Insights Type: Thought Leadership

Where AI Belongs in the Hotel Marketing Triad

Jennifer Hill of Kalibri and Dan Rice of Expedia Group recently led HSMAI Washington, DC’s Building Smarter Hotels Masterclass, organized around the hotel marketing triad of owned, earned and paid media. 

They ended the session by handing attendees 100 pieces of candy to allocate across the three categories for different demand scenarios. It made a hard point tangible: hotel marketers have limited money, time and attention, and every investment in one channel is a choice not to invest somewhere else. 

Now generative AI is entering that conversation. It is tempting to add it to the diagram as a new marketing channel. It absolutely is not. 

AI is not a fourth piece of the triad. It is a helpful tool that can strengthen the decisions and workflows inside all three. 

That distinction matters. If we treat AI as one more place to publish, we will use it to produce more emails, more social posts, more ads and, quite possibly, more noise. We really do not need any more noise, right? 

The better use is to help us run owned, earned and paid media more accurately and more profitably. 

Owned: Control only matters if the information is good 

A hotel’s website, booking engine, email database and guest communications are assets it controls. But the information behind them is usually scattered across systems, departmental files, old PDFs and the heads of experienced employees. Generative AI can pull that together so people can actually use it. 

Imagine an employee being able to ask: 

  • Which of our experiences would be most relevant to this guest? 
  • What information is missing from this group inquiry? 
  • Do our website, sales materials and confirmation emails describe this package consistently? 
  • What one thing can we convey that will set our hotel apart? 

During the masterclass, Jennifer and Dan noted the high open rates of transactional emails and how often hotels leave meaningful upsell opportunities out of them. The opportunity isn’t to have AI write more upsell copy. It’s to match the right offer to the right guest at the right point in the journey, using accurate information and the hotel’s real voice. 

That is the difference between producing content and improving the guest journey. However you apply Gen AI, start with this question: how can we make the experience better for our guests? 

Earned: Listen before responding 

Review responses are the most obvious use of generative AI, and one of the easiest to do horribly!!! Paste in a review, get a polished reply in seconds. But if the result is another generic “Thank you for your valuable feedback,” we have only automated something guests were already ignoring. 

I believe the more valuable work happens before the response is written. AI can analyze reviews over time to spot recurring themes, separate an isolated complaint from a developing operational issue, compare sentiment across departments and surface the words guests use to describe what they value most. Then it can help a manager write a specific response that acknowledges what that guest actually experienced. The hotel listens at a scale that would otherwise be hard, and the employee starts with something better than a blank page. 

The same principle applies to social media and public relations. Generative AI can summarize coverage, identify patterns, repurpose approved stories and help connect activity to meaningful commercial outcomes. But the experience, expertise and credibility still have to come from the hotel. 

AI can help express a genuine story. It can’t make an inauthentic story true. (Though sometimes it might try so watch out for that too!!) 

Paid: Make a better decision before making another ad 

Generative AI can produce headlines, ad variations, keyword ideas and audience-specific copy lightning fast. Useful? It can be. But the bigger opportunity is the decision that comes before the ad. 

AI can help a commercial team bring together campaign results, booking patterns, market conditions, audience behavior and property priorities. It can summarize what happened, flag questions worth investigating and help the team compare uses for the next marketing dollar. 

Should we protect branded search? Build a landing page for an upcoming demand generator? Retarget past guests? Increase metasearch visibility? Use an OTA campaign to fill a specific need period? 

AI should not make those calls alone. It can help the team examine the evidence and see the tradeoffs more clearly. In other words, it can help us allocate the candy more wisely, and more profitably. 

Where I draw the line between automation and augmentation 

As I work with hotels on practical AI adoption, I find it useful to separate the two. AI is well suited to repetitive work such as: 

  • Collecting and organizing information 
  • Categorizing comments or inquiries 
  • Summarizing meetings and research 
  • Reformatting material for different channels 
  • Preparing first drafts, updating trackers and routing information to the right person 

Human judgment remains essential for: 

  • Making brand promises 
  • Handling sensitive guest communication 
  • Resolving service failures 
  • Setting budgets, priorities and strategic tradeoffs 
  • Approving what ultimately reaches the guest 

The goal is to remove enough administrative friction that people have more time and better information to practice hospitality. Never forget that. 

I love gen AI and use it all the time, but I also have a big sign above my desk reminding me: people first. 

What this 90-day project is teaching me 

I am currently documenting a 90-day AI project with an independent hotel. We are examining how generative AI can support sales, marketing, the guest experience and hotel operations while carefully protecting the property’s identity, data and brand voice. 

The process does not begin with, “What can ChatGPT or Claude do?” It begins with better questions: 

  • Where are guests experiencing unnecessary friction? 
  • Where is revenue being missed? 
  • Where are employees losing time? 
  • Where does information break down? 
  • Which decisions could be improved with faster access to better information? 

Only then do we decide whether the right answer is a prompt, an AI assistant, an automated workflow, or even no AI at all (always my last resort!!). 

I will share something that has been a little eye-opening for me. I KNOW that people come first (remember I even have a sign!) but every time we embark on a new area, I still WANT to think, how can Claude fix this? Claude cannot fix this. A really good system can be helped along with Claude to save people some time, or deliver something that enhances the guest experience, but on its own, Claude is not the answer. Darn it. 

Owned, earned and paid remain the foundation of hotel marketing. AI doesn’t replace that foundation, and it doesn’t belong beside it as a shiny fourth category. It belongs inside the work. 

Holly Zoba is the cofounder of hotelBschool.com and coauthor of the CHDM study guide for HSMAI.  Subscribe to her biweekly newsletter to follow her commercial experiments with AI – https://mailchi.mp/hotelbschool/commercial-lab

Marketing Beyond the Room Night: Why Hotel Marketers Must Now Answer the Profit Question

Nancy Johns, SVP of Commercial Strategy, Spire Hospitality | Chair, HSMAI America’s Marketing Advisory Board 

Marketing’s job is no longer just to fill rooms. It’s to fill them with the right guests, at the right cost. Owners are already measuring us that way, whether or not our dashboards have caught up. 

That was the premise I brought to a recent meeting of the HSMAI America’s Marketing Advisory Board. For years, hotel marketing has been judged on traffic, impressions, room nights, revenue and RevPAR. Those numbers still matter. But the questions owners ask today are different: What did it cost to win that guest? What did they contribute to profit and ancillary spending? How is marketing affecting cash flow and asset value? 

The conversation that followed was candid, and it confirmed what I’ve been seeing across our industry: the goal of hotel marketing is shifting from driving room nights to driving the most profitable guest mix at the right acquisition cost. Below are the five shifts we discussed that marketing leaders are making, what is getting in the way, and what you can start doing this quarter. 

Why now 

Three pressures are converging: 

  • The cost to acquire a guest is rising. Distribution commissions, paid media and loyalty program costs all keep climbing. 
  • Guests are less brand-loyal. Today’s travelers are loyal to experiences more than to logos. A memorable stay, not a points balance, is increasingly what earns the next booking. 
  • Operating costs keep growing. Labor and expenses are squeezing margins, so revenue that costs too much to win does less for the owner than it used to. 

Topline metrics remain part of the picture, but on their own they no longer the only answer the ownership question. 

Five shifts marketing leaders are making 

1. Measuring closer to profit 

Board members described the same progression: moving from metrics that measure demand toward metrics that measure what the business keeps. TRevPAR and TRevPOR came up repeatedly. Here is how the key metrics fit together: 

Metric The question it answers Marketing’s role
RevPAR Are we filling rooms at a good rate? Drives demand
TRevPAR / TRevPOR How much does each guest spend across the whole property (rooms, F&B, spa, parking, events)? Attracts higher-spending guests and promotes outlets
Net RevPAR How much room revenue is left after commissions and acquisition costs? Shifts channel mix and lowers cost per booking
GOPPAR How much operating profit reaches the owner per available room? Influences it through the inputs above; does not control it

 

What “closer to profit” means for marketing. I am not suggesting marketers should own GOPPAR. Operations controls labor and departmental costs; finance owns the P&L. What marketing does control are the inputs that move profit: which channels guests book through, what it costs to win each booking, how much guests spend beyond the room, and whether they come back. Those inputs belong in the marketing report, next to occupancy and RevPAR: 

  • Cost of acquisition by channel (commission, media, transaction fees and loyalty costs per booking) 
  • Net room revenue by channel, after those costs 
  • Ancillary revenue per occupied room from the segments marketing targets 
  • Direct repeat booking rate 

2. Redefining what makes a guest valuable 

Several members are revising how their teams define guest value. Room rate is only one part. Ancillary spend, on-property engagement and repeat behavior all count. In many cases a guest with a lower room rate produces a stronger total contribution across the stay. The example below shows why. 

Illustrative example: two guests, same two-night stay 

Guest A Guest B
Room rate (ADR) $250 $210
Room revenue (2 nights) $500 $420
Food & beverage spend $40 $200
Spa spend $0 $300
Total guest revenue $540 $920
TRevPOR (total revenue per occupied room night) $270 $460
Less: cost to acquire the booking ($90) 18% of room revenue ($25) about 6%
Less: rooms operating cost ($45 per night) ($90) ($90)
Less: F&B operating cost (70% of F&B revenue) ($28) ($140)
Less: spa operating cost (80% of spa revenue) $0 ($240)
Contribution to profit $332 $425

Figures are illustrative. Acquisition costs and departmental margins vary by property, brand and channel; use your finance team’s numbers. 

On a RevPAR report, Guest A looks like the better guest: $40 more per night. On a profit view, Guest B contributes $93 more for the stay, about 28% more. Three things explain the gap: 

  1. Guest B costs less to win. Guest A’s booking cost $90 to acquire; Guest B’s cost $25. That $65 difference recovers most of the $80 gap in room revenue before the guest even arrives. 
  2. Guest B spends beyond the room. Guest B spent $500 in F&B and spa against Guest A’s $40, which turns a slightly lower room revenue into a far higher total revenue. 
  3. But ancillary revenue is not profit. Guest B’s $500 in ancillary spend added only $120 of contribution, because F&B and spa carry high operating costs. Marketing that only looks at revenue will overstate the value of outlet promotions. This is exactly why finance needs to be at the table. 

And the table doesn’t capture the biggest long-term advantage: a guest who dines, books the spa and has a great experience is far more likely to book again, directly. 

3. Funding what’s incremental, not just what’s attributed 

Return on ad spend (ROAS) shows how efficient a campaign was. It doesn’t show whether the booking would have happened anyway, or what that booking contributed after costs. Members described moving toward incrementality testing and marketing mix modeling, and some have already shifted spend after reviewing how each channel performs beyond its initial room revenue. The working rule that emerged: use ROAS to optimize campaigns, and use contribution and incrementality to decide where the budget goes. 

4. Bringing revenue, operations and finance in earlier 

Teams that are making progress bring revenue management and operations into campaign planning before launch, not after. Working with finance to track what each guest persona actually spends gives marketing a clearer view of what revenue a campaign can deliver to a property and what it will cost to deliver it. It also protects the experience: promoting a spa package or dining offer that operations can’t staff undermines the very thing that earns the next booking. 

5. Rethinking incentives 

RevPAR-based goals can work against profitability. A team rewarded on RevPAR alone has every reason to prefer Guest A over Guest B. Some organizations are adjusting incentive structures to reflect acquisition cost and channel contribution, for example by pairing a RevPAR goal with a net RevPAR or direct-channel-mix goal. Cross-department education supports this, so more roles understand how their decisions affect profit. 

What makes this hard 

No one at the table claimed to have this solved. The common obstacles were: 

  • Distribution cost is difficult to isolate across brand, third-party and direct channels. 
  • Vendor data requires validation before it can be trusted for investment decisions. 
  • Attribution is inconsistent across systems, so the same booking can be claimed by several channels. 
  • There is no standard approach yet. Some teams use marketing mix modeling and incrementality testing; others are building internal models for distribution cost and guest value. 
  • Loyalty programs cut both ways. Members bring volume and often a lower acquisition cost, but benefits, upgrades, points and credits carry real costs. And because guests are less brand-loyal than they once were, the program alone won’t bring them back; the experience has to. Measure both sides with precision. 

Members described their progress as uneven, and that’s normal. Documented assumptions that finance has agreed to are far more useful than waiting for perfect data. 

What to do this quarter 

  1. Add cost of acquisition by channel to your monthly report. Start with commission, media, transaction fees and loyalty costs per booking. Rough numbers are fine; write down your assumptions. 
  2. Report net revenue alongside ROAS. Keep ROAS for campaign optimization; use net contribution for budget decisions. 
  3. Build a simple guest value view by segment. Include ancillary spend and repeat behavior, and apply finance’s departmental margins, as in the example above. 
  4. Run one incrementality test. A geographic holdout or a short pause on a single channel will teach you more than another attribution report. 
  5. Set a standing monthly meeting with finance and revenue management. Agree on cost assumptions once, so the conversation can move on to decisions. 
  6. Market the experience, not just the room. Promote the outlets, spa and on-property moments that earn the next booking, and confirm operations can deliver them before you launch. 
  7. Pitch your budget in profit language. “This campaign shifts 300 room nights from an 18% channel to a 6% channel, worth about $9,000 in net contribution at a $250 rate” lands differently with an owner than “ROAS of 8:1.” 

My takeaway 

This is commercial strategy in practice. The shift for marketing is already visible in our metrics, in how we collaborate and in the decisions we make every day. The marketers who thrive in the next five years will be the ones who can walk into an owner meeting and talk about contribution, not clicks. 

My thanks to the members of the HSMAI America’s Marketing Advisory Board for such an open and generous conversation. 

Recommended reading 

Discussion questions for your team 

  • Which metrics do we report today, and which ones does our owner actually ask about? 
  • Do we know our cost of acquisition by channel? If not, what would it take to estimate it this quarter? 
  • Which guest segments deliver the most total contribution, and are we marketing to them? 
  • How should marketing work differently with revenue management, operations, sales and finance? 
  • Do our incentives reward volume, or profitable volume? 
  • Should marketing be measured on its influence on GOPPAR, through the inputs it controls, rather than on revenue metrics alone? 

From Bots to Agentic AI: 4 Contact Center Trends to Watch

HSMAI Contact Center SIG Fireside Chat

Steering Committee Co-Facilitators

Fatima Fisher, Director of Global Reservation Support, Pyramid Global Hospitality

Denise Pullen, Founder & CEO, Daisia Consulting

The HSMAI Contact Center SIG, a community for guest engagement leaders, recently hosted a Fireside Chat. These informal conversations give members a space for discussing emerging trends, shared learning, and industry connection.

At a recent call, contact center leaders discussed all the ideas that surfaced at the HSMAI Commercial Strategy Conference. Read on for the top 4 trends that surfaced from the discussion.

  • AI’s Next Phase

Participants discussed agentic AI, virtual agents, web chat, AI call scoring, and agent-assist tools. Questions centered on privacy, voice recordings, content accuracy, and how AI-generated information is managed. One participant reported that their web chat solution is successfully handling nearly 80% of website engagements and has tripled web chat conversations. Another described how they learned different companies approaches to employee AI use, with some allowing approved AI tools and others limiting employees to company-approved platforms.

  • Routing the Right Calls

Call routing generated significant discussion. Participants shared efforts to redirect operational inquiries away from reservation consultants through IVR updates, direct property routing, and digital channels. One participant reported redirecting nearly 40,000 calls back to hotel resources. The goal was to ensure guests reach the right resource as quickly as possible.

  • A Seat at the Table

Technology purchasing and marketing campaigns surfaced as common challenges. Participants discussed the importance of involving contact center teams in technology evaluations, noting that those who use the systems often have valuable operational insights. Marketing and promotional campaigns created similar concerns. Several participants described receiving little notice before launches, while others shared examples of being included earlier in planning discussions to prepare staffing, training, and guest-facing resources.

  • Organizational Alignment

Reporting structures varied, with participants sitting under revenue, sales, commercial, and commercial strategy organizations. The conversation also touched on collaboration with revenue management, marketing, distribution, operations, and analytics teams.

AI’s Best Use Case? Giving Time Back

Sydnee Berger, Senior Sales Manager, Sojern, HSMAI Rising Sales Leader Council Member 

Gabrielle Kantarovich, Senior National Sales Manager, Placemakr, HSMAI Rising Sales Leader Council Member  

A recent discussion of the HSMAI Rising Sales Leader Council explored AI disruption and transformation in hospitality. The conversation focused on how hospitality professionals can adopt AI while preserving the human connection that defines the industry. 

One breakout group discussed the question: What’s one task in your role that AI could realistically make easier? A common theme was efficiency. Participants described the challenge of managing hotel information across multiple systems, tools, and documents. The group discussed the need for a centralized, “one-stop shop” resource that could make information easier to access for both clients and guests. CRM activities and email drafting were also cited as areas where AI can save time. Automating routine tasks allows teams to spend more time on client relationships, business development, and service.  

Across the broader discussion, participants repeatedly returned to the importance of human interaction. AI can help create content and organize information, but participants emphasized the need for human review, personalization, and creativity. As one rising leader put it, “we all desire the human connection.” 

The conversation also included concerns about privacy, security, and the use of personal information. Participants discussed the importance of guardrails around guest data and the responsibility that comes with using AI-enabled tools. 

Another topic focused on how travelers search and discover hotels. Participants discussed the importance of digital visibility and maintaining detailed website content that helps AI systems understand a property’s features and match them to traveler needs. 

The session closed with a shared perspective that hospitality professionals do not need to become AI experts overnight. Learning how to work alongside AI, understanding its capabilities, and adapting as the technology evolves were viewed as valuable skills for the future. 

Recommended Readings 

Questions for Teams 

  1. What skills do you think will become more important as AI becomes more common? 
  2. What’s one task in your role that AI could realistically make easier? 
  3. What do you think is the right balance between human interaction and automation in hospitality?

The Future of Hotel Distribution May Start Before the Booking

Megan Fratangeli, Revenue Manager, Omni William Penn Hotel, Rising Leader Council Member

William Lee, Senior Market Manager, Priceline Agoda Global Partner Services, Rising Leader Council Member

For years, discussions around hotel distribution have centered on the question, what is the right OTA mix? A recent HSMAI Rising Revenue Optimization Leader Council discussion challenged the premise that there is a single answer. Participants focused less on OTA share as a percentage and more on whether each channel generates profitable, incremental demand once the full cost of acquisition is considered. As one member summarized, “ultimately, each channel should have incremental business.” That perspective shifted the discussion away from direct-versus-OTA debates and toward the role each channel plays in a property’s commercial strategy. 

When More OTA Business Makes Sense 

Participants identified several situations where higher OTA contribution can be intentional and healthy. OTAs were viewed as an effective way to introduce a property to travelers who may not otherwise have discovered it. Several hoteliers referenced the “billboard effect,” using OTA visibility to attract first-time guests and then creating opportunities to convert those travelers into direct-booking customers on future stays. 

The discussion also highlighted how ideal channel mix varies widely. Market type, hotel size, brand affiliation, location, and business objectives all influence the appropriate distribution strategy. 

Independent and boutique properties may have very different needs than hotels operating under major brands. Some smaller properties with limited inventory may require little or no OTA contribution during certain periods, while others benefit from the reach OTAs provide. 

There was broad agreement that no universal benchmark exists for a healthy OTA percentage. 

Looking Beyond Commission Costs 

Participants noted that OTA commissions are easy to identify, while the costs associated with direct bookings are often spread across marketing, loyalty programs, technology investments, and labor. 

The group also discussed challenges associated with measuring true acquisition costs. Return on ad spend, conversion metrics, and other performance indicators can create significant noise, making it difficult to determine the actual cost of acquiring a reservation. Several attendees raised concerns about long-term customer ownership. OTA bookings can be difficult to convert into repeat direct guests because hotels often have limited access to guest data and communication channels. This creates a broader evaluation challenge. The question was not simply what a booking cost today, but what future value that guest may generate. 

AI Enters the Distribution Conversation 

The discussion then turned to how AI may influence hotel discovery and booking behavior. 

Participants shared personal experiences using AI tools to plan travel. In some cases, the tools direct users to OTA platforms rather than brand websites. Others reported being directed to business listings and review platforms. Those experiences prompted discussion around how hotels can improve visibility when travelers begin their search with AI rather than a traditional search engine. 

We discussed how important quest reviews are when AI recommendations often draw from publicly available information, including reviews and ratings across multiple platforms. Delivering strong guest experiences and actively responding to reviews were identified as practical steps hotels can take today. Content accuracy also surfaced as a key consideration. Property details, amenities, renovations, room descriptions, and operational updates need to remain current across digital channels. Outdated information could affect whether a hotel appears in AI-generated recommendations. 

Website readiness was another topic we discussed, including the importance of understanding where AI systems source information and whether hotel websites are structured in ways that make property information accessible and discoverable. For now, the emphasis appears less focused on paid visibility and more focused on ensuring that accurate, relevant content exists wherever AI tools may be gathering information. 

A Wider View of Distribution 

As AI changes the way travelers discover options, participants suggested that future distribution conversations may focus less on where a booking occurs and more on what influenced the guest’s decision. The discussion returned repeatedly to three considerations: 

  • Incremental demand 
  • Full acquisition cost 
  • Visibility throughout the digital journey 

Those factors, rather than any predetermined OTA percentage, shaped the group’s definition of a healthy distribution strategy. 

Recommended Reading 

Questions for Teams 

  1. Under what circumstances can a higher OTA contribution be a healthy and intentional part of a hotel’s distribution strategy? When might it indicate overreliance or a distribution concern? 
  2. How will AI change hotel distribution, and what should hotels do now to ensure their properties are surfaced and recommended when travelers begin their search with AI? 

Do We Have a Sales Training Problem? Or a Commercial Capability Gap?

Benjamin Premack, Regional Director, Sales & Marketing- US & Mexico, Omni Hotels & Resorts, HSMAI Sales Advisory Board Member 

At a discussion of the Sales Advisory Board, I brought a question that many sales leaders are asking: are hospitality organizations investing in the right kind of development for today’s sales professionals? We’ve all seen that hotel sales roles have changed. For example, sellers who once focused primarily on relationship-building and prospecting are increasingly expected to understand business mix, profitability, technology, and broader commercial strategy. Training programs have evolved as well, but not always at the same pace as the role itself. One participant summed up the issue: 

“If your sales training program disappeared tomorrow, would anything actually change in how your team sells next week? If not, it’s not a training program, it’s a checkbox.” 

Throughout the discussion, advisory board members brought up how training is no longer limited to teaching sales techniques. The conversation focused on capability development, helping professionals build the skills needed to succeed in a commercial environment that now includes revenue management, digital marketing, analytics, and AI. 

Many sales professionals entered the industry when success was measured by relationships, prospecting, and securing contracts. As organizations became more specialized, roles narrowed around specific market segments and business objectives. Commercial strategy has brought sales, marketing, and revenue management closer together. Sales professionals are now expected to understand which opportunities generate the greatest value for the organization, not simply how to secure more business. Several participants pointed to business acumen as a growing requirement. Understanding profitability, evaluating business mix, and making smarter decisions about demand have become important parts of the role. 

Some participants noted that their organizations have adopted increasingly sophisticated systems and are now exploring AI across the commercial enterprise. While many companies are introducing AI tools and training programs, questions remain about how quickly teams can adapt and how effectively new technology can be integrated into daily selling activities. The discussion was not focused on mastering specific platforms, instead it centered on helping teams become more analytical and more effective in using technology to support decision-making. 

Several Advisory Board members contrasted hospitality training practices with approaches used in technology and SaaS organizations. Rather than relying on periodic training events, these organizations often emphasize ongoing coaching, real-time feedback, performance review, and continuous skill development. Training is directly connected to outcomes and adjusted as business needs change. Others emphasized the importance of providing visibility into career opportunities and outlining the skills needed for advancement. Programs like leadership development programs, mentorship structures, self-assessments, and formal career pathing initiatives support retention while helping employees build both technical and leadership capabilities over time. Career pathing was also discussed as a recruiting advantage. Candidates increasingly want to understand not only the role they are being hired for, but also where that role can lead. 

As hospitality sales becomes more commercially focused, some participants suggested valuable skills can come from outside hospitality, particularly from industries where sales training is rigorous, performance-driven, and highly accountable. Others noted that hospitality’s unique inventory and service-driven environment require specialized commercial knowledge that must be developed after hiring. The consensus was less about finding a specific background and more about identifying adaptable, curious professionals who want to learn. Ambition, coachability, relationship-building ability, and a willingness to develop new skills were repeatedly cited as desirable traits. 

Recommended Reading 

Questions for Teams 

  • How has the current hospitality sales professional’s role evolved over the years? From seller to leader to executive. 
  • How have our industry’s training and development programs changed to align with new roles and responsibilities? 
  • Should every salesperson be fluent in revenue management, digital marketing, and financial analysis, etc? 
  • Are we hiring the wrong profiles for modern hospitality sales roles? And are we providing what is needed to the right talent to keep them in the industry? 

More Resources 

AI and the Shift from Doing to Thinking

Beth McDermott, Area Revenue Manager, First Hospitality, HSMAI Rising Revenue Optimization Leader Council Member 

Shelby Livingston, Cluster Revenue Manager, Rosewood Hotels, HSMAI Rising Revenue Optimization Leader Council Member 

A recent discussion of the Revenue Rising Leader Council explored how AI can help further career growth. The conversation focused on practical ways AI is being used today, where it creates efficiency, and how it may help rising leaders spend less time on repetitive tasks and more time on analysis, communication, and decision-making. 

Participants reported using AI daily and current applications included meeting transcription, note-taking, report summaries, data validation, code interpretation, email support, knowledge searches, and identifying action items from daily reporting. 

The strongest theme was time. Several participants described AI as a tool that helps surface information faster, allowing more attention on strategy and problem-solving. One discussion centered on using AI to identify trends, booking window shifts, length-of-stay changes, and other patterns that revenue professionals already review manually. 

As one participant put it: 

“If AI can tell us what the issue is, then we can just think about what we’re going to do about it.” 

The group also discussed limitations. Participants noted that AI output still requires review and validation because mistakes can occur. While many viewed AI as an advantage, the group poll showed most participants saw it as an equal mix of opportunity and risk. 

Career development emerged as a second major theme. Participants shared examples of using AI to improve public speaking, executive communication, leadership presence, and learning. Others highlighted AI’s ability to help locate information across meetings, messages, and documents, reducing time spent searching for context. 

The discussion reflected a broader reality for revenue professionals: AI is already embedded in daily workflows. The question is becoming less about whether to use it and more about how to use it effectively. 

Recommended Readings 

 Questions for Teams 

  1. Where in your current role do you feel stuck in “doing” instead of “thinking,” and how could AI help shift that balance? 
  2. What is one career goal you’re working toward (next role, skill, or responsibility), and how could AI help you get there faster? 
  3. Looking ahead 3–5 years, which skills will distinguish top revenue leaders, and what role will AI play? 

The Rising Leader Councils are powered by the HSMAI Foundation. As part of its mission to power the people behind the business of hospitality, the Foundation invests in emerging commercial leaders through professional development, networking, mentorship, and leadership opportunities. The Rising Leader Councils help cultivate the next generation of talent across sales, marketing, revenue management, and distribution. 

AI’s Place in the Guest Journey

Shannon Burdine, Corporate Director, Digital Marketing, Sage Hospitality Group, Marketing RLC Member
Melissa Olson, Senior Marketing Manager, Equinox Hotel New York, Marketing RLC Member 

A recent discussion of the Marketing Rising Leader Council explored a question many hospitality marketers are asking right now: When should AI be used to impact the guest journey? 

The conversation started with how AI is already showing up in daily work. Participants shared examples ranging from content creation and caption writing to data visualization, meeting summaries, task management, workflow organization, research, and fact-checking. Most viewed AI as a practical tool that reduces manual work and helps teams move faster. 

The discussion then turned to the guest experience. Participants pointed to chatbot experiences, AI-supported customer service, and voice-enabled guest assistance as examples where technology has become more useful and less frustrating than many early versions. Several noted that AI now handles simple requests efficiently, reducing wait times and helping guests find answers quickly. 

The question wasn’t whether AI can improve efficiency, but where AI efficiency should stop and hospitality should begin. Many participants felt the strongest guest experiences combine AI and human follow-up. Technology can answer questions, capture preferences, and remove friction. Human interaction remains critical when personalization, empathy, judgment, and relationship-building are required. 

One participant summed up the current moment this way: “It really feels like we’re in this everyone’s doing whatever they want sort of stage” 

The group also discussed concerns around ethics and authenticity. Topics included AI-generated content, AI influencers, image manipulation, permissions, likeness rights, and brand voice. Several participants noted that policies and guardrails are still developing as adoption accelerates. 

Another recurring theme was the risk of losing personality. While AI can support workflow and productivity, participants cautioned against relying on it for everything. Brand voice, community engagement, and guest relationships still benefit from a distinctly human approach. 

The conversation ended with broad agreement that AI is becoming part of hospitality operations. The opportunity is finding the right balance between automation and authentic service. 

Recommended Readings 

Questions for Teams 

  1. How are you using AI in your daily life? 
  2. Where are you seeing AI implemented in daily life outside of work? 
  3. Where have you noticed AI improving your own customer experience? 
  4. Where have you noticed AI frustrating your own customer experience?  
    • Does AI risk removing empathy from luxury hospitality? 
    • At what point does AI content or AI-powered experiences become unethical? 
  5. Where is AI going? How do you think AI will evolve over the next 6 months? 1 year? 5 years? 
  6. What opportunities does AI create for hospitality? 

Building Careers in an Integrated Commercial World

Dorothy Dowling, Principal, Introspect Strategic Advisory Services Special Advisor, HSMAI Foundation 

As we continue the research journey toward the HSMAI Foundation’s next State of Talent report, I recently had the opportunity to spend time with members of HSMAI’s Rising Leaders Councils. I wanted to hear directly from emerging leaders about how changes in hospitality’s commercial model are showing up in their careers—how they are developing, how much exposure they are getting across commercial disciplines, how AI is changing their work, and how they are thinking about their own career progression. 

It was an important conversation, and one theme stayed with me: the expectations of commercial leadership are broadening faster than many of our traditional career pathways. 

Sales, marketing, revenue management, distribution, digital, loyalty and analytics are increasingly interconnected. Technology is accelerating that convergence. Organizations are centralizing some capabilities, outsourcing others, and asking leaders to operate across a much broader commercial landscape. 

For people building careers in this environment, functional expertise remains important. But increasingly, it is only part of the equation. 

Building breadth in a world of convergence 

Our Rising Leaders conversation reinforced the importance of cross-functional experience. Participants clearly valued opportunities to understand disciplines beyond their own, yet those opportunities were not always part of a formal development path. 

For many, career development was something they were actively navigating themselves—seeking mentors, volunteering for broader projects, learning from colleagues in other disciplines and making thoughtful decisions about which roles and experiences would build the capabilities they would need next. 

One participant captured it particularly well: 

“Career paths aren’t linear anymore, so you have to really think about the job choices you’re making internally in the organization, and also what roles can really drive your development outside of the organization.” 

I think there is an important lesson in that observation. 

Owning your career is not a new idea. 

Previous generations of leaders also had to seek out experiences, build relationships, take risks, find mentors and sometimes make lateral moves to acquire skills they did not have. Organizations can—and should—provide learning opportunities, feedback, exposure and clarity about what successful progression looks like. But no organization can completely map a career for us. 

Career development has always required personal agency. What may be different today is the complexity of deciding which experiences will matter most. 

The apprenticeship model is changing 

For decades, hospitality developed commercial talent through experience. People learned by doing the work, observing more experienced leaders and progressively taking on larger responsibilities. But the work itself is changing. 

AI, automation, centralized services and external partners are beginning to perform some of the analytical, administrative and production work historically undertaken inside commercial organizations. That creates efficiencies, but it also raises an important talent question: 

As we redesign the work, are we also thinking carefully enough about how people will learn the work? 

If some traditional stepping-stone responsibilities disappear or change substantially, we will need to think differently about how future leaders acquire judgment, commercial instincts and operating experience. 

That does not necessarily mean recreating yesterday’s career paths. It may mean building new ones. 

Cross-functional projects, exposure to different parts of the commercial organization, stretch assignments, mentoring and a stronger understanding of the financial implications of commercial decisions may become even more important. 

AI changes the work—and the learning agenda 

AI was already very much part of the working environment for the Rising Leaders we spoke with. Participants described using it across content creation, marketing activities, reporting and analysis. But becoming proficient with AI tools is only one dimension of readiness. 

As technology takes on more execution, human capability will increasingly need to move toward judgment, problem solving, interpretation and decision-making. For emerging leaders, that means asking not simply, How can AI help me do my current job? but also, What capabilities do I need to develop because AI is changing my job? 

That same question applies much further up the organization. 

This is not only an emerging-leader issue 

While my conversation with the Rising Leaders Councils provided one valuable perspective, our broader State of Talent work is examining these changes across the commercial leadership pipeline. 

And some of the greatest pressure may actually be occurring among established leaders. 

Across the industry, organizations are operating with increasingly disciplined organizational structures while AI, automation and new operating models continue to reshape how work gets done. In many cases, experienced leaders are being asked to absorb broader responsibilities, lead across functions and technologies, manage increasingly complex organizations and continue delivering results with fewer resources. 

For someone who has spent years becoming very good at a particular discipline, that can represent a significant professional transition. The question of career development therefore does not end when someone reaches a director, vice president or C-suite role. If anything, the need to keep learning may be accelerating. 

The established commercial leader may need to develop AI fluency, stronger financial acumen, broader cross-functional understanding, new approaches to leading technology-enabled teams and the ability to determine which work should remain internal, which should be automated and which may be better accessed through external expertise. 

Career ownership is becoming a lifelong requirement. 

A new commercial career landscape 

One of the ideas we will continue exploring through the State of Talent research is what a successful commercial career looks like as the operating model changes.I don’t believe the answer is simply that organizations need to provide more development. Nor is it that individuals are entirely on their own. It is a shared equation. 

Organizations have an important role in creating environments where people can learn, gain exposure, receive meaningful feedback and take on greater responsibility. 

Individuals have an equally important role in understanding where the industry is going, identifying the capabilities they will need and actively seeking the experiences that will prepare them for what comes next. 

That applies whether someone is three years into their hospitality career or thirty. As we continue the State of Talent research, there are several questions I believe are worth asking: 

  • Are we building commercial talent with enough breadth to operate across increasingly interconnected disciplines? 
  • As AI, automation and new operating models change the work, how will people acquire the experiences and judgment traditionally developed through doing that work? 
  • Are we treating development as something that continues throughout a commercial career—not something that ends once someone reaches leadership? 
  • And perhaps most importantly: are we all taking enough ownership of keeping our own capabilities relevant as the industry changes around us? 

The commercial organization of the future will almost certainly look different from the one many of us grew up in. Our challenge is not simply to prepare the next generation to lead it. 

It is to make sure all of us are continuing to learn fast enough to lead in it. 

From Demo to Divorce: Why Hotel – Vendor Relationships Fail (and How to Fix Them)

Kristi White, VP Reporting, Data & Analytics, Groups 360, HSMAI Sales Advisory Board Member

If you’ve ever sat through a flawless product demo, signed a contract full of optimism, and then found yourself frustrated, underserved, and locked into something that isn’t working, you’re not alone. At the 2026 HSMAI Commercial Strategy Conference, Dan Wacksman of Sassato walked through the full lifecycle of hotel-vendor relationships with the kind of honesty the industry doesn’t talk about enough. 

Why You Should Care 

Technology decisions are among the most consequential a hotel team makes. A bad vendor relationship doesn’t just waste budget. It drains staff time, stalls strategy, and creates the kind of organizational cynicism that makes the next technology adoption even harder. What Wacksman made clear is that these relationships don’t fail because people are bad at their jobs or because vendors are evil. They fail because of structural, repeatable problems most teams never stop to address. 

What the Presentation Got Right 

The courtship phase is built on mutual fiction. RFPs reflect what hotels wish they were. Vendor responses reflect what buyers want to hear. Demos show a best-case scenario with perfect data and a rehearsed A-team. References come pre-screened. And often, the decision ends up going to the best salesperson, not the best product. 

Once the contract is signed, the problems shift. During the sales process, “it’s on the roadmap” sounds like a promise. After the contract is signed, Wacksman translates it for what it actually means: we heard you, we are not building that, please stop asking. If you’ve ever nodded along to that phrase and then waited 18 months for a feature that never came, you already know he’s right. 

Beyond the roadmap problem, there are no defined success metrics, no clear internal owner, no regular operating rhythm, and communication only happens when something breaks or a renewal invoice lands. Wacksman named three root causes that keep this cycle going:  

  • Misaligned expectations 
  • Diffuse accountability 
  • Relationship inertia.  

That last one is the most insidious. It is almost always easier to stay and complain than to fix things or walk away. 

A Framework Worth Keeping 

The practical takeaway from the session is what Wacksman calls the DATE framework:  

  • Define success in real numbers before you sign 
  • Assign one named owner on each side 
  • Talk on a regular rhythm rather than only in crisis 
  • Exit with intention when the relationship isn’t working  

Simple, but most teams skip at least two of those four steps. 

Where to Go From Here 

The hotel industry has never had a shortage of vendor options, and it has never had a shortage of disappointing implementations either. Wacksman’s point is that the pattern is predictable enough to be preventable. The demo will always look great. The salesperson will always be charming. “It’s on the roadmap” will always sound more reassuring than it should. But teams that go in with clear success metrics, a named owner, and an honest willingness to fix or walk away are the ones that get value from the tools they buy. That’s less about vendor selection and more about how you show up to the relationship from day one.