I've also found the Novotel marketing posters in the hotels to be very "fun" and feature kids in them along with talking about family-related promotions and this is also mentioned prominently on their online site as well.

Personally I find Novotel and Mercure to be very close to each other although Mercure is usually the cheaper option, but again with Mercure you can be rolling the dice just the same. My wife's first experience in a Mercure was at the one in Nadi and that certainly wasn't a very good impression of the brand! I had to convince her that this was not the norm at all when I booked our trip to the Kuala Lumpur location!