In the quest for online bookings and more direct business, some hotels have relegated their reservation sales team to people who take orders. They’re serving as mere extension of website support, sometimes just confirming dates and room type.
But, there is a reason why the guest has dialled in and not completed the booking online. That’s where your reservation sales agent comes in – an all-important conversion point or even the one who upsells. So what should the agent ask that doesn’t come across as an automated sales pitch? What will sell more? Doug Kennedy, an expert in hospitality training articles and programmes, explores.
If you’re like most hoteliers these days chances are you are looking to reduce distribution costs by increasing direct bookings. If so, perhaps it’s time to update your reservations sales processes. Based on my experience running a hotel reservations mystery shopping business, I can definitively say that these days the majority of front desk and reservations agents offer little more than what I call “website search support.” In other words, they do nothing more than what the caller could have done themselves by visiting the website; find out the dates, the number in the party, click enter, and then read off a list of the room types and rates that come up. Perhaps this reflects that their leadership has lost its focus on the voice reservations channel.
Most of those that do attempt to sell the guest are stuck using outdated sales models and processes that were designed from the era when guests had very little information prior to calling. Back then most were looking at a few bullets of features in an ad from resources such as the Hotel & Travel Index or the AAA Auto Tourbook, so it was important to offer what we would now call a “30 second commercial” overview of the hotel’s main features and benefits.
