Best Practices | HSMAI Americas

HSMAI Adrian Awards Best Practice: Wyndham’s Crisis Response Marketing

For the 2020 Adrian Awards program, HSMAI introduced four new focus categories to recognize the resilience that the industry demonstrated in response to COVID: corporate social responsibility, crisis communications and management, recovery strategies, and talent and leadership development. In Hospitality Successes During the Pandemic Year, a new HSMAI Special Report, we profile all of the Best Practice Gold winners in these four categories — including Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, which was honored for crisis communications and management. Details will be available shortly on the 2021 Adrian Awards competition.

BACKGROUND: In 2020, it was critical to ensure that Wyndham Rewards members felt peace of mind when it came to their points and status. To that end, Wyndham launched “Unlock Member Levels Faster,” a campaign that paused the expiration of Wyndham Rewards points for all members globally through the end of 2020, extended current member levels earned in 2019 through the end of 2021, relaxed earning requirements to allow members to gain status with fewer nights stayed, and relaxed cancellation policies. Wyndham also offered essential workers and first responders an instant complimentary gold membership in Wyndham Rewards and a 15-percent discount at participating hotels through the #EverydayHeroes initiative.

RESULTS: Through “Unlock Member Levels Faster,” Wyndham increased the number of members in all status levels; month over month, there was a 20-percent increase in members achieving the next level. Through #EverydayHeroes, 40 percent of those who signed up were new members, making this campaign successful in both enrolling new members and activating existing members.

Effectively Market Hotels on Facebook: Drive Awareness and Inspiration

HSMAI’s Marketing Advisory Board Tactical Workgroup has produced a series of resources focused on leveraging Facebook — which 70 percent of travelers use every week — to help drive revenue recovery. Previous resources focused on how to use dynamic ads and creative testing ideas. The next one addresses driving awareness and inspiration.

THE ISSUE

Hoteliers today desperately need to inspire travelers. They are thirsty to reach consumers who have travel intent to drive both consideration and long-term bookings. Hoteliers need a solution to capitalize on net new intent and foster potential travel.

IT’S IMPORTANT BECAUSE …

The travel industry has been hit hard by the pandemic. Many hotels are not close to full occupancy, and consumers have not yet fully bought into the idea of safe travel in this new normal we live in. We need to inspire confidence in travelers.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

If a picture is worth a thousand words, imagine the story you can tell with a truly immersive video. Use Facebook Trip Consideration targeting with video and image assets to reach people in market to travel. This strategy will help you reach people who have travel intent and inspire consideration of your brand for their next trip. It leverages online browsing activity, behavior, interests, and travel history.

The setup is a simple “toggle” in Ads Manager, ideally using Conversions, with no catalog required. Ideally, the KPI leveraged are “site visits” — driving inspiration and consumers to visit the hotel site.

STEP BY STEP

You will need an ad account in Ads Manager, the Facebook pixel, and inspirational creative. Ideally, the creative includes both video assets (4:5 videos < 15 seconds) and image assets (4:5 images).
Specific set up steps are here.
Get inspiration.

EXPECTED COST

The campaign setup in Ads Manager takes 10 to 20 minutes. The recommended budget is highly variable and based on how many site visits are desired.

Restructuring Departments and Other Priorities for Hotel HR Professionals in the Middle East

By Kaitlin Dunn, Writer, Hospitality Sales & Marketing Association International (HSMAI)

The HSMAI Foundation and HSMAI Middle East hosted a virtual Executive Roundtable on Oct. 21 for hotel chief human resources officers in the region to discuss best practices they have developed after nearly eight months in the world of COVID-19. J. Bruce Tracey, Ph.D., editor of Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, professor of management at Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration, and member of the HSMAI Foundation Board of Trustees, facilitated the discussion. HSMAI Americas hosted previous CHRO roundtables on July 14 and Oct. 15, HSMAI Asia Pacific hosted one on Aug. 19, and HSMAI Europe hosted one on Sept. 16. Participants shared lessons learned and best practices, many revolving around changes in HR departments, technology, and employee wellness.

CHANGES IN HR DEPARTMENTS

HR departments are not immune from the changes that have affected most of the hospitality industry, with several roundtable participants noting that their departments have been restructured. “In HR, we’re going into a completely self-service environment with technology,” one participant said. “Everybody will be able to do their HR-related work from their phones. I’m actually looking at taking HR out of all my properties and moving them into a centralized services office. There will be self-service kiosks, where you can get in there, go onto Teams, get into HR, and have your issues handled where necessary.”

The participant added that HR at their company is also transitioning some of its traditional duties to managers and instead serving in more of a support role. “All of the discipline and related issues, unless it comes to termination, have to be managed at the property level by the employees’ managers,” the participant said.

Another participant’s HR department is also being restructured and decentralized, so hotels and employees are more self-sufficient and less dependent on HR. “I find that we were babysitting our employees way too much,” the participant said. “Our employees want to make their own decisions and have self-service, but getting people to stop being reliant is not easy.”

TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION

The pandemic has accelerated the use of technology in most aspects of the hospitality industry. Participants said that guest services is one area where they have seen a lot of change. “We’re wanting to do a lot more particularly around understanding guests better,” one participant said.

One participant mentioned a new loyalty program their company recently rolled out. “It’s beautiful in its marketing, but it’s actually a very robust system on the back end,” the participant said. “It’s cleaning up guest profiles and finding better, more targeted ways of interacting. There are huge investments behind the scenes to drive greater engagement.”

While technology brings many efficiencies to the industry, it also eliminates the need for many jobs, participants said. “I don’t think technology will replace people in hospitality very soon,” one participant said, “but there will be a reduction in people because of the efficiencies that technology will bring.”

The participant added that technology likely will make some jobs that handle things like restaurant reservations or room-service orders obsolete, but people will always be needed to run hotels overall.

Along with technological changes, hotels are changing processes and services, forcing employees to come up with creative new solutions or, in some cases, look at older ways of doing things. “I used to laugh at anyone that was doing gueridon service and say they were a dinosaur,” one participant said. “Well, guess what? It’s back. We can’t bring people to the buffet, so we take the buffet to them. We immediately changed our buffets to these rolling trolleys.”

EMPLOYEE WELLNESS

As much as HR professionals and managers want employees to put their wellbeing first, roundtable participants said they have been having a hard time getting them to use benefits designed to help them, such as employee assistance programs (EAPs). “We have a wellness program, and we have a hotline, we have legal advice, mental health advice, and financial advisers,” one participant said. “But quite often people just don’t call those numbers. I want to push staff to deal with wellness and stress and fatigue. Safety and security have to be looked after before people can self-actualize and be contributing members of the organization.”

Another participant’s organization has been conducting workshops at each of its hotels to make sure that employees know what resources are available to them and that managers are able to help their employees. “I’ve been stressing with my HR team and general managers to look for different behavior,” the participant said. “If there was a good performer pre-COVID and their performance is going down and they’ve been quiet or calling in sick, you need to support and help them. We’ve been doing our best to create awareness within the hotels.”

One participant said that it’s a difficult balance supporting employees’ individual work needs while still operating the hotel. “Wellness is a strange thing right now, because some of our associates are completely okay with the way everything is going,” one participant said. “But others have really changed their lifestyle and it’s very scary for them. Finding a balance on allowing people to work from home and allowing others to come into the office has been very tricky.”

HSMAI Foundation: The mission of the HSMAI Foundation is to elevate the overall caliber and performance of sales, marketing, and revenue optimization professionals in the global hospitality industry by driving initiatives that will attract new talent, develop emerging talent, and engage existing talent. Learn more here.

For additional information, insights, and tools, visit HSMAI’s Global Coronavirus Recovery Resources page.

HSMAI SPECIAL REPORT: Best Practices – 2019 Platinum HSMAI Adrian Awards

Every year, HSMAI’s Adrian Awards program honors creativity and innovation in hospitality advertising, digital marketing, and public relations. When we recognized the winners of the 2019 Adrians at the Adrian Awards Dinner Reception and Gala in New York City on Jan. 21, 2020, we had no idea that would be the only time we would gather our community together in person this year.

But COVID-19 had other plans for both HSMAI as an organization and hospitality as an industry. And now more than ever, we find inspiration in the advertising, digital marketing, and public relations campaigns that stood apart.
To that end, this Special Report — presented with the support of HSMAI’s 2020 Organizational Member companies — offer profiles of the 24 campaigns that won Platinum honors as part of the 2019 Adrians. We hope you’ll find their ideas and examples valuable as we work together to steer hotel sales, marketing, and revenue optimization into and through recovery.

To learn more about these and other Adrians winners, visit adrianawards.hsmai.org.

Messaging, Trust, and Other Priorities for Hotel Loyalty Professionals

By Kaitlin Dunn, Writer, Hospitality Sales & Marketing Association International (HSMAI)

As part of Road to Recovery 2020, HSMAI hosted a virtual Executive Roundtable for hospitality chief loyalty officers in partnership with Clairvoyix on Oct 2. Roundtable participants choose the topics that they wanted to focus on; participating companies included Accor, Marriott, Red Roof, Best Western, Preferred Hotels & Resorts, Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, Extended Stay America, and Radisson Hotels. Participants had a robust discussion around topics of their choosing, including:

RECOVERY TIMING

The timing of when a vaccine becomes available to the general public is a major factor affecting how quickly the industry will recover, but roundtable participants said that they don’t believe it will be a magic switch back to normal. “The availability of the vaccine is key to all of us recovering, but it may not be the golden ticket that will have people flooding into our hotels like they were before,” one participant said.

Other participants, however, think that just the announcement of a successful vaccine may help inspire confidence and potentially bring some business back. “Even if it takes a while to be distributed, I think that just the announcement of a vaccine will start to relieve people’s stress and allow them to focus on their future lives,” one participant said. “It won’t immediately drive people into hotels, but it will let them relax and think about getting back to normalcy.”

“I don’t see this one crystalizing moment where everything goes back to normal,” another participant said. “I think it’s going to be slow growth, and the question is just how slow will it be. I think the announcement of the vaccine will build trust with some people, but the overall recovery, especially for group and business travel, won’t be until 2022.”

However, participants said, the vaccine isn’t the only factor to consider, and it is still too soon to accurately predict when business levels will return to pre-COVID levels. “What’s unknown is when people will feel comfortable,” one participant said. “There are a lot of people who won’t feel comfortable taking a vaccine for quite some time. A lot of us thought at one point that once we got a vaccine there would-be pent-up demand, but I think it’s going to take a while. People have gotten used to things now and there are still a lot of concerns. It may take into 2022 for us to be back to more normal occupancies.”

Another participant added: “It’s going to be at least 2022 before we are getting close to what we consider good levels. The other factor is the economy. It’s going to take a while before businesses feel comfortable putting their travelers on the road.”

NEW MESSAGING

As marketers have had to adjust their strategies to the new world we live in, customers are showing strong preferences for some surprising features, such as exterior corridors. “Those properties have become king of the road,” one participant said. “They are doing substantially better than comparable offerings with interior corridors”

“It’s been fascinating to think about how things that generally for the vast majority of travelers haven’t been preferred, have now become a key part of our messaging,” another participant said. “Those exterior hallways are partially why occupancy has come back quicker in economy and budget hotels that have them than upscale hotels.”

Other participants said they are pushing out creative ways to utilize their space, including one participant whose properties are offering a day rate for people who want to work in a hotel room instead of at home from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. “We keep testing different uses for our space,” another participant said. “We have a few hotels that have offered virtual academies for local students.”

BUILDING TRUST

Messaging has to focus on hotels’ cleanliness policy, which is a big part of building up customers’ confidence and trust in the industry, participants said. “Demand used to exist, and it was our job to bring it in,” one participant said. “Now it’s different. The demand doesn’t exist, so we have to build back that trust to consumers who no longer trust the concept of travel.”

One participant added that while cleanliness messaging is important, it’s more important that individual hotels actually enforce those policies. “We have a focused approach at delivery at the hotel level,” the participant said. “If the execution doesn’t happen at the unit level, we will lose the few customers that did have that trust in us. We have to make sure we are executing the statements we made about cleanliness. It’s rallying the troops and ensuring the actions match up to our marketing messages.”

Another participant added: “We need to keep talking about and sticking to our commitment to clean. Tired hotel rooms look dirty.”

(Read takeaways from HSMAI’s previous CLO virtual Executive Roundtables here and here.)

For additional information, insights, and tools, visit HSMAI’s Global Coronavirus Recovery Resources page.

Best Practices From Hospitality HR Professionals in North America

By Kaitlin Dunn, Writer, Hospitality Sales & Marketing Association International (HSMAI)

The HSMAI Foundation and HSMAI Americas hosted a virtual Executive Roundtable on Oct. 15 for hotel chief human resources officers across North America to discuss the best practices they have found after nearly eight months in the world of COVID-19. J. Bruce Tracey, Ph.D., editor of Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, professor of management at Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration, and member of the HSMAI Foundation Board of Trustees, facilitated the discussion. HSMAI Americas hosted a previous roundtable June 14, while HSMAI Asia Pacific hosted one on Aug. 19 and HSMAI Europe hosted one on Sept. 16.

Participants shared their lessons learned and best practices, many revolving around employee retention, communication, and innovation.

EMPLOYEE RETENTION

One concern among roundtable participants is keeping talents in the hospitality industry, as many are leaving for industries that seem more stable or offer different benefits. One participant suggested that talents may end up dictating the continuation of remote work beyond the pandemic — or hospitality may lose them. “People are looking to fill jobs,” the participant said, “and that leaves us to compete with industries like pharmaceuticals that have transferable skills and are starting to advertise that you can work anywhere. We’re spending a lot of time figuring out how we move forward.”

Another participant said that focusing more on employee recognition and engagement helps talents feel like they belong at the company and goes a long way in retaining them. “We want to make sure they know we appreciate them,” the participant said. “Not being able to go to the properties has been difficult, so we have to find different ways to communicate with employees.”

The participant suggested making more frequent Zoom meetings with and phone calls to associates and writing notes on their paychecks as ways to communicate your appreciation. “I think that will go a long way toward retention and keeping folks with us,” the participant said.

“Employees are always going to remember how you made them feel,” another participant said. “Even if we laid off employees, we did it in a way that didn’t leave a bad taste in their mouth, and they still feel loyalty to the company.”

Another participant’s company has created an easily accessible fund for employees who are on leave. “I felt that sent a significant message to our active team members that we are in alignment with our values,” the participant said. “It’s about reaching out to our team members in times of need.”

COMMUNICATION

Companies had to drastically shift gears on their employee communication strategies when the majority of the workforce went remote this spring. Roundtable participants said that the ways they communicate with employees virtually continue to evolve. “It’s really challenged the mindset of the hospitality industry about needing to be together,” one participant said.

Another participant said that her company is mixing up its communications by partnering people from different teams to have lunch together via Zoom. “They get to talk humanly about what’s going on,” the participant said. “We’ve found it very useful to connect people, because that was something that folks were missing from our regular day-to-day work.”

One participant said that his company created a series of sessions for general managers, corporate leaders, and sales and marketing employees to interact with each other, express how they’re feeling, and share what’s on their minds. “It’s really raising to the forefront challenges that they are sitting on right now,” the participant said.

Another participant said that while communication may be strong at the corporate level, it’s still tricky at the property level. “On the hotel level, we’ve still got a lot to sort out,” the participant said. “It’s going to be really sticky for leaders in the future to tell employees they don’t have to be in the building every day when we still don’t know what that looks like. It’s forcing us to listen a lot to figure it out.”

INNOVATION

On the plus side, many creative and technological advances have arisen from the pandemic, roundtable participants said. “As we start to recover and come back as an industry, the use of technology to aid and support the business is going to accelerate,” one participant said. “But more so, I think our guests are going to expect that, and I think as an industry we were behind on that. We’re always going to be a people-centric business, but that doesn’t mean we can’t be open to doing things differently.”

Another participant said: “We’ve learned that we can do things faster than ever before. Necessity is the mother of invention, and we have been really able to get things done.”

The participant added that the shift to virtual has helped their company add value to its internal meetings and led employees to want to attend not just large virtual gatherings but even weekly sessions because they have more of a purpose. Being able to see people’s faces on camera is very important to connecting successfully virtually. “We’re leaning into the virtual platforms to be just as effective, if not more than in person,” the participant said. “We’re learning how to deliver workshops to bring people together and split them into breakout groups.”

Another participant said that their company is utilizing technology to virtually showcase its facilities, particularly meeting spaces. “I think using creative technology such as drones and having footage that shows the protocols and safety measures we’re taking helps get people more comfortable and confident,” the participant said. “I think steps like these are really going to help the industry continue forward.”

For additional information, insights, and tools, visit HSMAI’s Global Coronavirus Recovery Resources page.

The 2021 Outlook for Hospitality and Travel

By Kaitlin Dunn, Writer, Hospitality Sales & Marketing Association International (HSMAI)

As part of HSMAI Road to Recovery 2020, global economist Bernard Baumohl will present a live webinar on Sept. 29 that offers insight into factors impacting recovery in hospitality and tourism around the globe. Recently, Baumohl spoke with HSMAI about his presentation, including what goes into making his predictions.

FORECASTING FACTORS

“I think we have to clearly brace ourselves for the next couple of months,” Baumohl said. “Right now and for the next eight weeks, we are going to be dealing with the tragedy of coronavirus and a political circus that will lead up to the November elections. There’s this toxic combination for the consumer and for businesses, and it will continue to have a negative impact on the leisure and hospitality industry.”

Baumohl said that there are three main factors that will shape the U.S. economy at least through 2022: the path of the virus, emergency funding from Congress, and who wins the presidential election. During his presentation, Baumohl will go over each factor and what happens in different scenarios for each one.

The first factor depends on how much more the virus spreads, which rests a lot on when a vaccine is developed, how effective it is, and if people are willing to take it, Baumohl said. “The effectiveness is critically important, because you can’t fix the economy and certainly not the industry without first fixing the virus.”

The second factor is what comes out of Congress in terms of an emergency funding package. “It is crucial that there be a financial bridge available at least until the vaccine is distributed,” he said. “It is necessary to keep businesses and the unemployed financially whole until then. If we do not have a meaningful package, then a recession is certain.”

Baumohl added that it is important to note that the Federal Reserve has done everything it can to support the economy. “It is now on Congress and the fiscal package,” he said. “A financial vaccine is needed until we get a coronavirus vaccine.”

The third factor is who is elected president. “We have radically different personalities with profoundly different policy agendas,” Baumohl said. “I will show what we think will happen if Trump wins or if Biden wins, and how it will affect the economy. It’s a major factor and their policies will have a huge impact on how the hospitality industry recovers.”

Even after coronavirus is no longer an active health threat, the economic and business landscape will look very different than it did during the pre-COVID world. Baumohl will review the areas where he expects to see major changes, then finish with additional factors that could affect the economy, including the possibility of the virus mutating, the accumulating national debt, and the risk of an international war. “There are lots of tensions that can derail economic expansion that are more political,” Baumohl said. “There are many international threats out there.”

THE HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY

One of the signs that the hospitality and travel industries are not close to recovery is the mass layoffs that are still occurring. “If companies are still seeing massive layoffs as late as August, that means these companies still don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel,” Baumohl said. “If they were more confident at the outlook, we wouldn’t be seeing that. They aren’t convinced the economy will turn around and show a stronger recovery anytime soon, which is concerning.”

There is a lot at stake for the hospitality industry when it comes to who wins the presidency. “The industry needs fresh funding, and it matters if they will find it under Biden or Trump,” Baumohl said.

Baumohl said that overall he believes the leisure and hospitality industry will recover more slowly than the rest of the economy, as people likely will still be uncomfortable with gathering and taking trips. Much of this could depend on a vaccine becoming available, but even then, Baumohl said people will have concerns. “We have to be prepared to erase our business model and come up with new strategies in the aftermath of the virus,” Baumohl said. “There will be a lingering fear for many years of another pandemic. It came out of the blue, and it could happen again. That’s the scary part.”

CHANGING PREDICTIONS

Due to the ever-evolving state of the world, Baumohl and his colleagues have found themselves having to update their predictions at least once a month. “We’ve run out of erasers,” he joked, “because we have to keep making new assumptions. All the events that are happening are still very fluid. This is so unprecedented. We’ve never shut down the economy like this before, and now we’re trying to open it again without a vaccine. We find ourselves often having to change our predictions.”

The most difficult part of making a forecast is trying to guess how humans are going to react, Baumohl said. “You can’t predict human behavior based on math, so we will always be behind on that,” he said. “We can look at policy decisions, but we really have to dive into human insights such as when will people be more comfortable. That’s why we have to keep reforecasting.”

HSMAI will present “The Changing Economic & Business Landscape” at 2 p.m. EDT on Sept. 29. Register here.

Adrian Awards Case Study: Discover Puerto Rico’s ‘Have We Met Yet?’

Nominations for HSMAI’s 2020 Adrian Awards competition will open on Oct. 1 — with a special focus on best practices, innovation, and community related to hospitality advertising, marketing, and public relations work created in response to the coronavirus crisis. Take inspiration from last year’s Platinum winners, including Discover Puerto Rico, whose “ ‘Have We Met Yet?’ Brand Repositioning” was recognized in the Advertising/Advertising Campaign/Complete Campaign – Consumer/Group Sales/Travel Trade category.

BACKGROUND: Following Hurricane Maria in 2017, Discover Puerto Rico launched a campaign to combat inaccurate consumer perception of its tourism industry, highlight the island destination’s recovery, and drive visits and bookings. The organization also wanted to increase meetings and conventions business as well as long-term awareness of Puerto Rico as a travel destination.

CAMPAIGN: After conducting more than 4,100 consumer interviews in U.S. and international markets to determine its competitive position, key messaging, and target audience, Discover Puerto Rico created “Have We Met Yet?” to serve as a warm greeting and invitation that doubled as an introduction — or reintroduction — to Puerto Rico. The campaign aimed to separate the destination from its Caribbean competitors by highlight the depth and passion of Puerto Rican arts and culture, gastronomy, and natural attractions.

RESULTS: Consumers exposed to “Have We Met Yet?” spent more than $66 million in tracked hotel bookings in the three months following launch — and paid an average daily rate that was 11 percent higher than ADR for all hotel visitors during that period. After the campaign launched, 71 percent of meeting planners rated Puerto Rico as a desirable location for a meeting, leading to a 41-percent increase in meeting bookings and a 34-percent increase in room nights.

The 2020 Adrian Awards are also taking nominations for the HSMAI Hospitality Hero award. Nominations will be reviewed each week by a panel of Adrian judges, and selected Heroes will be honored weekly online leading up to the Adrian entry period as well as at the 2021 Adrian Awards celebration. Learn more and submit a Hero nomination.

PR Best Practices: Contiki’s #VoteWithNoRegrets

Nominations for HSMAI’s 2020 Adrian Awards competition will open on Oct. 1 — with a special focus on best practices, innovation, and community related to hospitality advertising, marketing, and public relations work created in response to the coronavirus crisis. Take inspiration from last year’s Platinum winners, including Contiki, whose “#VoteWithNoRegrets” campaign was recognized in the Public Relations-PR Campaign-Public Affairs/PSAs category.

BACKGROUND: Contiki wanted to build on its once-in-a-lifetime travel experiences for young people and boost engagement with its #NOREGRETS slogan. It aimed to leverage its joie de vivre philosophy and reputation among young people to increase voting and participation in the 2018 mid-term election cycle. The target audience included 18-to-35-year-olds with a propensity to travel.

CAMPAIGN: Contiki’s campaign used the slogan #VoteWithNoRegrets as its focal point, encouraging young people to vote with the same enthusiasm with which they travel. The brand offered a chance for a free trip to destinations such as Cambodia, Portugal, and New Zealand in exchange for posting an “I Voted” selfie and following/tagging Contiki on Instagram. Contiki’s strategy relied on the company’s prior research on young travelers as well as amplification from media coverage of the 2018 midterm elections.

RESULTS: The campaign generated more than 2,300 social posts hashtracking #VoteWithNoRegrets, 2 million social media impressions, and 4 billion editorial/digital impressions, with 63 stories across millennial titles and traditional media and travel publications. Instagram interactions tripled on launch day, and positive gains included 2,500 new Instagram followers and 12,500 profile visits.

The 2020 Adrian Awards are also taking nominations for the “HSMAI Hospitality Hero” award. Nominations will be reviewed each week by a panel of Adrian judges and selected Heroes will be honored weekly online leading up to the Adrian entry period, as well as at the 2021 Adrian Awards celebration. Learn more and submit a Hero nomination.

Reopening Concerns and Best Practices for Hotel Management Companies

By Kaitlin Dunn, Writer, Hospitality Sales & Marketing Association International (HSMAI)

HSMAI hosted the final event in a series of three Hotel Management Company Sales & Marketing Virtual Executive Roundtables on June 11 that focused on the impact that COVID-19 is having on sales and marketing at HMCs. Roundtable participants discussed their biggest concerns as hotels are beginning to reopen and shared the best practices they have learned along the way. Here are key takeaways from the discussion:

STAFFING CONCERNS

As some furloughed employees are beginning to return to work, companies must handle the logistical issues of deciding who should be prioritized — and in some cases convincing people to come back. Several Roundtable participants mentioned that through the end of July, many furloughed employees will still be making more on unemployment than if they are working their job again, which doesn’t incentivize them to come back.

Meanwhile, many employees are doing jobs that they never signed on for, such as a marketer working in laundry. This brings another round of complications to the rehiring process, one participant pointed out. Even if the marketing team is ready to bring an employee back full-time, somebody still has to do the laundry, which means that that another employee has to be rehired for that position, or someone has to be shifted into it. “We’re trying to work as a team, because you have to take the staffing levels of the entire hotel into consideration,” the participant said. “We’ve got a lot of requests from different departments and not enough staff to fulfill them. Everyone believes that they are the most important, but we all have to figure out a way to help out other departments and do our normal jobs.”

PERMANENT CHANGES

COVID-19 has brought many changes to the industry in all disciplines, as hotels struggle to stay afloat. But while some changes are only temporary, others are here to stay as the industry reinvents itself.

One change that several participants mentioned is the need for employees to be multitaskers and work in different segments. “Job descriptions need to be updated,” one participant said. “Everyone has to be a generalist, from social media marketers to sales managers. We have to be prepared for everything. This is a call for us to think about hospitality differently.”

Sales departments in particular have needed to adapt very quickly to the new conditions. “We talk a lot about how you’re selling everything now, not just in one area,” one participant said.

“The sales relationship we’ve had for so long is changing and will continue to change,” another participant said. “Our sales teams can barely connect with customers when they’re at home, which changes the need for a relationship role to a technological role. Sales specialists need to be able to use technology platforms and follow through there.”

BEST PRACTICES

Roundtable participants offered advice on everything from managing teams to bringing in business. Here in their own words are some of their suggestions:

“Cross-train everyone. People are willing to do what it takes to survive right now, and they have to be able to work in different areas.”
“We’re doing weekly reviews to determine what segments are booking. It’s giving us the opportunity to review and redirect from what is not working as we struggle to find where the business is.”
“Right now, we have team goals instead of individual goals and it’s been working well. Normally this is more of an individual sport, but we have to a team sport for the time being.”
“The people on my team who are being the most flexible were surprisingly the younger leaders. I thought that the ones who had been through downturns before would be able to pivot and know that they have to try new things, but they’re stuck. We have to get them to think of things differently.”
“Our teams have to want to stay when they come out of this. We need to have empathy for them so that they don’t regret having to work 100-hour weeks right now.”
“Think out of the box. One of our hotels’ greatest successes was a having backyard rate and putting out a banner in front and advertising at the laundromat. The never would have expected that a few months ago.”
“Remember that your teams are having a hard time, too. Our sales teams have been through two-and-a-half months of cancellations and their spirits are broken right now. Be as compassionate with them as you can.”
“We’re looking at university dorm overflow as a source of revenue for the fall, as schools open back up but still need to keep students socially distanced in their dorm rooms.”
“There are a lot of owner expectations and pressure from owners who don’t understand the situation fully. That brings morale down for our teams, but we have to bring it up and keep them motivated, even with the lack of business and the increased frustrations.”

Professionals from these companies participated in the HSMAI Hotel Management Company Sales & Marketing Virtual Executive Roundtables: Aimbridge Hospitality; Atlific Hotels; Commonwealth Hotels, LLC; Crescent Hotels; GF Hotels & Resorts; Kessler Collection; LBA Hospitality; M&R Hotel Management; Marcus; Prism Hotels & Resorts; Pyramid Hotel Group; Regency Hotel Management; Remington hotels; Sage Hospitality Group; Sound Hospitality Management; Staypineapple Hotels; Summit Hospitality Group; and Wright Investments.

For additional information, insights, and tools, visit HSMAI’s Global Coronavirus Recovery Resources page.