As hoteliers, we have massive amount of information about our guests. If only, we had the foresight to mine this data and use it smartly for revenue generation, we would be the Amazon of the hospitality industry.
Let’s start with a story.
It is about a man who inherits a copious reserve of gold right beside his house. He sometimes finds some gold dust scattered above the ground. So, this man does a strange thing – he collects the gold dust, sells it and earns enough money to buy a few small luxuries, like a new TV, for which he feels extremely lucky!
I know you must be thinking that this man is blind! However, if you knew him, you would probably pity him or laugh at him. If there is gold dust that’s surfacing from the ground, one can only imagine the riches under! All he needs to do is mine it, and probably get featured in Forbes for discovering it! But, would you ever fathom that this person could be you?
What if I were to tell you that you may very well be the blind one; that you may be the man who looks at the gold dust and is simply happy to gain profit, however little, from it?
As hoteliers, we probably have more data today about our guests than Amazon did when they were trying to become the giants that they are at present. If only we hoteliers had the foresight to mine this massive amount of data and use it smartly for revenue generation – we would be the Amazon of the hospitality industry.
In fact, after the spouse and Google, we are probably the third to really know our guests. Sometimes, we even know more about their eccentricities that the other two might be aware of.
Still not convinced?
Consider this – What is it about a customer that we, as hoteliers, don’t know?
We know what he is called, where he lives, how old he is, how often he travels, what he likes to eat and when, what he likes to drink, how he likes his coffee, if he needs an alarm to wake him up, what kind of bed he likes, his favourite mode of transport, whether he gets upsold easily (this last one can come in so handy, isn’t it?). The list can go on and on…
Just sprinkle basic data enrichment and connect social information to what we already know, and all of a sudden we’ve opened a whole new Pandora ’s Box (the good variety!)… from then on there is literally no limit.
Now maybe we agree, maybe we give a small nod, but the next obvious question remains – how and where to start?
Every story has a beginning, so let’s just start from there!
Study your data first. Some obvious insights will pop out.
Read rest of the article at: Hotel Online
