Hotel guest mix: developing the demand your property needs

A larger audience does not yet tell you whether a hotel is developing the demand it needs.

Commercial work starts with the guest segments to retain and those to attract, according to trading periods, reasons for travel and markets. Protecting strong sales and developing an underperforming period call for different decisions.

This changes the product to promote, the sales conditions, the content and the channels. Some demand is also built through companies, event organisers and referral partners. Communication aimed at individual travellers does not cover the whole sales effort.

Price, location, atmosphere, services and value for money matter in a specific context. I connect these reasons to book with the guests the hotel wants to attract and what it can genuinely offer them.

To assess whether visibility is useful, I return to sales: the periods developed, the rate sustained and relevant ancillary revenue. The costs of the channels used complete the picture.

Guest mix is developed through this connection between demand, offer and commercial activity. It gives marketing actions a direction and links them to the development of the hotel's top line.

Further reading: What I look at to understand if a hotel is truly aligned.

Want to develop new guest segments for your hotel? Explore my consulting assignments.