96 – Spring Workshop Takeaways

Episode Transcript

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Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot where by hoteliers test-in and we examine out what is trending in resort internet marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree.

Ryan Embree:
Hi there everyone and welcome to an additional episode of the Suite Location. This is your host, as normally, Ryan Embree, Director of Marketing at Vacation Media Group. And we’ve received a fantastic episode for you right now. We do these episodes four instances a yr since we essentially perform 4 occupancy workshops for hoteliers. And this season’s workshop is titled “Business is Blooming: How to Improve Occupancy this Spring.” So this is our spring occupancy workshop. It is one particular of my favorites mainly because we are coming out of the wintertime, which is typically a slower time for the marketplace. And we’re finally starting off to see that expansion and occupancy. Now the springs the earlier couple yrs have of course been a little bit unique with the pandemic and coming out of that. But with these workshops, we are chatting about positioning your lodge digitally for results when vacationers are browsing and they’re carrying out really a little bit of browsing, which we’ll speak about in this article in second.

Ryan Embree:
So once again, these are occupancy workshops in which we satisfy a single-on-one particular with hoteliers in about a 15 to 20 minute session talking about the hotel’s electronic presence. How are they positioning on their own coming into the period of spring break, holidays, May, Memorial working day, a lot of good issues in the spring and actually placing ourselves up also for the summertime in which occupancy definitely heats up. So with these episodes, what we like to do is, commonly when I perform these workshops, we get some actually excellent takeaways and insights from the hoteliers that we chat about some popular themes and threads. So in the earlier, clearly we’ve talked about the staffing lack appropriate now, which has been hurting a ton of people today. This is our third time executing a spring occupancy workshop. Once more in 2020 and 2021, there have been quite unique discussions, which prospects me to our initial craze that we seen this workshop vs . many others, which was the positivity of the hoteliers that we have been conversing to. The optimism that was out there, that travel is returning.

Ryan Embree:
And as I communicate about these travelers carrying out lookups, you know, I have received a truly remarkable stat that we arrived across, where it claims U.S. natural Google research go to development by field in Q4 of 2021 compared to Q4 in 2020. And the proportion transform for travel was at 41%. So that is a good deal of eyes hunting and arranging and staying inspired to journey once all over again. But as I caution the hoteliers that I spoke to on this workshop, they are gonna be searching at your hotel’s electronic presence a lot otherwise than they did pre-COVID-19 and pre-pandemic. But trend number one particular, occupancy is growing. It’s below. Whether we like it or not, transient leisure has generally been there the previous few several years and has been top the pack in restoration, but we’re also looking at business, weddings occur back again. So we’ll chat a little little bit about that afterwards, but the next pattern that I found on these conversations that I was obtaining is, you know, we have been as an sector running all over, it feels like, trying to determine out what to do to adjust to this pandemic, this new typical that COVID has sort of ushered into our sector.

Ryan Embree:
And then on prime of that, you have this staffing scarcity, ideal? Inflation now commencing to strike property as well, but we’re starting to see factors form of slow down and hoteliers genuinely last but not least checking items like their social media, their evaluations, critique responses. And a large amount of the hoteliers I talked to when we took 15 minutes to in fact sit down and take a glimpse were actually stunned with what they observed. They possibly experienced a entrance desk supervisor or a DOS that had still left for the duration of these past two several years that was in demand of this stuff. And now it is kinda laid dormant there. So I would inspire you if you are listening to this, examine your Fb, look at your hotel’s Instagram, LinkedIn, ideally you are on these internet sites, but check out and see when the last time you posted, mainly because time has been traveling by proper now and just before, you know, it, a ton of these posts that we had been looking at ended up back in 2021 and vacationers are seeking now far more than at any time for appropriate data.

Ryan Embree:
So if they see anything again in, in 2021 or even 2020, it is not gonna be applicable to them. And it could mean a unfavorable connotation, adverse impression for the vacationers that are doing investigate. They’re lastly sitting down down and examining issues like their overview websites and observing on web-sites like TripAdvisor, OTAs, Google, areas where travelers are generating booking selections that the final critique that they acquired was 6 months ago. We know appropriate now that everything is relocating so quickly. Omicron came in November and swept by the country. And that altered the way that people perceive traveling and the stage of basic safety of what that was. So yet again, examine like your resort, social media, your status and evaluation responses. That was a further detail we have been speaking about, is obtaining the time to respond to reviews. And I know for a good deal of hoteliers listening to this, it could possibly be a single of people items at the bottom of our precedence list, but it is so vital ideal now when we speak about our following trend, which is location anticipations versus meeting anticipations. And I’ll demonstrate the difference.

Ryan Embree:
So conference expectations is, believe about a traveler walking into an economic system lodge and anticipating Ritz-Carlton services at an economic system stage cost. Those people anticipations are a little bit way too higher, and it could be tricky to meet individuals expectations. Setting expectations is a wholly distinctive dialogue. Assume of placing expectations as a person going for walks into your lodge in the summer time and anticipating to enjoy that beautiful pool that you have, and your pool’s closed for renovations. And they had no strategy that that was the scenario. That is a failure to established anticipations from a hotelier standpoint. So there’s a quite distinctive distinction there. And when we chat about evaluate response is just one of the most effective places that we can set anticipations for our potential traveler.

Ryan Embree:
Indeed, it is incredibly important to answer to the responses that is in front of you and to that traveler that took time outta their working day to leave you a critique for your business. But it’s also placing the expectations for that potential traveler. So substantially has improved around the past two years from breakfast, facilities, even resort insurance policies, the way we’re cleansing rooms, the way we’re interacting with attendees. There could be tourists that when they appear on to your assets have a completely diverse expectation. So if you are not setting those people prior to their keep, then you’re failing to established their expectations. And that is actually the number a single reason that we are looking at adverse assessments on-line. As a large amount of you know, that listen to this, Vacation Media Team has a Answer and Solve alternative wherever we reply to guest assessments. We have now hit the unbelievable benchmark of responding to in excess of 750,000 opinions for our hotel companions and are currently responding to a thousand guest resort assessments a day correct now in our headquarters.

Ryan Embree:
And the number just one explanation, the selection just one explanation that we are seeing these adverse opinions come in is mainly because right anticipations are not established. So if we can use overview reaction as a way to communicate and message to long term vacationers, that is gonna give us the chance to set all those proper expectations. And I’ll give you a swift instance if you are next me. So 1 of the items that has wholly changed and I suspect will take a very little bit longer transition to get back again to typical or pre-COVID is breakfast for our residence, ideal? With the staffing lack, with individuals interacting, breakfast buffets, we have been instructed to stay absent from these in the course of the thick of the pandemic. Now we are at a position in which resorts could be at completely distinctive spectrums of breakfast. Some could be ideal again to where by they were in 2019 with a big hot breakfast buffet.

Ryan Embree:
Others are continue to being conservative, breakfast on the go. If your guest walks into your hotel and does not know what they’re heading to get in the morning, that is a failure to set anticipations. And we’re seeing that at times in these assessments. So evaluate reaction is a fantastic way to established that. Social media, also. Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, you wanna make positive that you’re location these correct visitor expectations, due to the fact we’re observing that all over again, genuinely impacting hotels’ reputations that we’re functioning with. And then ultimately, the very last development that we talked about with hoteliers all through these workshops is just altering to the new normal. Seeing these teams come back and what it’s going to consider in buy to receive their enterprise. Weddings, very last episode, if you are adhering to me the prospect right now for weddings and wedding blocks for our attributes is unbelievable revenue probable out there.

Ryan Embree:
So what are you executing to check out to seize that and current market your hotel, taking edge of the bleisure travel pattern, appropriate? The business enterprise traveler that now will work from property all week and needs to start their getaway early. They want to occur out to the home on Wednesday, Thursday, or on Wednesday with their spouse and children so that the household can delight in some of the amenities or attractions in your place. And they perform from the hotel, extending their getaway, extending the place nights per keep. So how are we attracting? How are we adapting our marketing approach to capture this new normal traveler that we’re gonna see? And as I wrap up this episode right here, I will say, it’s been a quite hard couple decades to do this form of spring workshop. And I’ve experienced to dig incredibly, very deep in exploration to try out to find some beneficial information in the marketplace as it relates to occupancy and ADR, but knock on wood, if anything goes ideal, this spring, we are in for a monster spring and an even bigger summertime.

Ryan Embree:
So the occupancy is likely to be there from vacationers. But the query I want you to talk to oneself is how do you want to be picked? Do you wanna be picked for the reason that that traveler had to begin with wished to continue to be at the lodge following door and they were being all booked or their price was way also large and they chose your hotel because you ended up solution B or do you want to be alternative A, do you want your traveler to be psyched about the stay that they are gonna arrive on property? Do you want them to become an advocate of your lodge immediately after they stay on residence? Have you set appropriate anticipations for this traveler when they phase in through your lobby and approach the entrance desk, these are the style of concerns that you want to be inquiring, due to the fact once again, the occupancy will be there.

Ryan Embree:
But the distinction in between traveler A that I just stated and traveler B is day and evening. And once you get that kind of snowball impact of occupancy and advocates for your house, it just furthers your arrive at and electronic marketing and puts you at a competitive gain for escalating your occupancy. So if you haven’t participated in these workshops, as I pointed out prior to, we do them every single single year. It is just one of my most loved parts of my task listed here at Journey Media Team. I would enjoy to speak with you about your home, about your locale. We know every one lodge is distinctive. So that’s what I enjoy about these workshops. If you’re intrigued in having a conversation about that, clearly you can achieve out to us whenever at travelmediagroup.com and we’d appreciate to communicate with you or following time we have got it in the summer season coming up. If you see that electronic mail run throughout your inbox, agenda a conference with me, enjoy to discuss to you, but I am confident the future time we do these insights, we ideally, fingers crossed, will have some great, great information to share. So thank you for all the hoteliers that participated in the workshop. Thank you for all for listening. And we’ll chat to you up coming time on the Suite Spot.

Ryan Embree:
To be a part of our loyalty program, be confident to subscribe and give us a 5 star score on iTunes. Suite Location is made by Travel Media Team with protect artwork by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree and we hope you savored your keep.