This testimony echoed a final strong key theme of the Summit, that revenue management has, and is, moving from a tactical profession to a strategic one. Getting the right technology to support this move is obviously very important, and it was found that more hoteliers are now relying more on technology for the tactical applications of the job. Automated systems provide the revenue manager with the right tool to do the right job.
They provide the hotel management team with a view to the true volume and value of demand to come, enabling the hotel to book the right business at the right time at the right price. The revenue manager can be more strategic in execution and provide better information further up the line so that better price setting decisions can be put in place. Finally, the global trend of creating a culture that supports revenue management as a strategic discipline within the hotel, has demonstrated the increasing maturity of revenue management as a whole.
To achieve a deeper understanding of the organisational culture surrounding revenue managers, we conducted a special global revenue management survey, where delegates at the Summit were asked to give their opinions on key issues. Some of our findings included:
- 35.94% of respondents expect that RevPAR will increase by 2.5-5% over the next six months.
- 62.5% of revenue managers present believe this increase will be driven by rate, not occupancy.
- 24.71% of attendees ranked ‘conference & banquets’ as the revenue area they spend the most time on, over and above rooms.
- 87.5% of hoteliers present had a brand active on social media.
- Of this number, 20.82% ranked Facebook as the most important social media platform to attracting new guests, followed by 19.33% for Twitter, 14.50% ranked YouTube and 12.64% ranked their own hotel blog.
- Of those hotel brands active on social media, 37.7% operated on two platforms, whilst 27.87% marketed their brand on three platforms and 19.67% operated on four or more.
- 58.33% of attendees reported that they had experienced declining ancillary revenue streams.
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IDeaS, a SAS COMPANY, is a provider of pricing, forecasting and optimisation solutions and services. IDeaS’ Solutions are implemented via Software as a Service (SaaS) and IDeaS Advantage and IDeaS for Success services help at all levels of a client’s organization. For more information, visit www.ideas.com.
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