Hospitality Industry Sales Overview

Hospitality Industry Sales Positions

• Sales positions include deliverers, order-takers/customer service representatives, missionaries (goodwill creators/educators), technicians, and demand creators

Nature of Hospitality Sales

• Prospecting involves locating and cultivating new customers
• Targeting means allocating time effectively among potential customers
• Communication entails providing information about the company's offerings

Sales-Force Objectives

• Objectives align with corporate goals, focusing on areas like revenue, and market share
• Objectives aid sales team members in planning and executing customized sales programs
• Objectives are designed annually
• Achieving goals includes sales volume, upselling, market share, and product-specific targets

Sales Volume

• Common measures include occupancy, passenger miles, and total covers
• Sales volume is tracked by segment and price/margin mix

Upselling and Second Chance Selling

• Involves selling additional services, upgrading rooms, and food and beverage options

Market Share

• Market share is a brand's portion of total category sales
• It is calculated by dividing a brand's sales volume by the total category sales volume

Market Penetration

• Market penetration is the percentage of market share a company captures in revenue
• Hotels are frequently measured against a defined level of market penetration

Product-Specific Objectives

• Designed to improve sales volume for particular product lines
• Sales managers must consider the impact on all product line members when setting these

Sales-Force Structure

• Structure is organized by territory (size/shape), market segment, market channel, customer, or a combination of these

Sales-Force Size

• Size is determined by annual sales volume, desired calls per group, with workload calculated by calls multiplied by number of accounts

Size of Hotel Sales Force

• Factors include corporate/chain sales support, use of sales representatives, team selling, electronic/telephone sales, and travel intermediary dependency

Organizing the Sales Department

• Inside sales teams provide technical assistance, sales support, handle reservations, and telemarketing
• Field sales teams are made up of commissioned or salaried representatives
• Team sales include sales blitzes, travel missions, and charity promotions

Relationship Marketing

• It relies on the idea that important accounts require continuous, focused attention
• Focuses on managing both customers and products

Strategic Alliances

• Strategic alliances entail relationship marketing between vendors/buyers or non-competing vendors and a common buyer
• One Night Stands are short-term, opportunistic relations like cross-advertising
• Affairs are mid-term tactics like hotels participating in airline frequent flyer programs
• I Do's are long-term commitments

Importance of Careful Selection

• Training new sales staff is costly; an unstable sales force is less productive

What Makes a Good Sales Rep?

• A good sales representative is honest, reliable, knowledgeable, and helpful
• They also possess risk taking abilities, and a strong sense of mission

Recruiting

• Three recruiting models: batch process, only-as-needed, and always-recruit

Training

• Three types of training: product/service, policies/procedures/planning, and sales techniques

Selecting Sales Strategies

• Key strategies include preventing erosion, growing key accounts, and dealing with marginal accounts

Principles of Personal Selling

• The principles include prospecting, qualifying, re-approach, approach, presentation, demonstration, negotiation, overcoming objections, closing, and follow-up

Presentation and Demonstration

• Five influence strategies: legitimacy, expertise, referent power, ingratiation, and impression

Motivating Professional Sales Staff

• Compensation includes straight salary, commission, or a mix
• Supplementary motivators include sales meetings and contests

Evaluation and Control of a Profession Sales Force

• Tools for evaluation include sales quotas, norms, time management tools, and call schedules

Best Practices

• Examples are Ruth Fertel of Ruth Chris Steak House and Harrah’s Cherokee Total Rewards program