Insights Type: Best Practices

What 2026 Is Demanding from Revenue Teams

Derek Boyle, CRME, Sr. Director, Account Management, IDeaS – a SAS Company, Rising Revenue Optimization Leader Council Member 

This article comes from a recent discussion of the revenue rising leaders council, where the discussion shifted from forecasting what revenue management might become to operating as if the next phase is already underway. 

The conversation centered on execution. AI is no longer emerging and no longer optional, but the group was clear that access alone does not create advantage. Advantage comes from learning faster, applying selectively, and staying focused on outcomes that matter to the business. The group felt that efficiency carried more weight than experimentation, with repeated emphasis on tools that reduce friction, improve forecast accuracy, and ultimately show up in dollars rather than dashboards. 

At the same time, restraint was called out as a leadership skill. AI fatigue was acknowledged openly, alongside the reality that technology is not a shortcut to strategy, nor a replacement for judgment, alignment, or clear priorities. One participant summed it up, “I think the reality is that AI is not a band-aid to fix all of our problems.” 

The group had examples of how strategic revenue management showed up in practical behaviors, such as cross-training across commercial silos. By sharing systems instead of parallel workflows, you end up with fewer isolated revenue calls and more integrated conversations that include marketing, operations, and leadership with revenue positioned at the center. The role of the revenue leader continues to evolve toward translator, connector, and decision driver. Elevating revenue management now is less about proving its value and more about embedding it into how the business  runs. 

Recommended Reading 

  • Review takeaways from previous meeting recaps 
  • The Future of Revenue Management Is Strategic Leadership 
  • 8 Revenue Management Trends that Define 2025 & Beyond 
  • EHL Insights Hospitality Outlook Report 2026 

 

Questions for Teams 

  1. Innovation & Future Focus: What bold ideas or emerging trends could elevate revenue management in 2026? Consider technology, automation, or creative approaches that could reshape how we work—and how we measure success. 
  2. Making Collaboration Real: How can we turn the concept of breaking down silos into practical action? What steps or initiatives would make cross-functional alignment a reality next year, and how can we track progress against clear goals? 
  3. Defining Success for People & Teams: What would meaningful progress look like for revenue leaders and their teams by the end of 2026? How do we apply what we know to set tangible outcomes and KPIs that demonstrate impact?

Building a Commercial Glossary GMs Will Actually Use

Katie Davin, Associate Professor, Johnson & Wales University, Sales Advisory Board Member

Scott Muety, VP, Revenue & Distribution, Viceroy Hotels, Revenue Optimization Advisory Board Member

General managers and operations leaders are stepping deeper into commercial conversations, but often still don’t speak the language. That gap slows decisions, softens confidence, and keeps too many leaders quiet in rooms where they should be active.

These recommendations come from discussions during the Sales and Revenue Advisory Boards. In both we looked at how a shared glossary could help GMs better navigate conversations with revenue, sales, marketing, distribution, and even owners. 

The discussions surfaced what actually helps, including:  

  • Definitions tied to actions 
  • Persona‑specific subsets so ops leaders don’t wade through what they won’t use 
  • Confidence to participate in revenue conversations instead of deferring 
  • Onboarding that includes commercial orientation 

The revised version is broader and more actionable, making it much easier to link to, reference, and use. 

Some teams are already moving this way offering short commercial primers for new GMs and re‑emphasizing terms in revenue meetings. This glossary is meant to be an aide in these conversations, and a practical tool to support everyday decision-making and cross-team collaboration. By using the glossary, we hope it ensures everyone on your team is speaking the same language and can confidently participate in commercial conversations. 

Explore the Glossary

Team Discussion Questions 

  1. Which terms in the glossary matter most for our property’s daytoday decisions? 
  2. Where do communication breakdowns happen between ops and commercial teams? 
  3. How do we make the glossary easy to use, not another PDF lost in someone’s downloads folder? 
  4. What personaspecific terms should our team understand to collaborate better?

Marriott Bonvoyland Lands Digital Best of Show

Marriott Bonvoy’s innovative approach earned them the HSMAI Adrian Award’s Best of Show honor in the Digital division for Marriott Bonvoy Land. The campaign successfully engaged younger generations by leveraging strategic partnerships and creating immersive experiences.

 

Learn more about the 2024 Adrian Awards Winners Here:  https://adrianawards.hsmai.org/winners-gallery/

Best Practices in Travel Advertising, Digital, PR/Communications & Integrated Marketing

2022 Adrian Awards: Platinum and President’s Award Honorees Special Report

In a year that started heavily impacted by the pandemic, destination travel marketing became more prevalent, especially highlighting the ecotourism trend of sustainable and responsible travel. The focus area of recruitment brought us entries that pushed the envelope creatively. We were awed by multi-faceted campaigns with great integration of all platforms, from traditional channels to new and exciting ones like VR, TikTok, and Twitch. We found beautiful storytelling, high quality content, and skillful use of influencers to really engage with guests. Finally, many brands and destinations are focusing on inclusive travel. Winning entries in the diversity, equity, and inclusion focus area included engaging, thoughtful, and authentic storytelling.

HSMAI Adrian Awards Best Practice: Moxy APAC Campaign

The 2023 Adrian Awards are now open! Take some inspiration from last year’s Best of Show –Marriott – Moxy APAC. Submit your entry for the 2023 Adrian Awards by September 8, 2023.

In a new Special Report, we profile all of the Platinum and President’s Award winners — including Marriott – Moxy APAC, which was honored for this Audience Marketing on New Platforms-Focus Category entry:

BEST OF SHOW WINNER: MOXY APAC BRAND CAMPAIGN “MOXY UNIVERSE, PLAY BEYOND”
AGENCY PARTNER: MEDIAMONKS

Background
Moxy is a young and trendy brand for travelers who are young at heart. As a relatively new brand in APAC, having only entered the market in 2017, Moxy needed to make a splash with its 2021 China launch and focus on dramatically increasing brand awareness and establishing a compelling positioning with fast-growing generation Z consumers. Moxy took the rising trend of Metaverse and gaming culture, and gave its own spin, creating a first of-its-kind campaign in the APAC hospitality market.

Campaign
“Moxy Universe, Play Beyond,” was an integrated campaign that broke the boundaries between offline and online, bringing a hotel experience designed to delight, capture and win the hearts of fun-loving generation Z consumers. They embraced generation Z values of diversity & inclusivity and continued to shape their identity through Avatar customization
and creativity and tied it with Moxy experiences.

Results
As the first hotel brand doing LIVESTREAM on Twitch, Moxy showcased its unique experiences and AR engagement with its audience. They hosted 4 offline events in Xi’An, Shenzhen, Osaka and Bandung with over 90 media and influencers. Through the campaign they achieved over 101MIL brand impressions, and a brand lift increased by 237% in TikTok/Douyin search trend and 77% in WeChat search trend index. They drove significant social buzz including over 7.2 million in PR reach and 872K engagements.

 

HSMAI Adrian Awards Best Practices: Visit Seattle Rain Booth

The 2023 Adrian Awards are now open! Take some inspiration from one of last year’s honorees –Visit Seattle. Submit your entry for the 2023 Adrian Awards by September 8, 2023.

In a new Special Report, we profile all of the Platinum and President’s Award winners — including Visit Seattle, which was honored for this Public Relations/Communications entry.

PLATINUM WINNING ENTRY: KISSING IN THE RAIN: SEATTLE EMBRACES ITS MOST CONTROVERSIAL SEASON
AGENCY PARTNERS: COPACINO FUJIKADO AND C+C

Background
After a year of uncertainty and challenging news coverage (crime, safety, homelessness issues) coming out about Seattle, Visit Seattle set out to change traveler’s perspectives of the Emerald City, by launching a national campaign, focused on reigniting excitement back into Seattle travel.

Campaign
Embracing an unexpected element, Visit Seattle headed over to the heat-encompassed cities of Los Angeles and Scottsdale, to launch their Kissing in the Rain Booth: a first-ever sustainable rain booth, built to highlight the magic and romance of a rainy Seattle day and invite potential travelers to fall in love with Seattle’s cozy season. After all, some of the most magical scenes in cinema involve rain – from kisses in the rain (a la The Notebook and Spiderman) to extravagant musical numbers (like the classic Singing in the Rain).

Results
The 17’ x 16’ booth had rainfall that was captured and pumped back to make the booth fully sustainable. The design itself featured wooden ramps and paneling to create a mid-century modern Pacific Northwest look. Visitors in both cities lined up to kiss, dance and sing in the rain, and were then given the opportunity to choose from three unique movie posterstyle Seattle backgrounds to share their Instagram-worthy misty moments in the booth with their followers. Afterwards, visitors walked away with Seattle-branded swag—from sleek bucket hats to cooling misting fans. The Seattle Rain Booth garnered 81 pieces of unique traditional news and social media coverage and was featured everywhere from Reuters to Yahoo News to the Weather Channel to Adweek—to the tune of a combined 167MM+ earned media impressions.

Overcoming Challenges Between Brands and Licensees: Best Practices in Franchising from the HSMAI Global Distribution Advisory Board

Michael Hucho, Management Consultant, HSMAI Global Distribution Advisory Board Member 

Across the world, long term relationships with loyal franchise partners are being put to the test. This is especially true for mid-size operating companies working in a multi-brand franchise environment. Hotels are increasingly questioning what they receive in return to their brand royalty fees, their system and transaction fees, loyalty fees, etc.  

Tensions on the franchisee side are the top line cost of distributions service delivery and staff that has been made redundant or had their hours reduced. Existing contracts are now under review leading to renegotiation in Europe. However, there are challenges on the franchises side as well such as increasing pressure, brand compliance, operational quality, and guest experience.  

The HSMAI Global Distribution Advisory Board met to discuss the challenge and share best practices.  

10 Best Practices in Handling Brand/Licensee Challenges 

  1. Focus on how to mitigate pain points for operators. Staff sizes are shrinking, so think about making their lives easier, make reservation delivery easier and more seamless.  
  2. Create partnerships with B2B and B2C distributors to fill in holes formed from the loss of segments (i.e. – group, business).  
  3. Concentrate on content and how to update content. Create a survey for hotels about what services they’re offering. This helps show hotels the brand value and support. 
  4. Streamline transaction fee pricing so all brands have the same fee structures. This makes it easier for our development offices to articulate the fee regardless of brand.  
  5. Standardize systems – for starting into the franchise arena get compliance from the start. For companies with acquired brands, move towards standard systems.  
  6. Create a distribution manual to communicate with franchise partners on the commercial side that includes resources for them to understand their obligations, rate plans, the fees, etc.  
  7. Communicate – Send emails (and track open rates), host town halls, and call franchisees.  
  8. Educate – Do internal education to make sure franchisees understand the key points of distribution, whatever the hot topic is that week or that month and give them the tools and the resources.  
  9. Measure – Have a scorecard that includes pieces of distribution, especially around rate parity and including photo scores, operational compliance, guest review scores.  
  10.  Combine feedback with action plans and resources. That’s the job of a franchise company – to supply the resources. Then that makes that make operators successful.  

Content and Rate Parity Best Practices from Global Distribution Executives

In the first ever HSMAI global distribution executive roundtable, leaders in the field gathered to share best practices and challenges. It was clear from the start that the group had a lot to talk about around content and rate parity and leakage – the biggest challenges everyone faced. Below are best practices that came out of the discussion.

CONTENT

3RD Party Content Current State

There was consensus among the group that for most hotel companies, a content hub does not exist to update all booking channels. Updating content across all booking channels requires a lot of work and a lot of communication between corporate and the properties. Many systems are antiquated and need to be updated to a be more integrated so that a change made in one place distributes across all channels. Some mentioned technologies that vacation rentals use to streamline content.  Many agreed that partners don’t seem to be putting a priority on assisting with content development. In fact, some partners regularly add content fields and do not tell hoteliers. It was agreed that hoteliers need to come together and push the partners to further technology in this space.

Given the limitations and challenges, here are ideas participants shared for optimizing efficiency in content.

Best Practices

  • Build the business case to have a dedicated team for updating content for third party partner sites.
  • Ensure there are proper communication channels in place, so the properties update corporate on changes.
  • Ensure you track changes made to content on all channels.
  • Reference the vacation rental industry who has a content hub for ease of updating content.
  • Contract with a company that can assist with image distribution and question/ answer sites.
  • Leverage content APIs provided by some partners.
  • Push your CRS & PMS providers to add more content fields to their systems.

RATE PARITY

Rate parity and leakage was the other hot topic among the global distribution executives. Though there are technology providers that say they can solve rate parity, it continues to be an issue. There were some great tips shared for handling parity and leakage.

Rate Parity and Leakage Tips

  • Sunset any contracts that provide static rates and move to dynamic rates.
  • In the B2B space – give the same discount to everyone to level playing field.
  • Do test bookings to find the source of distributer that is reducing the rate – either internally or using a 3rd Build clauses into the agreement to have the 3rd party pay for test bookings.
  • Contract a partner that will perform rate shops on your behalf.
  • When leakage is found, either terminate the offenders or give them limited rates.
  • Add clauses to the contract that leakage is grounds for termination.

Executive Roundtables are invite only discussions and networking for HSMAI members that are senior level hotel leaders.