Resort hoteliers are in a uniquely challenging position today, having found their properties trapped between the rising cost of goods, limited labor, economic uncertainty, and unrelenting guest expectations. High consumer prices have compressed the hotel market to the point where midscale properties and up are all in competition—and that’s not to mention alternative accommodations. Travelers are feeling the squeeze on their purchasing power and are seeking deals to make the most of their vacation budgets. With these factors in play, it’s no wonder operators across the resort industry increasingly rely on technology partners to provide the advantages they need to stay on track for continued growth while managing costs and tracking operations.
Access to technology has become the deciding factor for resort hotelier success today. These properties are too big and their operations are too varied to manage their revenue strategy manually. Resorts with access to today’s most advanced revenue management tools can leverage invaluable data when prescribing new strategies or operational changes, helping each property find the optimal benefit in every scenario without creating undue strain on operations teams.
Advanced RMS technology also helps resort operators diagnose the barriers preventing revenue growth and address them confidently. In many cases, revenue optimization in resorts comes down to demand or pricing issues, and the culprit is often the resort’s pricing strategy. Ineffective pricing strategies frequently have clear root causes, such as manual operations or steps prone to unforced errors. Resorts can optimize their rooms' value by leveraging automation in a few key areas while allowing revenue managers to experiment in other areas.
Joining Forces
Resort hotels are equal parts experiential and transactional, and there is often no easy way to accurately weigh the value of these two aspects against each other. New managers seeking to disrupt existing protocols and spark change frequently complicate this process. If operators and revenue managers learn to work toward mutual benefit, they can avoid unnecessary friction and grow their bottom line.
What defines your property? What entices your guests to return? What adds most to your bottom line, and where is it dragging? Can anything move, change or be replaced?
These are the beginnings of a discussion that must take place at every resort hotel today. Operators must confront the reality of the business today and compare it to the aspirational experience guests are paying for. How can your hotel exceed guests’ vision? Where is the experience falling short? And what must change to preserve your resort’s success?
It’s clear that siloed departments with similarly “walled off” technologies supporting them can be a drag on growth. Without shared data and understanding between departments, conversations surrounding guest experience enhancements and revenue-generating opportunities become one-sided and much more challenging to navigate. When departments communicate with each other on potential packages, experiences, or offerings, resort hotels can better plan for future changes and provide the elements to offer the best possible guest experience. As resorts use technology to improve communication and tame the many moving parts required to deliver high-level hospitality, guests may not even notice. When it’s done right, they might be too satisfied to care.
Automate to Maintain Consistency
Resorts often have a complex, varied mix of rooms, packages and other “product” offerings that can make implementing effective, demand-based dynamic pricing strategies a tall order without the help of an advanced RMS. Today, this technology makes quick work of rate distribution efforts while maintaining consistency across a resort’s full selection of distribution channels. This increase in efficiency gives resorts the agility needed to quickly implement demand-based pricing decisions that drive incremental revenue growth.
Resort operators have also found this technology invaluable because it can oversee their business mix while preparing contingencies for the unexpected. Cancellations, airport closures, natural disasters, and more are all unforeseen events that can impact a resort hotel’s profitability or test its operations team. The ability to react to these events as they occur is invaluable. Automation is needed to assist hoteliers by stemming the tide of new challenges while operators orient themselves to address guest needs.
Most importantly, resort hotels benefit from access to the most accurate data on their revenue potential and what must be done to stimulate growth. A resort’s revenue management team must develop a clear goal for property growth and communicate it so that the operations team can rally around it—something tangible, allowing hoteliers to aim high with a purpose.
When targeted data is combined with open dialogue between departments, revenue management strategies can help insulate a resort’s team from the unknown while earning the best possible return when business is good. This way, resorts can celebrate their guests and earnings with equal enthusiasm.
Maricarmen Cardenas is a solutions engineer, Americas at IDeaS Revenue Solutions. She has in-depth knowledge of commercial revenue strategy to help clients identify technical needs and implement tailored, effective technology solutions.