Think Like a Revenue Officer to Find Your Ideal Hotel

by | Mar 19, 2015 | For Organizers

One of Group360’s greatest strengths is that many members of our team, including our entire executive team, were in hotel sales and operations before we started the company.

We speak “hotel” and understand how hoteliers think. This knowledge and experience translates into better contracts for our event planner clients.

Your RFP must appeal to two important parties. The first is the salesperson. With the right RFP, a salesperson becomes a great ally. The second important party is the revenue officer, who is responsible for ensuring the hotel chooses events that are the best fit for the hotel.

Three keys for every revenue officer

The revenue officer is looking for three keys in any potential contract:

•  Historical data
•  Historical spend
•  “Pattern” at the requested date

The most important part of the historical data is your track record of room pickup from prior events. Every contract includes a block of expected room nights, depending on the type of event. The pickup is the percentage of room nights that you actually used. RFPs that show a high average pickup receive more favorable consideration.

The second element is a historical spend. While room nights are the No. 1 profit center for a hotel, food and beverage (F&B) is the No. 2 profit center. Including F&B in your RFP is one of the best ways to make your proposal more attractive and more likely to get attention.

Pattern is hotel lingo for demand on a specific date. It’s a combination of both the market demand and hotel demand. Patterns change month to month for individual markets and hotels. For example, hotels in Orlando consider February a premier month, whereas October is a premier month in Nashville.

Every revenue officer uses a pattern to figure out the right groups a hotel can accommodate at any time.

Creating value

Our goal at Groups360 is to create the best value for your meeting. The first step in that process is knowing how a revenue officer thinks.

Step two is building the best RFP possible, which includes everything your meeting or event needs to be attractive to hotels. It’s why we strongly encourage our clients to include both historical data and historical spend in their RFPs. Remember how I mentioned building allies of salespeople? Including this information with your RFP means fewer follow-up calls and gives salespeople the information they need to advocate for your event.

The final step is using industry data to do our own pattern analysis so we find the right markets and hotels for your event, which could vary greatly by market and time of the year. Groups360 believes it is important for you to have the same information that revenue officers use to make decisions.

Of course, our approach is completely transparent to you and the hotels we recommend. Transparency is a core value and leads to a better outcome for everyone.

Get started today

If you need help finding the ideal location for your next meeting, contact us here or give us a call today. Anyone of our sales partners is ready to help you.