At Plan B Consultants, Inc. and Sales4Hire™, we are highly engaged in proactive sales efforts.  But we also recognize that our hotel partners are also tasked with responding to inbound leads that are reaching them through various sources.

An interesting example was shared with me by a meeting planner this week, and I was shocked as to how similar this story was to others I’ve seen and heard during our partnerships with hotels.  From time-to-time we’ll conduct market shops & interviews to evaluate response time and hotel sales manager engagement.  What I’ve heard and what we’ve witnessed are fairly similar.  As an industry, we have some work to do with ensuring sales managers are really listening to the client, responding with what they need and engaging appropriately.

The Inbound Hotel Sales Lead Scenario: 

A very typical RFP was sent including the reason the group was visiting, number of guestrooms needed with specific dates (no flexibility), and space needs.  As far as RFPs go… this one was very detailed.  She shared what was important to the group (walking distance to restaurants & nightlife), and gave a date and time of day for when she needed the responses (4 full business days).

She called ahead to get the email address of the proper sales person or the sales lead catcher’s email address and confirmed those.

Hotel Sales Response Results:    

Of the 6 Hotels that received the RFP:

• 2 Hotels responded with a rate proposal and all of the information she asked for within the timeframe that she requested.
• 1 Hotel responded 2 days past the due date.
• 1 Response was received from the hotel saying that they just received the RFP (this was 3 days after the due date) and asked if they could still respond. She responded positively that she would still be open to their proposal.  1 day after that, she received an email from the sales manager asking her to resend all of the information about the need.  The planner resent the information never to hear back from the hotel again.
• 2 Hotels did not respond at all.
• 1 Hotel sent a follow-up email to see if she had any questions, and what they could do to earn her business and asked how their proposal compared.
• 0 Hotels reached out via phone at all throughout the coarse of the bidding process

The Meeting Planner’s Reaction: 

She shared with me that this is common for her to have to chase down proposals, re-share information that has already been given to someone at the hotel, and receive nothing back from hotels she considered at the top of her list based on initial research.  She was really disappointed in this particular city for this particular group because one of the properties she felt was a perfect fit for the group did not respond.  She even tried to give them another chance with a phone call to no avail. She said she understood if they couldn’t accommodate, but the fact they never responded deters her from ever sending that hotel another bid for any future groups.

Additionally, she was shocked that none of the properties tried to call her, and only one reached out in follow-up after they sent the proposal.  Radio silence!   I asked if she would’ve welcomed phone calls during the process and her response was, “Absolutely!”  She said that she does get frustrated when a sales manager calls to ask the same questions that are already on the RFP, because it’s as if they are calling just to check the box to say they did it. However, if they call to ask valid questions so they can add value to their proposal and dive deeper into the need, then she is willing to spend time with them.

So there you have it.  Of course, just one short example, but a true learning opportunity straight from someone who is on the other side of the relationship, every day.  If we as hoteliers do not want our product to be commoditized, then we must treat the process accordingly and do everything in our power to engage meaningfully.  How we approach the customer engagement in the RFP process will be reflected back to us in how the customer makes their decision.

By the way… She chose the hotel that showed some love and followed-up with her! 🙂