A checklist to prepare the hotel industry for its post-coronavirus future
Column — This year brings a new reality to the hospitality industry, a new normal that we should all get ready to face immediately. Many companies are searching for new solutions whilst ignoring the fact that most have already been invented. I would like to share with you the most important steps to put the pandemic behind you and get ready for a new start, this list should help.
Update, update, update
It is vitally important that you maintain close contact with your guests and keep them informed. Most will look for information on your website, simply because it is the fastest and easiest way. Consequently, keeping your website up to date is essential for guests who have already booked a room. You should also inform new guests whether a stay is possible or not, and do not avoid having to pass on bad news if necessary.
Update your Internet Booking Engine (IBE) with rates, restrictions, and availabilities, all vital data for your guests. HRS use SimpleBooking, a tool that provides the state-of-the-art features needed to run your own IBE. It is user friendly and intuitive, making it easy for your guests to navigate their way through the reservation process. This IBE also gives you to access to predictions and facilitates the integration of channels, databases, and hotels, by using modern advertising features.
Informing your partners
Your partners will need to be informed about your current situation, whether it is freely available for occupation or subject to restrictions. Allowing agents (channels) to sell your rooms will improve your ability to sell all your available inventory, anywhere, and anytime. This is the most reliable way to increase your revenue in these post-pandemic times. Only a good channel manager such as SmartHOTEL, will allow you to track and measure which online sales channels are working, and conversely, those which are not.
Price adjustment
To stay profitable, you will need to implement dynamic pricing, and a solution like IDeaS is irreplaceable for this task. This solution makes it quick and easy to utilize world-class price optimization, providing hotels with fast access to the industry’s most advanced revenue management analytics and reporting capabilities.
“An increase of a single digit can help you remain profitable.”
IDeaS precision forecasting is also perfect for the development of proactive strategies. The use of sophisticated demand uncertainty and pattern recognition technology allows the user to positively improve their market share. During periods of regulated capacity limitation, an increase of a single digit can help you remain profitable.
Budget adjustment
Speaking of profits. Maybe there is no need to mention such a clear point, but sometimes we overlook the obvious. Adjusting budgets and forecasts for 2020 and 2021 is critically important, and for this, you will need to use the best financial planning and management reporting solution which has been written specifically for the hotel industry.
At HRS, we work together with Fairmas, a developer who has specialized in powerful cloud-based solutions that are focused on planning optimization and revenue monitoring. All these solutions have been built to maximize the financial performance of any hotel business.
“I strongly suggest working on what-if scenarios.”
In addition to budgeting and forecasting, I strongly suggest working on “what-if” scenarios, these can be added to your strategic development plan. Check what would happen if you started to renovate or rebuild rooms, will my business benefit in the long-term, or run into short-term risks?
Our software partner, Fairmas, has a “what if” function that makes profit optimizations easy to submit. You can ask the solution to calculate the effects of a reduction in income, and it will give you a comprehensive analysis of the outcome. Users can then add or subtract conditions in order to develop a clearer vision of the situation.
Gathering the information together
To analyze this information effectively the data must be combined in your PMS. The Oracle Hospitality PMS is configurable and makes it easy to obtain fast and accurate information on either an individual or complex hotel environment running multiple properties in a database.
By checking all of these positions you will ensure that you are ready for the post-pandemic future of contactless software, kiosk solutions, eSignature, ID scan, mobile keys, and vending machines instead of in-room bars.
About the author:
After graduating from high school Jochen Röttger trained as a cook in a gourmet restaurant, he then studied hotel management after which he was taken on as a management assistant. A period as a management trainee in Minneapolis, US, was followed with a move to a hotel chain in Frankfurt where he became an event manager.
In his 19 years at Fidelio, Micros-Fidelio, Micros and Oracle, Jochen held positions as an installer, product manager, and finally as a customer service manager. Today, Jochen works as a Business Development Manager for HRS Hospitality & Retail Systems. He cannot imagine a job outside of Hospitality Industry, he loves the interaction with hotel teams and enjoys traveling both for business and in private.
