Seasoned Sales Trainer Doug Kennedy, President at Kennedy Training Network, Inc. and Cory Falter, Principal at Lure Agency recently explored some of the biggest challenges, opportunities and predictions in hospitality sales.
Here's what they had to say.
Hospitality Sales Challenges
Seasoned Sales Trainer Doug Kennedy, President at Kennedy Training Network, Inc. and Cory Falter, Principal at Lure Agency recently explored some of the biggest challenges, opportunities and predictions in hospitality sales.
Here's what they had to say.
Hospitality Sales Challenges
Transcript
Hospitality sales professionals are facing many challenges. đŸ˜°
There are many challenges we're facing right now. It's hard to pick the top ones, I would say.
Some of those would definitely be staffing. Too many salespeople have been required to go out there and cover shifts at the front desk or help out operations.
But really, the biggest challenge of the industry is that we have to get back to a hunter's mindset for years now, we have had some growth market ten years prior to COVID, where most locations, depending on your geography, you could sit back and live off of inbound sales. So it became a fishing mindset, relying on the digital, a key event promoting ad or the website or in the social business wedding, where the novelty we'll see the big listing to give us that little fish to swim by nibble on our digital bait and reel 'em in.
So it really was a fishing mindset. Now we have to wrap on the orange vest and go out there and hunt down to new prospects the most that we've not had, either. So people can be 35 and have never had to be in this kind of market. Those of us who are a little more mature, we may be just seasoned. Seasoned... yes!
Hospitality Sales Opportunities
Transcript
Right now is a huge time for opportunity in hotel sales.We are at a crossroads.
Some of the industry will follow the way of automation and much of our industry may become automated with companies like Group 360, iVvy, many others looking to automate the booking of small meetings.
Many people move into order taking, and sales may become largely an administrative role. The hunters of the world will go out there and see this as an opportunity to put people into the sales process to use technology to touch people.
That's why we're having a lot of success with the training we do on selling to remote buyers, breaking through the digital core communication barrier. We've got ways that involves tools like Calendly or similar to make it easy for someone to schedule a time with you and avoid the back and forth. To embrace Zoom, but not just flip on a webcam, but to really be good at presenting.
And also, I love using technology such as personalized video email not embedded into an eProposal or something, but actually a message you record on your smartphone that is text sent by text or email directly to them. There's a lot of opportunities for people with the right habitudes, for the right for the new sales habitat.
Nice. Nice. Fantastic.
Hotel Sales Predictions for 2022
Transcript
Sadly, Cory, I'm not overly optimistic about the sales profession evolving.I do think there are some people with the right vision.
What I predict is going to happen is that let's hope the Delta variant was the last surge.Maybe there will be other surges.
But we know there's more rollout of vaccination and natural immunity taking place.
This is going to come slamming back like a tidal wave that pulls all the water way out than it's gone before and then slams the beach.
We're going to get real, real fast. Sadly, what I predict is many hotel salespeople will switch back into the fishing mode and live off of inbound, and they will probably meet their and exceed their 2022 sales goals.
What I hope is that people will take the path less travel, embrace their CRM. Embrace follow-up. Use tech for touch, as we mentioned in the previous segment, and have a new sales habitude to which common it combines habits and attitudes. We have to have the right mindset.
But we also have to take the sales habits. New sales habitudes for a new sales habitat is what I hope happens.
What I predict is slipping back into an era of what I call profitable sales mediocrity, where we can get by being mediocre because of an upmarket.
Hospitality Sales 2022
Are you looking for hospitality sales support in the coming year? Let's connect! Inspiration and information are just a click away >>
