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Online strategies
Today, everything is about online, online, online. And that’s great! Changes keep businesses alive and in progress.
So, what can you and your BD team do to prepare for an outstanding business opening?
- Start with a rate structure that fits your budget.
- Computer-generated pictures are nice, but plan money in your pre-opening budget for a professional hotel photographer. The real pros are rare, and USD 20k + expenses may not be enough – but it is worth it. You may even have to hire actors, if approved because pictures with people, with life, with soul are the best.
- Confirm your opening date. There is nothing worse than customers who want to come to stay at your new hotel, and you have to cancel their bookings.
- Awareness will be your issue for the opening, so you have to create attraction either through your brand or chain or a top-rate listing at OTAs (but only for a limited period), or by another attraction so that other organizations will do part of your awareness marketing. I like to do big opening parties, invite travel agents, corporates, diplomats, politicians, journalists, key accounts … anybody who can spread the word. I still remember my Grand Opening Party in Thailand and the late Dr. Hari (one of the owners) with tears in his eyes as the lanterns rose into the night sky.
- Contact tour operators as early as possible. In some markets, they still work with printed brochures, that’s a year ahead. When you are late for a brochure, you can still get into their online systems – perhaps offer a higher commission for the first year or specials for their customers…
- Set up your website booking followed by OTAs. You need a good channel manager so that you upload your rates and conditions once and distribute/change them to all your online sales channels with one mouse click.
- Amend rates according to occupancy, but my recommendation is that you be very moderate with rate changes at the beginning – make customers get used to your system.
- Never publish cheap rates – no, you cannot just increase them later, customers won’t forget! Instead, work with discounts or other specials, but ensure customers understand what the real rate is.
- You want to work with upgrades and other free benefits? Great idea, but make sure to train your FO team so that they mention the “free” benefit several times upon check-in!
Tiga Network 