That’s right, Roger Smith is on Google Plus! @RShotel #Rogersrooms Giveaway
Posted on 09. Jan, 2012 by JohnKnowles in Community, Hotel
Last week marks a turning point in our social media engagements as we began our community initiative on Google Plus. What better way to jump into the growing platform than under the guidance of marketing and blogging expert Chris Brogan. On Wednesday January 4th, 2012 Chris met with our team and talked with us about Google Plus for business. We have been lucky to have Chris be a brand ambassador over the years and are thrilled to be able to engage with him about such a fresh topic! We are currently building our presence on the platform and will be launching new collaborations with Chris in 2012. 
If you want to know more about “Google Plus for Business” you should read Chris’ book and engage in the conversation.
As part of our #Rogersrooms initiative, I will be giving away a 2 night stay at the Roger Smith to be used in January as part of this blog post. To win the #Rogersroom contest, please tell us your favorite feature or fact about the Google plus platform and why you think it is interesting. The most unique, cleaver, useful, or original feature presented will win the contest! If you present a case study of who is innovating with in the platform, that could help you stand out as well! Please post your comments on our blog or this G+ post to be considered.
The stay can only be used in January 2012. I will be choosing a winner on Wednesday January 11th. I look forward to your feedback!
Be sure to follow +Roger Smith Hotel and engage us with your interest, ideas or inquiries. We will be hosting Google + meetups in the future and are excited about the relationships we will build on Google + in 2012.
Please share, comment and engage!
Thanks
John Knowles – Director of Digital Marketing
@RSHotel, @Pancity
How Roger Smith fell out of bed!
Posted on 09. Jan, 2012 by JohnKnowles in Community, Hotel
This is the story of how Roger Smith is become more then just a hotel in New York. There are many hotels in New York and we are not the biggest, the newest or the fanciest. Our rooms are large in comparison to other hotels yet they have an old-world charm.
So how does a 130 room hotel in the middle of midtown Manhattan distinguish itself from it’s competitors?
What does Roger Smith think of himself?
Roger Smith is a place of ideas!
Roger Smith is a friendly host!
Roger Smith is a place for advanced media opportunities!
Roger Smith is a place for the arts; both creation and consumption!
Roger Smith is a place to be discovered!
Roger Smith is a place to be launched!
Roger Smith shares your content!
Roger Smith creates his own content!
Roger Smith is a personality!
I am Roger Smith!
You are Roger Smith!
He is Roger Smith!
Roger Smith Pops Up!
Roger Smith will engage with you on twitter as well a have a drink with you in Lilys!
Roger Smith will be your friend, follow you and learn about your influence!
Roger Smith is not just a Hotel, it is a family!
Become part of the Culture!
A Great Start to 2012! @RSHotel is what’s happening! @Chrisbrogan & Google+ @Harlanmack #Studio501 Popup Shop!
Posted on 08. Jan, 2012 by JohnKnowles in Community, Events, Hotel
I’d like to share with you some highlights from our first week of the New Year @RSHotel. There’s much to look forward to! On January 4th we met with Chris Brogan to talk about Google + for business! His book is a complete Business Guide to Google+, Today’s Hottest New Social Network!
On January 5th we celebrated the work of sculptor Harlan Mack at our first artist dinner for the 125 Window Gallery in the starlight ballroom.
Follow www.125windowgallery.tumblr.com for updates.
The third highlight of the week and major development of the year is the acquisition of a new space currently known as Studio 501 located between the RS Pop shop and the Lab Gallery. This space will activate new and exciting brand collaborations in 2012. Stay tuned for more details!
In thinking about this new space, I am not sure what to call it… What would you call this new popup space? What would you do with a time limited popup opportunity? Look forward to your feedback. Happy New Year!
Please share, comment and engage!
Thanks
John Knowles – Director of Digital
Marketing
@RShotel
@Pancity
Meditation / Mediations A reflection on artistic collaborations with Daniel Rothbart by John Knowles
Posted on 06. Jan, 2012 by JohnKnowles in Arts, Community, Hotel
Video as an art-form was my creative indulgence in 2011. I have been testing visual concept through patterns and loops and have developed a style and method for my creative expression. It has inspired new collaborative projects that test my ability to mix and balance different elements of light, color, intent and other contributing inputs.
On November 20th 2011, I set up my projections with artist Daniel Rothbart to test out new forms of creative alchemy. The ingredients of the experiment consisted of my intent to drive future success and innovation combined with Daniels perspective as a conductor within the light.
Together we explored the dimension of the empty space in the bowls and played with the shadows as they appeared on the wall behind him. His calm and observant nature provided the an ideal collaborative chemistry.
So what can you as the objective observer take away from this experience? I believe that creative expressions of intent opens the door to new realizations and physical manifestations. By exploring the depths of your creative potential you can imagine and experience any reality you choose. My objective is to inspire and stimulate others to create and participate.
Stay tuned for collaborative art projects in 2012. We will soon be launching an Artist meetup at the Roger Smith where creative personalities be able to meet and experiment.
Reach out and engage to be part of the growing network.
Welcome to @pancity! Where all your dreams come true!
Give the gift of New York! Win a free stay @RShotel. #Rogersrooms
Posted on 20. Dec, 2011 by JohnKnowles in Community, Events, Hotel
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In the week leading up to Christmas, Roger Smith will be putting on his Santa hat and giving away a series of #Rogersrooms. It’s a brilliant gift idea to give a 2 night stay at New York’s Roger Smith Hotel. The rules to win are as follows. In the comments section of this blog, tell us who deserves the gift of New York and why. Once you have posted your comment on the blog you must also post “Give the gift of New York! @RShotel #SantaContest #rogersrooms http://bit.ly/u0wWAt” to your twitter or to our facebook profile. 
We will be choosing 2 winners on Friday December 23th, just in time for Christmas.
In the wake of Santa Con, we are also giving away 1 room to the best Santa Costume Picture Submitted to twitter with “Give me my #Rogersroom @RShotel #Santacontest” in the body of the tweet.
Thanks ahead of time for participating. Happy Holidays
John Knowles, Director of Digital Marketing @RShotel
#TweetDrive inspires NYC’s Social Community to give back! ~ Harrison Kratz guest blog post
Posted on 20. Dec, 2011 by JohnKnowles in Community, Events, Hotel
On Tuesday Decemeber 13, social media professionals and community builders from the New York City area came together to give back and celebrate the holidays at the Lily’s in the Roger Smith Hotel for the New York City Tweet Drive.
The New York City Tweet Drive was part of Tweet Drive, a global social good campaign that brings together social media communities to collect toys for under-privileged children during the holiday season.
New York’s social media community came out in full force and showed what the holidays are all about – friends, family, drinks, giving back, and more than a few ridiculous Facebook photos.
Thanks to event partners such as HP, Community Managers Meetup, SCVNGR and popchips, New York rocked around the Christmas tree to the tune of over 100 toys collected for Toys for Tots’ Brooklyn chapter! In celebration, there may or may not have been some “Tebowing.”
As the organizer of Tweet Drive, I would just like to say thank you for making this an unforgettable night. While there are many things to do in the city during the holidays, you all chose to spend it with us to give back to a great cause.
Santa Con may have been last Saturday, but for one night at the Roger Smith Hotel, we all got to be our own version of Santa Claus.
This is a guest blog post from Harrison Kratz.
Bio: Harrison Kratz navigates New York City as the Community Manager at MBA@UNC, the new MBA online program from the University of North Carolina. He also sticks to his entrepreneurial roots as the founder of the global social good campaign, Tweet Drive.
On The Stage – December On/Off Broadway Guide by James Fox
Posted on 05. Dec, 2011 by Birdsong in Arts, Community, Events
December offers four new shows on Broadway which make great pre-holiday treats:
www.bonnieandclydebroadway.com
REVIEW: Art critic Jonathan Goodman on The LAB’s Summer 2011 Show ‘Projected Drawings’ by Helen Dennis
Posted on 30. Nov, 2011 by danikadruttman in Arts, Community, Hotel
Helen Dennis at The LAB
Educated both in England and America, Helen Dennis has decided to stay on the States, where she appreciates the openness of the art world she participates in. Part of this freedom has to do with the styles and themes the artist has chosen–Dennis works figuratively, primarily describing architecture and outdoor street life in white on black drawings; she takes numerous snapshot photos of her chosen site, then projecting them onto black paper and painting or drawing the images according to her photographic guide. For the current project at The LAB (on through September 2nd), Dennis has used the corner gallery space as an ongoing experimental site, rendering the roads—47th Street and Lexington Avenue—and their buildings, which have been projected from numerous photographic snapshots fitted together. As a result, her stay at the gallery means several things at once: a chance to see someone work on a big picture, the ability to see the work develop over time, and the opportunity to consider the relations between the rendered image and the actual visual cues that inspired it.
Dennis, who is at great pains to be precise and accurate in her vision, has been using markers filled with reflective silver paint, which is applied to black paper put up on the wall; the work’s presence at night is spectacular, animated by a spectral glow that is never diffuse because of the right-angled architectural features she is presenting to her audience. The results are wonderfully visual: the iridescence of the silver results nearly in an image that looks like it is electrically lit! Of course, that isn’t Dennis’s point, which is instead oriented toward a poetic re-presentation of the city, at a site whose coordinates match those of the streets immediate outside it. Dennis, whose activities and friendships are truly international in their implications, shows us just how urban—and urbane—we have become in New York, one of the great art capitals of the world. Although the blocks framing the gallery do not stand out to the casual passerby, it is clear that the artist is using them as a reference to the seen reality of a city street, whose rhythm and building supports both are captured by Dennis’s skillful renderings. And it is a wonderful thing to be able to track imagined realism with the actual objects themselves, however close or loose relations might be between the two.
Two of the four walls consist of glass windows, allowing a casual viewer passing by outside to gauge the two other walls, which Dennis has covered with black paper. She has complete command of perspective, given the sharp angles of the buildings and streets she presents by using the markers. Rows of windows are caught, and their angled parallelograms are filled in, leaving a very bright impression of a façade; other urban details are paid attention too: streetlamps, one-way traffic signs, and, a favorite object of Dennis’s, bicycles. In a way, it would be easy to view Dennis’s journey as an impressionistic attempt to give the city its due, but my feeling is that she is offering more than a map of New York. It has something to do with the ambience of the city, an unspoken presence that is captured by Dennis’s playing close attention to detail—for example, on the second wall, there is a door leading to the hotel space the gallery is part of; Dennis has accommodated its access by drawing carefully across, to the point where the outline of the door is difficult to see. Dennis, a gifted craftsperson, also knows how New Yorkers are often emotional, even triumphalist about the experience of their city. As someone coming from England, she keeps her affection for New York in practical restraint, even as she makes it clear that she too loves the everyday experience of America’s great metropolis.
By Jonathan Goodman
The LAB (for installation + performance art) is a New York based, converted storefront producing fast paced performance art and site-specific installations. Viewable exclusively from the sidewalk and aimed at the furious midtown foot traffic, The LAB’s exhibitions seek to throw a moment of uncertainty into the predictable monotony of the midtown shuffle, forcing an interaction between the high energy, “outrospective” work it produces and the nearly 25,000 daily passersby. The LAB is located on the North East corner of 47th and Lex and is a Roger Smith Collaboration
For more information about The LAB CLICK HERE
The Roger Smith is a hub for social media in #NYC. People. Art. Food. Wine. For 10% off our best available rooms rate: bit.ly/RSrooms
twitter: twitter.com/rshotel
fb: facebook.com/rogersmithhotel
blog: bit.ly/RSlife
web: rogersmith.com/
Molly Barnes Art discussion with Mark Kostabi and Gail Levin (Video Archive 11/17/11 & 11/18/11)
Posted on 16. Nov, 2011 by Birdsong in Arts, Community, Events
Mark Kostabi talks about his art work and introduces his new game show “Title this“.
Gail Levin, a biographer, art historian and curator, discusses her new biography of Lee Krasner
The Roger Smith is a hub for social media in #NYC. People. Art. Food. Wine. For 10% off our best available rooms rate: bit.ly/RSrooms
twitter: twitter.com/rshotel
fb: facebook.com/rogersmithhotel
blog: bit.ly/RSlife
web: rogersmith.com/
Appnostic announces SocialBooker Facebook booking app; @RSHotel in NYC first hotel
Posted on 15. Nov, 2011 by Birdsong in Community, Hotel
(via Hotelmarketing.com)
SocialBooker allows for any hotel using any Central Reservations System (CRS), Internet Booking Engine (IBE), or Property Management System (PMS) to harness the power of Facebook’s Social Graph.
Appnostic, a leading social media and travel technology provider, is introducing the first fully integrated Facebook hotel reservations booking app; SocialBooker. SocialBooker allows for any hotel using any Central Reservations System (CRS), Internet Booking Engine (IBE), or Property Management System (PMS) to harness the power of Facebook’s Social Graph. Appnostic’s SocialBooker provides true social commerce, personalizing the hotel booking experience, while providing travelers a better way to socially interact and book a hotel.
SocialBooker is the hotel industry’s first reservation platform specifically optimized for Facebook’s Social Graph. The look and feel can be easily customized to complement a hotel’s existing branding and CRS connectivity. SocialBooker enables the hotel to harness the viral capabilities inside the Facebook network to maximize sales, build customer loyalty, and deliver improved customer service.
According to Appnostic CEO Brian Dass, “SocialBooker is a Facebook app that delivers a completely integrated booking solution, from room availability through payment transaction, all from within the Facebook environment. Furthermore, hotels can customize their unique booking paths to deliver a fully branded, immersive, and socially connected room-booking experience,” he explained
“We are very excited to have jointly launched a private label version of SocialBooker with the Roger Smith Hotel, a New York based hotel known for their proactive approach to Social Media.” Dass explained. Furthermore as consumer adoption for F-commerce continues to grow at a rapid pace, more and more hotel bookings will be conducted through Facebook. “Beginning with the Roger Smith Hotel, Appnostic is helping the hotel industry prepare for the social commerce revolution that is already having an impact on consumer travel.
John Birdsong, Roger Smith Hotel New Media Director says, “Customers are increasingly looking to engage with the hotel via Facebook. Each month over 500 million people on Facebook use an app or experience the Facebook social plugin on other websites. It’s becoming the must-have marketing platform for hotel managers. SocialBooker brings the first complete booking app solution to our Fan Page, and allows the Roger Smith Hotel to monetize our fan base, while opening up an entirely new sales channel.”
By becoming part of the Facebook eco-system, hotel property operators are able to access user profile data and gain insights through Facebook’s internal analytics. This experience is fully personalized including ‘Friend Recommendations, Wall posts, and “Like” button integration, all leveraging Facebook’s newsfeed technology to virally spread your special offers, promotions and packages.
Jeff Thomas, Appnostic’s EVP, Business Development stated that many hotels have expressed a strong interest in adopting the SocialBooker app. “We have active discussions underway with a large number of hotels and groups in North America and in Europe on utilizing SocialBooker as their preferred social media distribution platform.” Thomas continued, “These hotels recognize the importance of this valuable new distribution channel and understand that early adoption is crucial in gaining a competitive advantage on Facebook while defining a standard for social revenue management and distribution.”
Check out the app here.
Let us know what you think in the comments section.
The Roger Smith is a hub for social media in #NYC. People. Art. Food. Wine. For 10% off our best available rooms rate: bit.ly/RSrooms
twitter: twitter.com/rshotel
fb: facebook.com/rogersmithhotel
blog: bit.ly/RSlife
web: rogersmith.com/
