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HOTEL BUSINESS REVIEW

OCTOBER FOCUS: Revenue Management

 

Hotel Rev Management Trends 2021: Value = Metrics, Marketing, Profitability & Skill Set

By Robert O'Halloran Professor & Director, Hospitality Management, East Carolina University | October 2021

Revenue management is a concept that evolved from American Airlines and evolved in the lodging industry via yield management until it became what we know as revenue management systems. Revenue management is all about value and guests or potential guest's willingness to pay for a room and related services offered.

The old conceptual equation of Quality = Price/Value relates directly to a guest's conceptual definition of quality as calculated by the price paid and value perceived. The bombshell that was COVID forever changed the landscape of revenue management (Krlya RevGEN, 2021). In Post-COVID 2021 we will need to re-align our priorities and stay on top of the latest trends to remain viable in this new, lower-rated, over-saturated, and hyper-competitive hotel world (Krlya RevGEN, 2021).

The increase in available data and ways to track and analyze it may seem like it has complicated the industry, but it also provides a wealth of new opportunities for your business to turn a profit (SiteMinder,2021). To begin the post COVID (hopefully, post COVID) revenue management process, lodging managers and owners need to reassess their hotels and objectively define the value they offer to guests.

Revenue management specifically, refers to the strategic distribution and pricing tactics you use to sell your property's perishable inventory to the right guests at the right time and to boost revenue growth. Other products such as your amenities and food and beverage offerings will also come into the picture (SiteMinder, 2021). 

Your Lodging Concept

An exercise to start this process is to conceptualize the optimal scenario for your hotel property. If you could build a hotel with everything you want to include and offer what would it be. These factors can include site, size, service level and style of hotel, decor, facilities, amenities, furniture, fixtures and equipment, location, and potential brand affiliation. Guests might have preconceived opinions concerning brand types.

For example, Marriott International (Marriott.com, 2021) offers a broad selection of brands (30) and hotel types ranging from Luxury-Ritz Carlton, Premium-Westin, Select-Fairfield to Longer Stay-Townplace Suites. Wyndham Hotels (WyndhamHotels.com, 2021) offers twenty brands which include the Registry Collection Hotels in the luxury area to LaQuinta, Travelodge, Super 8, Days Inn, Baymont, Howard Johnson, and Ramada.

The strategies of these two hotel companies are obviously different. Marriott targets multiple services levels with select brands offering upper-tier brands but not offering economy choices. Wyndham Hotels, alternatively, offers limited choices at the higher end of service and multiple known brand economy-oriented hotels. These company brand offerings are lodging business choices by their organization's decision-makers to attract different target markets and provide value differentials within service levels. A solid revenue management strategy can drive a hotel's operating plan.

Similarly, when assembling a hotel's competitive set, what criteria are utilized to select competitors? Factors such as site, amenities, facilities, service level, etc. can all be used to assess who should be part of your competitive set and ultimately data for your Star Reports via STR Global. Revenue management revolves around the measurement of what customers from different segments are willing to pay, and this can only be done by measuring and monitoring the supply and demand of your hotel rooms (Siteminder.com, 2021).

The primary consideration in the planning process is to define your hotel and your target markets. Traditional target market examples have often included business, leisure, group, etc. The drill-down questions for these segments can be what do business or commercial travelers mean? Are these travelers, salespeople, executives, managers training employees, or others, that all will have a different level of perceived value for the lodging product they seek. Leisure could include traditional tourists, sports, tourists, etc. Groups, alternatively, could mean corporate business meetings or association meeting/ conference members. 

If a corporation, for example, like Microsoft had a meeting for their employees outside the office that employees are required to attend, Microsoft would likely pay all expenses on a master folio. For association groups, an example could be the National Restaurant Association annual trade show in Chicago, which is typically held each May and attracts 75,000 plus attendees over a four-day conference. These attendees include vendors, restauranteurs, students, faculty, and other allied industry representatives.

Factors to help differentiate attendees can be cost, i.e., per diem rates, discount rates, or rack rates, that can be reimbursed by their employer or paid by the attendee at their own expense. The best strategies are based on the understanding that hotel pricing is fluid and can change from one day to the next. This fluidity is why a hotel can increase its rates. Customers expect increases over time – most businesses where consumers spend money are varying their prices based on demand and shifts in costs (Siteminder.com, 2021).

Siteminder.com (2021) also noted in recent times a revenue management strategy including tactics that allow the hotel to be bookable online. Guests consider booking online more as more of a necessity rather than an option. Guests have become more experienced in the process of searching and looking for the best value on a hotel stay. Others have re-embraced travel agencies like AAA Travel and others. 

Additionally, lodging operators need to build a revenue culture in their business. All employees should be part of the revenue-enhancing process. Siteminder.com (2021) for example, shared a value equation as follows, anticipatory service + proactive revenue-minded employee = emotionally connected customer with engaged loyalty and higher revenue returns.

Your revenue management team also needs to inventory your hotel's demand generators. Demand generators are linked to target markets, and events and attractions can boost demand for room nights at a hotel. For example, a hotel located in a university town has recurring events such as graduation ceremonies.  The starts of school years mean move-in/out logistics, sporting events, concerts, etc. are all related to room night demand. There can also be local festivals and events that can be packaged with room sales to enhance the value of the hotel. Larger festivals like Memphis in May in Memphis, Tennessee have events over an entire month providing an opportunity for a local hotel to add value to their guest's stay.

Forecasting and Analytics 

Trends also indicate that a collaborative revenue management team should include people from rooms, information technology, sales, marketing, distribution, other departmental operations with a focus on focus on profitability.  Accurate forecasting and decision-making from lodging analytics involves the use and analysis of various metrics. These metrics, for example, include revenues, and the sources of the revenues.

In terms of revenue management this would include average daily rates that would be inclusive of discounts, and various pricing schemes. These schemes could include dynamic pricing, value-added pricing, price per segment, length of stay pricing, positional pricing, penetration pricing, and skimming. Additional data for accurate forecasting and decision-making also includes occupies room nights, turnaways, induced or latent demand, reservation metrics, and market trends. 

Today's revenue managers need the following four components to build the foundation for successful hotel revenue management: (Hotel Tech Report, 2021).

  1. Compset: Competitors' rates are also a critical input for setting the best rates, as those prices shape the consumer's perception of the "right price" for a given stay.
  2. Value analysis: A value analysis puts your property in context among your competitors by comparing its location, property amenities.
  3. Rules and alerts: Technology empowers revenue managers with automation.  Siteminder.com (2021) listed the following as the leading RMSs: BEONPRICE, Duetto Edge RMS, EasyRMS, guestrev, HotelPartner Yield Management, Hotelsdot, IDeaS, LodgIQ, MaxEngine, Rainmaker, RateWise, and RevPar Guru.
  4. Routine and habits: Powerful routine and habits can be to unlock revenue management genius.

The COVID-19 pandemic has in some ways provided an opportunity for the lodging industry to begin again, and reevaluate how it has done business, focusing on:

  1. Data collection from scratch.
  2. High volatility in demand.
  3. Booking behavior changes.
  4. Aggressive competition.
  5. New data sources.
  6. Technology above all (Qualpro.co, 2021)

Revenue Management Career Pathways

Revenue analysts and revenue managers are increasingly popular career positions for students and young managers in lodging operations. For example, a revenue manager job description posted by JOBHERO (2021) is shared below focuses on duties and responsibilities, skill set, and core skills.  

Revenue Manager Job Description

Developing pricing strategies and forecasting revenue for hotels and other lodging establishments are the main activities of a Revenue Manager.

Revenue Managers work primarily for hotels, motels, spas, and resorts.

Revenue Manager Duties and Responsibilities:

  • Create Pricing Strategies
  • Conduct Competition Analyses
  • Track Hotel Revenue

Revenue Manager Skills

Revenue Manager would need excellent analytical, communication, customer service, and organizational skills.

Core skills: Based on job listings and other sources we looked at; employers want Revenue Managers with these core skills. If you want to work as a Revenue Manager, focus on the following.

  • Developing pricing strategies, including building rates for rooms and packages, and determining discounts and special rates.
  • Forecasting pricing and revenue based on demand and market trends.
  • Evaluating trends in the economy and hospitality industry.
  • Creating promotional plans to increase revenue.
  • Understanding inventory management processes.
  • Generating revenue reports.

(Adapted from JobHero, 2021).

The skillset as described above frames the course content and or focused courses that integrate revenue management into their curriculum. This author's course, Hospitality Financial Management, includes projects each semester working with smaller cities and towns that have an interest in developing a hotel in their community. Over the last ten years, this course and its students have worked with eastern North Carolina communities including Greenville, Farmville, Washington, Belhaven, Tarboro, Edenton, Ayden, Carteret County, Lake Mattamuskeet, and many more.  

Per the discussion in this article, this project has noted the trend of broadening lines of revenue generation to enhance total revenue management programs. One example of this concept is contained in a project conducted at Lake Mattamuskeet in North Carolina. Mattamuskeet is a manmade lake (waterfowl bird flyway and National Wildlife Refuge) in southeastern North Carolina, located in Hyde County. Hyde County, one of the poorest counties in the state, was interested in the economic development of a small historic Inn at the Mattamuskeet Pump Station on Lake Mattamuskeet.

We, as the School of Hospitality Leadership and this author's course, were invited to conduct a preliminary feasibility study, which was to look at renovation and reopening of the Inn at the pump station. This opportunity presented a challenge to research and analyze market data for an assessment of supply and demand (target markets) and the financial feasibility of the Lodge. This process also required a focus on a broader revenue management plan.

The Mattamuskeet Lodge is a small hunting-like lodge building with only fourteen rooms and some common space, and limited kitchen facilities. The students were charged with conducting a study of the space and the renovation of the Mattmuskeet Lodge with the additional charge of creating new revenue streams. It can be difficult to maximize profitability and revenue management with fourteen rooms. Therefore, students researched and recommended potential new lines of revenue that could enhance total profitability.

Students defined target markets and activities that included, hunters (in season), fishermen, photographer tours, birdwatching groups, and other leisure travelers. These are not typical segments but ones that fit in the context of this lodging facility    

In the report, students included recommendations for room revenue sales and marketing, food and beverage revenue, including a bar and lounge with a view of the lake, retail space for a convenience store, retail space with resources for fishing, hiking, hunting, and bird watching, and rental offerings that included kayaks, canoes, fishing equipment and bait, hook up sites for recreational- vehicles, campsites for tent, and tours for bird watching in addition to game hunting for black bear and other local designated game.  These recommendations were part of what might be described as a comprehensive revenue management plan to maximize the profitability of the Mattamuskeet Lodge.

Opportunities and Positioning 

To enhance overall revenues, employees as a team need to upsell all hotel products, starting with rooms and inclusive of all and innovative revenue streams. Revenue up-sell opportunities could include food and beverage takeout and delivery, the selling of housekeeping services, selling of chef services at premium prices outside the hotel, bartender services for private parties, perhaps even offering laundry services, office space use, and day-use of any hotel facilities. Some hotels have also sold spa and recreation memberships for tennis, golf, and other opportunities. Another idea has been to sell underutilized parking (if any) to maximize revenues.  

The message for navigating pandemic recovery times is to create value and compete on that value beyond room price. Revenue managers and the whole revenue team need to utilize their hotel but also their destination. AHLA Foundation (2020) research shared encouraging trends during the pandemic for hotels and locations. These included:

  1. Lower-level service hotels versus Upper-Class hotels were performing better.  That value has to do with a total product perceived by potential guests, not luxury and price. The value proposition for each hotel and their level of service will differ.
  2. Interstate, Small towns, and Suburban hotels were outperforming urban hotels and resorts. Destinations and therefore smaller lodging offerings have their own perceptions of value. The guests for this segment have tended to be auto travelers looking for convenience and access for a reasonable price. Do we remember staycations? Stay closer to home and drive to destinations near home. We as Americans often look past our own attractions to travel.  This ties directly to smaller locations/cities, resorts, and short trip travel.
  3. Another trend for travelers has been secondary resort destinations, consisting of older resort motels, that have a limited number of rooms, outside entrances for each room, and limited common space and staff interaction. Some lodging operator shave renovated these older motels and been successful in selling their value.
  4. Other popular trends have been short-stay guests, often targeting the weekends versus weekdays.  Value for these folks may mean getting away
  5. Outdoor spaces, venues, parks and beaches, and other outdoor tourism attractions may be opportunities for events, weddings, etc. Hotel locations with access to trails, walkways, and scenic beauty are increasingly attractive. Vacation management rental businesses, Airbnb, and others are being sought out as channels to provide accommodations for families. The access is individual and the transactions with owners and managers are almost always mostly virtual (Adapted from AHLA Foundation, 2020).

Conclusions

"Revenue management is selling the right room to the right client at the right moment at the right price on the right distribution channel with the best commission efficiency." -Patrick Landman, Xotels, (Hotel Tech Report, 2021).  Key Takeaways from this discussion include:

  • Know your hotel and its worth and place in the market.
  • Define your target markets in detail. Each has uniqueness and its own metrics.
  • Define your guest's perception of value. Know your guests and identify their needs for value.  
  • As a leadership team define value from your hotel's perspective for your guests and match this with the guest perception of value.
  • Planning & Forecasting; Like the old saying "ABCD" always be collecting data, planning is constant, and updating forecasts regularly.
  • Know your competition and be constantly assessing your comp set.
  • Identify the lodging metrics decision-making tools that will help you make optimal decisions. 

Hotel revenue management is a process of using analytics, performance data, and other information to anticipate customer demand so that pricing, distribution, and availability can all be optimized. In the process, those within the hotel industry can maximize the amount of revenue they generate, improving their overall financial results (Mahmoud, 2021). Additionally, Siteminder founder Bill Daviau gave his predictions for the top 3 hotel revenue tech trends and innovations that he thought would make or break the industry in 2021 (Krlya RevGEN, 2021).

  1. Automation, system interconnectivity, and API integration.
  2. Forward-looking benchmarks, and
  3. Growing Importance of Digital Presence and E-Commerce.

COVID has presented lodging in general with a chance for a do-over! Starting your revenue management process again can help manage and coordinate your resources and lead to value creation by identifying and utilizing key metrics, positioning a lodging property through marketing and promotion, and ultimately profitability.

Additionally, the creation of a revenue manager career pathway in a hotel or a company can channel the next generation of revenue managers and the skill set they should embrace.  

References and Resources:

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13. PRIVACY POLICY

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We can be reached via telephone, email, or online at our contact page. When you visit our site we do not log any information regarding your domain or email address. Information Sharing: We do not share user information with any third parties other than via press release distribution as described below.

Hotel Newswire is a newswire service that distributes press releases on behalf of our users. If you decide to submit a press release for distribution through our system we will transmit your entire press release including any personal information therein contained to our media contacts and online distribution points including search engines. This is the only redistribution of your information that we engage in. Your submission of press releases through our system indicates consent with this policy. The information we collect during your registration process is used to notify users about updates to our service and inform users of any special events hosted by Hotel Newswire. This information is not shared with other organizations for commercial or non-commercial purposes.

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If you feel that this site is not following its stated information policy, you may contact us.

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