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Actual Human Beings Now Booking Travel

How do you explain a 10% bump in leisure and business travel booked through traditional agencies that are staffed by real people? Two reasons:

1. Emerging from the wreckage of the global recession, the travel industry is picking up steam. In both 2010 and 2011, there’s been a 10% increase in bookings through traditional travel agencies. Their bookings account for a third of the $284 billion U.S. travel market. In 2009, however, things were really grim, nearly hopeless: bookings through brick-and-mortar agencies plummeted 23% that year. But as the economy goes, so goes corporate travel.

Here’s where it gets interesting…

2.  About the convenience and immediacy of booking travel online? Turns out it’s a drag for many people. It’s way too time-consuming and there are simply too many options. Time-consuming? In a survey of 2,000 travelers, Steve Peterson of the I.B.M. Institute for Business Value found 20% complaining that it took them over five hours to search and book travel online. Almost 50% of respondents said they spent more than two hours booking travel. “It’s come to a point that it’s too much information to be confident that they have the ability to book the lowest fare,” or uncover the best place to stay, says Peterson. “Consumers are hungry for that one-and-done shopping experience.”

And to think that for over a decade, we thought that flesh-and-blood travel agents would go the way of the dinosaur. Turns out they’ve mastered the very technology that was supposed to bring about their extinction, providing around-the-clock service via text, email, instant messaging, and social networks. The rest of us don’t have the time to book our own travel anymore.

[via HotelMarketing.com]

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Does Pinterest Work for Hospitality?

The jury’s still out on whether Pinterest is the new Facebook. But note that in a mere 9 months, Pinterest went from 50,000 users to 17 million, where it took Facebook 16 months to get there. Whether or not the phenomenon lasts, of course, remains to be seen.

However, if you’re curious about Pinterest and want to throw something new into your marketing mix, think about how you’d like to convey the customer experience in a creative, original way. Say you operate a restaurant in an eclectic, hip, buzzworthy part of town. Pin photos of places of interest around and nearby your place, as would a tour guide. Pin photos of unsung landmarks, living, breathing culture, street musicians and artists then pin photos of elaborate drinks served at your bar, enticing dinner specials, even candid staff shots.

Pinterest can be just as useful for hotels, in that a majority of your guests are out-of-towners who are largely unfamiliar with the lay of the land. Pin photos of popular destinations, recommended dining establishments, event coverage from the hotel, perhaps you can feature architectural flourishes in the hotel that don’t convey in marketing materials. Don’t these possibilities sound exciting?

This is your chance to play tour guide/concierge/ambassador to the city for your guests. “When it comes to pinning, the breakdown should be approximately 70% about the city and 30% about the hotel”  says Kelli Crean, eCommerce Manager for the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City. You’re free to play around with those percentages any way you like, but that’s a good rough guideline to follow. Creating your own pinboard is free, and easy to manage and maintain, from a human resource standpoint. Why not give it a shot?

[hat tip to Carol Verrett]

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Invitation to eCornell’s Cocktail Reception at the HR in Hospitality Conference & Expo

Network with members of the eCornell team, as well as faculty from Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration and School of Industrial & Labor Relations.

Tuesday, February 28
5:30pm – 8:00pm
Hilton San Francisco – Financial District
750 Kearny Street
San Francisco, CA
RSVP Online

Are you attending this year’s HR in Hospitality Conference & Expo in San Francisco? If so, we invite you to join us for a cocktail reception at the Hilton San Francisco following the conference. Join your peers at the bar, meet eCornell’s Hospitality Group and make connections with faculty and staff from Cornell University’s world-famous School of Hotel Administration and the School of Industrial and Labor Relations.

We’ll provide an open bar for the first hour and appetizers throughout the evening. We hope you’re able to join us for this unique networking opportunity at this year’s HR in Hospitality Conference & Expo.

RSVP Online

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“Advanced” is the key word in Hospitality Revenue Management.

This isn’t your mother’s Revenue Management program, that’s for sure.

What does eCornell’s new certificate program Advanced Revenue Management: Pricing & Demand Strategies have that other programs don’t?

  1. For starters, this certificate program was developed with one of the world’s leading authorities on Revenue Management, Dr. Chris Anderson from Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration. He advises leaders at world-renowned hotels, airlines, rental car and tour companies, in addition to consumer goods and financial services firms on how to update, fine-tune and execute their revenue management strategies.
  1. In 2012, knowing how to manage revenue is simply not enough. Since Revenue Management broke into the mainstream years ago, strategies for pricing, inventory and demand manipulation need to be kept current. Knowing the fundamentals will only get you so far in this game. This new program shares advanced pricing and demand strategies.
  1. With the proliferation of mobile technologies, consumer behaviors and purchasing patterns change rapidly from one day to the next. Hospitality 2.0 comes with a whole new set of rules for driving profits and steady growth. And that begins with high-level strategies that more accurately anticipate consumer behaviors.
  1. This is essentially the only advanced Revenue Management program of its kind. If you’re a general manager, revenue and finance manager, operations manager, or a sales or marketing professional with over 3 years of experience working on the financial performance of your organization, this program is most certainly for you.

To learn more about this unique new online certificate program, please go here.

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Cocktail Reception Invitation: eCornell’s HR in Hospitality Post-Conference Reception

Network with members of the eCornell team, as well as faculty from Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration and School of Industrial & Labor Relations.

Are you attending this year’s HR in Hospitality Conference & Expo in San Francisco? If so, we invite you to join us for a cocktail reception at the Hilton San Francisco following the conference. Join your peers at the bar, meet eCornell’s Hospitality Group and make connections with faculty and staff from Cornell University’s world-famous School of Hotel Administration and the School of Industrial and Labor Relations.

We’ll provide an open bar for the first hour and appetizers throughout the evening. We hope you’re able to join us for this unique networking opportunity at this year’s HR in Hospitality Conference & Expo.

Tuesday, February 28
5:30pm – 8:00pm
Hilton San Francisco – Financial District
750 Kearny Street
San Francisco, CA
RSVP Online

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Cornell Hotel School Partners Up for eCornell Scholarship Program

IDeaS Revenue Solutions and the Cornell School of Hotel Administration have announced the launch of the IDeaS Cornell Revenue Management Scholarship Program. The scholarship program offers hospitality professionals access to an online certificate and professional development opportunity in Revenue Management through eCornell. There are 5 eCornell courses offered through the scholarship:

1) Introduction to Hotel Revenue Management
2) Forecasting and Availability Controls in Hotel Revenue Management
3) Pricing Strategy and Distribution Channels in Hotel Revenue Management
4) Overbooking Practices in Hotel Revenue Management
5) Non-Traditional Applications of Hotel Revenue Management

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Cornell Holds Hospitality Summit in Mumbai, India

The Cornell International Hospitality Summit in India India will feature the ninth edition of the Dean’s Leadership Series, a CEO Panel of four of the top hospitality executives in India.

Who should attend: Senior executives in hospitality, travel, tourism and real estate from India, the Middle East and Asia Pacific.

January 17, 2012
The Taj Mahal Palace
Mumbai, India

 

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What Does the Near Future Hold for Hotels?

Jan de Roos, the HVS Professor of Finance and Real Estate at the Cornell School of Hotel Administration and executive director of the Cornell Center for Real Estate and Finance, discusses the effects of the economic downturn and continued market turbulence on the hotel industry’s growth. He highlights areas of recovery and suggests opportunities for growth. Click here to view the video.

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Customer for Life: The Holy Grail of Hospitality

Hospitality people know how vital regular customers are to staying in business. Regulars may not always run up the biggest restaurant bill or book the most expensive rooms, but over time, those familiar faces and repeat business lead to steady earnings long-term. And those regular customers are the ones most likely to actively promote your business or refer you to their friends.

But it’s astounding how often businesses ignore the fundamentals. When a disproportionate amount of time or attention is paid to new customers or large groups, regulars may become dissatisfied with the decline in service or feel they are being taken for granted. Earning customers for life is not a one-time accomplishment. It’s an evolving relationship that requires nurturing and constant evaluation.

Cultivating long-term customer loyalty should drive your entire business strategy. From the company’s mission statement down to individual performance goals, “earn customers for life” should be adopted as a mantra for your entire organization.

Want to know exactly how important a regular customer is to your business? Run the numbers. Calculate the lifetime value of a customer’s loyalty by taking an average bill and multiply it by the number of times they visit in a year.You’ve got a lifetime value metric in place, and now you can gauge the net effect that losing this regular customer might have on your bottom line.

Ask for their feedback, solicit their opinions, and most importantly, respond to their criticisms. They can help you improve your business practices. And do everything you can to ensure that when asked, they’ll speak highly of your business and recommend you to others.

Stever Robbins is right on the money in his piece about lifetime value. The takeaway: Keep that special jar of hot peppers in stock, if only for the guy who eats at your restaurant 5 days a week.