Tell Newsletter #68
Thoughts on the Paris Olympics, PR problems in the travel industry, Booking and Hotels. Are Sales and Marketing people essentially doing the same work? Food for thought.
Hello,
Back in the office after a short holiday last week, so I’m going to recap two weeks of news and articles I found interesting enough to share. There was a lot I had to discard, but maybe you can catch up on that through the 10 Minutes newsletter/site (plug).
Best, Martin
About me: I'm a fractional CMO for large travel technology companies helping turn them into industry leaders. I'm also the co-founder of 10minutes.news a hotel news media that is unsensational, factual and keeps hoteliers updated on the industry – also it is the most read hotel newsletter in Europe. See the international edition of the newsletter and subscribe to it here. 
On the Paris Olympics
The Paris Olympics are probably going to be the most beautiful Olympics ever. They were designed to be seen on TV with amazing locations, scenic backdrops, spectacular photography, a superb graphic style (and an opening ceremony that was not worth $1600 a seat). I’d argue that the IOC needed Paris more than Paris needed the Olympics. As is somewhat evident in the lower than 2023 hotel occupancy. Somehow, some people believed that raising rates up by 500% was a good idea (despite evidence from London and Milan expo to the contrary). Paris is beautiful right now and also not very full. Maybe the “this time it is different” mentality came in, maybe it was FOMO whatever it was, the fact remains that watching the games on TV is spectacular. And I hope this gives a boost for the games in the future. Oh and all the controversy on the opening ceremony was most likely designed to generate more viewers - it seems like it worked.
PARIS OLYMPICS TOURISM
Booking really has a PR problem
The love/hate relationship between hotels and Booking is, in my opinion, really a PR problem. Booking doesn’t do enough to really provide hotels with that extra “love” to become a hotelier’s friend. Probably they think they do, by providing hotels with lots of reservations. And they really do a good job there. But it is perceived as their duty, not a plus. I wrote about that in the pandemic when they were doing brand ads during the 2020 European cup. A time when travel was a mess, they could have been doing ads to encourage safe travel rather than promoting themselves. I believe if they would start helping hotels with additional non-paid services they could probably change this perception issue and become real partners. But that’s easy to say.
UNFAIR BUSINESS PRACTICES
Storytelling in hotel marketing
I know, storytelling was the marketing buzzword of about a decade ago. Still we can do better. While the whole industry has become exceptionally good at performance marketing - we shouldn’t forget that building a brand for a hotel is a lot about building that connection with the guest from the advertising stage through to when they get home. I recently stayed at an amazing hotel in Tuscany, weeks after we returned home they informed us about a lost item that they had found and sent it back to us with a beautiful letter. Which contrasts with another experience in a hotel where they asked me to send a photo of my credit card to pay to send the items back (I figured I’d just buy new items, the risk of card fraud wasn’t worth it). These are details but they’re great.
CUT THROUGH MARKETING
Some hotels also have a PR problem
Resort fees, drip pricing and other surprise costs aren’t designed for the guest. They leave a bitter taste, just like bait-and-switch marketing campaigns do. I don’t think regulations would need to intervene to such the extent of telling companies how to manage their pricing. If companies really did what was best for the guest, regulations wouldn’t need to step in. Unfortunately that didn’t happen. Here’s a great guide to managing the California Junk Fee Law with compliance and defense tips. Again all this wouldn’t be necessary if the priority was the guest (while running a profitable business of course).
CALIFORNIA JUNK FEE LAW
Travel intent is on the up and up
When asked if they intend to travel abroad, 20% of Americans surveyed answered they did. An all time high that just keeps growing. If travel is the canary in the coal mine of the economy then it seems like we’re doing fine. I’m not sure that’s the best benchmark since this is just intent. But it is quite interesting. The whole report is worth checking out.
CONSUMER TRENDS REPORT
Facial recognition in hotels?
Facial recognition could technically greatly enhance the guest experience by simplifying check-in/out processes, but are we really ready for it? Terry Schulenburg highlights the current low adoption rate of biometrics in hotels but anticipates a rise in 2024 and 2025, I think it will take longer. The technology, could be a solution to staffing challenges and will become more affordable. It could facilitate access control, payments, etc but GDPR?
FACIAL RECOGNITION TECHNOLOGY
AI in hotels comes after data in hotels
We love to talk about the latest tech for hotels. But we don’t love to talk about what it will really take to implement them. In hotels, we first need to clean up our data - which is often a mess. Customer profiles are a key data point. Centralized guest profiles can drive repeat business and reduce customer loss when used with AI and machine learning. Currently most loyalty systems are rewards, maybe that’s because the data is so unclean that it isn’t possible to really drive loyalty through them.
DATA STRATEGY and DATA LAKES
THOUGHTS:
Are Sales and Marketing the same?
Sales and Marketing are fundamentally the same thing. With a small difference: Marketing speaks to masses, Sales speaks to the individual.
Probably the best training for a marketing person is to start doing sales, one gets a really good idea of why people buy, their real problems that need solving, the day-day. It takes away all of the fluff and bring marketing down to earth.
And for sales, the best training is to start doing some marketing. Learn how to take product facts and turn them into a story. How to put personality around your product and company. How to find the value props and pivot when the buyer doesn’t care.
It still surprises me how many marketing people have never sold and how many sales people have never had to build a compelling story.
These aren’t two different worlds. They’re the same world with different channels and tools to communicate.
I am surprised by how many “marketers” believe they’ve done a great job when they got a lot of likes on social media. It is great to be able to get lots of likes - and it isn’t always easy. But it needs to result in increased revenue.
In the same way I’m surprised by how many “sales” people believe the leads should arrive with a signed contract in their hands. People who can’t improvise a great (on brand/product) story that makes the product great.
Process is critical, but being able to think holistically is even better.
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