Orlando | The timeshare industry with 10 billion in worldwide sales is quickly approaching its fifth decade. In the coming year, millions of travelers around the world will encounter and experience timeshare vacation ownership, fractional ownership, residence clubs, and condo-hotels. The upcoming years will bring about a new era in the timeshare industry; one that embraces branding, diversity, globalization, digital media, and more. Lawrence Hefler, a marketing and branding expert, and founder of Hefler International, is excited and passionate about reshaping the timeshare and vacation ownership industry. “Consumers will begin to realize new ways of how, when, and where the shared ownership messages for leisure and vacation products are delivered,” Hefler said. “Innovative companies will engage customers throughout the online and offline experience, delivering clear and consistent messages across all consumer and guest touch points while building brand trust.”

Hefler’s seven trends capture the new “brandstyles” that will transform the industry into the next decade:

  1. Demobrandics: Preview centers, sales galleries, and resort destinations will offer the alternative of self-guided, audio-visual tours that will give diverse audiences a clear and consistent brand and product message, at their own pace, and in the language of their choice. Marketers will further see that audiences (especially baby boomers) are not a single segment at all, but rather a group of sub-segments differentiated by their lifestyle, life stage, and purchase behaviors, much more so than demographics of age, income, and geography.
  2. Maxi-vacs: The days of one-dimensional, printed collateral materials, displays, presentation books, and signage are fading (literally and figuratively.) They will be replaced by multimedia screens, interactive touch screens, kiosks, and mobile tablet PCs. These technologies will allow consumers to engage more of their senses; to see, feel, and hear about the product, creating an emotion, thereby becoming more open to absorb and retain the information.
  3. Postviewing: Old will become new again as electronic media; such as TV and radio will be utilized to reach and target local market segments. Face-to-face marketing will edge out telemarketing as the dominant way to personally connect consumers to the brand and the product. New preview centers and vacation galleries will proliferate in cities and locations away from the actual property being sold.
  4. E-mmunities: Web sites will become more content based, user friendly, interactive, and transactional, creating opportunities for lead generation, rental inventory, re-sales, and eventually, purchasing online. With over 60 percent of US Internet users having broadband, expect to see greater use of rich media to engage users online. Consumers will further leverage their online research capabilities to make decisions, and share their experiences through user groups, online communities, chat rooms, and blogs. The use of RSS (Really Simple Syndication) will rise as users can receive (rather than search) content, such as news, tips, information, and promotions from multiple sources by subscribing to a personalized feed.
  5. Brandsharing: Companies will seek out and embrace strategic partners for co-branding, co-marketing, and data sharing. This will enhance their database with their partner’s database to gain a more robust view of their customers and prospects. Subsequently, a co-branded product message may come directly from a marketing partner.
  6. TPG (trust per guest): To avoid consumer dissatisfaction with the sales and marketing process, companies will pay more attention to the Code of Standards and Ethics of the American Resort Development Association, also known as the Timeshare Bill of Rights. These guidelines are a template for best practices for timeshares, fractionals, and vacation clubs
  7. Glocalization: The coming year will be the time to watch the growth spurt of the industry’s global marketing plan with strategic specific guidelines. Major players will look to grow their brands in new markets around the world. But, similar to the hospitality brands, it will be a learning experience to market globally and adapt their brand and product to local cultures.

“Timeshare style marketing, sales techniques and product experiences will be blogged about in social media-spheres. Some companies will fall short, while forward-thinking companies that engage in more education and compliance will win the hearts and minds of the buyer, their friends, their family, and most importantly, create brand advocacy,” Hefler added. Hefler’s opinions on the timeshare purchase experience parallels those of the American Resort Development Association: “The tolerance for aggressive, outdated direct sales practices is lower than ever before and comes with greater risks to our new found status as the desirable vacation product timeshare.”

Hefler is the founder of Hefler International, a marketing and brand consulting firm specializing in the timeshare vacation ownership, fractional, residence club, and condo-hotel spaces. After nearly a decade in the industry, Hefler saw the need for more sophisticated marketing strategies, brand integration, and innovation in a robust and still evolving industry in need of greater consumer confidence. Hefler’s marketing acumen is a result of his 20 years of experience in marketing management roles with global consumer brands including: American Express, BellSouth, Disney, and Hilton.

To request an interview, additional information or schedule a speaking engagement, visit or call 407-644-7840.

Biography – Lawrence Hefler – Hefler International

American Express, BellSouth, Boise, Disney, and Hilton are the brand heritage of Lawrence Hefler, founder of Hefler International. Hefler has over 20 years of experience in the art and science of branding, marketing, and customer relationships. He has enjoyed leadership roles during his Fortune 500 journey, but now, on the cusp of the timeshare industry’s fifth decade, Hefler is poised and ready to help transform the face of the industry for the next generation. He stated, “The timeshare vacation ownership industry will experience a plethora of changes in the years ahead and it’s my mission to be a perpetrator of these changes.”

The Hefler brand saga started at the powerhouse of consumer brands, American Express Company, as a marketing manager in New York. It was here that his passion for brand marketing took hold and he was soon recognized as an innate marketing talent for travel-related services and card products, becoming the company’s first western region marketing manager in San Francisco.

His penchant for change landed Hefler at BellSouth Corporation in Atlanta, Georgia, where in his first year he optimized the small business customer base of one million across 500 markets for The Real Yellow Pages by designing and launching cutting edge, direct marketing programs.

After three years at BellSouth, Hefler was tapped to an even more complex role and accepted a database marketing position at Chicago-based Boise Cascade (now Office Max), an international paper and office supplies company. Hefler lead the design of a state-of-the-art database and Internet marketing strategy, delivering a 25 percent increase in product sales.

Hefler’s reputation was building as an early practitioner of Internet technology, which piqued the interest of the Walt Disney Company. As senior manager of e-business and integrated marketing, Hefler launched one of the first direct e-business solutions for Disney Vacation Development and other niche brands of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, in Orlando, Florida. Disney, the “brand-king” of customer relationships, challenged Hefler to develop a customer-centric program that would combine the Internet, direct mail, and telemarketing programs into an integrated revenue source. Disney was not disappointed; e-business-driven revenue increased by 200 percent while direct response rates improved by 30 percent. “This was a huge undertaking as we had to stay within the brand guidelines mandated by Disney in regard to customer relationships while integrating e-solutions into the mix,” Hefler said. His new e-business platform eventually developed into a full-fledged e-organization.

Hefler’s marketing successes at Disney spread like wildfire in the marketing world and soon he was being courted by other Fortune 500 companies. One stood far above the others as it offered a new executive marketing position over a rapidly growing, multi-million dollar subsidiary with locations in Orlando, Las Vegas, and Hawaii. Hefler accepted the offer from Hilton Hotels, as vice president of brand marketing for Hilton Grand Vacations Company (HGVC). Brand integration played a huge role in his new position and enabled HGVC to enjoy double-digit sales growth year after year. Again, his knowledge of e-business, coupled with affinity relationships and strategic alliances led to the expansion of the HGVC database from one million to more than 30 million households. This allowed for a 100 percent revenue increase from a newly launched telesales channel. In addition, his decision to champion multi media and interactive programs dramatically impacted lead generation and conversions.

Today, Hefler is ready to face the challenges of a new era in the timeshare industry and share his well-earned knowledge either as a keynote speaker or as an on-site partner, assisting companies in the timeshare vacation ownership, fractional ownership, and condo-hotel spaces to implement emerging strategies that increase customer acquisition, reduce marketing and sales costs, and build brand value. As an independent consultant, Hefler is also poised to act as a catalyst for innovation, lead a marketing team, or help to develop a new business model that will change the rules of the game and redefine the marketplace for shared ownership in travel and leisure.

Hefler resides in Orlando, Florida with his three children. When he is not traveling the globe discovering new timeshare opportunities, he takes the time to digitally capture the world around him as he pursues his passion for photography.

Nina Zapala (Fareed and Company)
757.437.7135
Hefler International