor, design authority, and cultural fluency—ultimately redefining how a modern luxury brand shows up online. By shifting from a rebrand to a holistic social-first operating model, W Hotels positioned itself as a cultural engine capable of driving brand relevance, performance, and global storytelling.
W Hotels brought its social-first vision to life through a strategic framework designed to scale content, operationalize platform-native creativity globally, and embed the brand in cultural conversation. The execution rested on four pillars.
1. Expanding Lo-Fi Content & TikTok: W Hotels intentionally diversified content away from polished editorial into lo-fi, humorous, socially native formats. TikTok became an engine for faster, bolder storytelling. Cheeky Text, trend-driven formats, and reactive edits demonstrated fluency in the platform’s language, helping W Hotels operate with agility and personality. This shift aligned with the brand’s modern luxury positioning and directly addressed next-gen traveler behavior.
2. Editorializing Social-First Thinking Across Markets: A major innovation was operationalizing creativity at scale. Toolkits, frameworks, and creative guidance empowered hotels and regional teams to produce on-brand content without sacrificing individuality. This evolved W Hotels’ presence from a brand-owned feed into a global content system, enabling a 300% increase in publishing volume year-over-year.
3. Scaling Narrative Franchises: Signature formats like Cheeky Text, mini-editorials, and event-specific story arcs created recognizable through-lines across platforms while leaving room for trend-based experimentation. These franchises acted as brand anchors, flexible enough to adapt globally, structured enough to drive consistent identity.
4. Driving Impact Through Collaborations & Partnerships: Partnerships amplified visibility beyond owned channels. Collaborations included W PRESENTS: The Retreat series, SXSW programming, influencer stays, and creator-led content series. Whitelisted creator posts extended authenticity and scale. Talent, including Ken Eurich, Benton McClintock, Cole Walliser, Hari Nef, and Lennon Gallagher, acted as creative collaborators rather than one-off amplifiers, producing content that mirrored their natural style while reinforcing W’s brand story.
Executional Challenge & Creative Innovation: The challenge was maintaining design-driven luxury standards while participating in fast-moving cultural moments. W Hotels solved this by blending high-production hero content with lo-fi everyday formats. This duality—luxury aesthetic meets witty, irreverent tone—became the creative signature that differentiated W Hotels in the hospitality category.
Together, this strategy transformed W Hotels from a rebranded presence into a culturally fluent, always-on social ecosystem—one that operates with speed, scale, and modern luxury storytelling.
W Hotels’ social-first strategy delivered breakthrough results, establishing the brand as Marriott’s most-engaged luxury brand and a cultural leader across platforms. Social content generated 161M+ total impressions, 36M+ total engagements, a 11.2% average engagement rate, 1.9B+ earned impressions, and over $3M in estimated earned media value. Paid content delivered an exceptionally efficient $5.44 average CPM.
On TikTok, W Hotels achieved 91.3M+ impressions, 13.9M+ engagements, and a sustained 14% engagement rate, proving that the brand’s shift toward lo-fi, humor-forward formats resonated strongly with next-gen luxury travelers. Meta delivered 66.9M+ impressions, 8.2M+ engagements, and a 13.6% engagement rate across paid and organic Reels.
Influencer strategy evolved from amplification to co-creation. Over 160 creators contributed to 50M+ impressions and drove expanded reach with whitelisting, expanding reach, and authenticity across channels. Creators acted as storytellers within W Hotels’ narrative rather than standalone partners, helping audiences experience the brand through lived perspectives.
Operationally, toolkits and global alignment enabled a 300% increase in content publishing, ensuring sustained storytelling around flagship launches like W Austin and W New York - Union Square, as well as evergreen programming.
Brand impact was measurable: social-first storytelling contributed to a +6.6-point lift in consideration and a +10.5-point lift in favorability, significantly outperforming benchmarks.
Together, these efforts transformed W Hotels’ social ecosystem into a global cultural engine. One that drives performance, relevance, and modern luxury leadership.
