Marketing Review - Spring 2008 - (Page 61)

That simple fact alone is widening the gap between sellers and meeting planners. PRECEDING PAGE: 200143619-002/MATTHIAS CLAMER/GETTY IMAGES; THIS PAGE: 200414612-003/LOUNGEPARK/GETTY IMAGES The Wall of Technology Schmidt points out that technology has made it more difficult for sellers to reach their customers and prospects. “People hide behind e-mail and voice mail today,” he says. “It’s more difficult to build relationships now, because it’s more difficult to get past e-mail and voice mail and even meet with planners. We continue to struggle to connect with people and build good relationships that are long-term. What used to be a relationship is becoming a transaction. These new technologies have made us much more efficient, but much less effective.” He finds the new arena a disservice to his brand, his salespeople, and his industry. “I’ve talked to planners who have booked meetings without even visiting the sites,” says Weiss. “They go online and look at a video. There is the ‘new’ way to do something, and then there is the ‘human’ way. The problem is, we’re taking the word ‘human’ out of human relationships. The relationship between hospitality sellers and meeting planners has been tremendously eroded. If we’re not careful, we’re going to take away the success of meetings.” John Branciforte, director of sales and marketing at the Omni Orlando Resort at ChampionsGate, one of the premier properties in one of the country’s most robust meetings markets, shares the concerns of Schmidt, Graham, and Weiss. “If we think we’re going to hide behind e-mail, we’re all going to lose,” he says, noting that 70 percent of Omni Orlando’s business is from meetings. “There’s no doubt in my mind. Because when you get into the crunch on-site during a meeting, you won’t have a relationship to fall back on. I want relationships, not transactions.” Michael Massari, vice president of Las Vegas Meetings by Harrah’s, which generated $382 million in meeting revenue in 2006 from six hotels including flagship Caesar’s Palace, is even more blunt. “I hate e-mail,” he says. “We have a saying here. ‘If you don’t care whether someone says yes or no, send them an e-mail. If you care, but it’s not that important, call them on the telephone. But if you’ve got to have a yes, get your tail off your chair, get on a plane, and go see them.’” John Webb, senior vice president of the SPRING 2008 • HSMAI MARKETING REVIEW Greater Ft. Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau, practices the same philosophy. He thinks face-to-face contact is so important that he has added a site visit quota to the room night quotas his 12 salespeople must meet. Massari also points out a potentially fatal flaw in the scattershot RFPs that have become the day-to-day currency of the meetings industry. “You’re not going to find in an RFP that a particular executive needs a particular thing for the meeting to be considered successful,” he says. “That is information you’re going to get from a detailed impatient planners feel they have not gotten the attention they deserve. E-mail also places a new requirement on salespeople, Graham says. “It places a premium on written word skills,” he says. “You have to be able to influence the actions of others with your writing skills, and that is not a skill that the typical salesperson— especially the best salesperson—usually has. A good salesperson’s skills are verbal.” A Race to ‘Commoditization’? David Nour, president of Relationship Economics in Atlanta, advises hospitality “It’s more difficult to build relationships now, because it’s more difficult to get past e-mail and voice mail and even meet with planners.” conversation. So, in that sense, e-mail has been a real detriment to our business.” Graham notes another new challenge created by e-mail: immediacy of response. “Current research shows that Internet leads must be responded to within 24 hours, and preferably within the same business day,” he says. The sheer volume of unqualified leads that arrive with the daily avalanche of incoming e-mails makes a truly substantive response almost impossible, which damages the supplier’s reputation for service when clients including InterContinental Hotels Group, Disney, and Marriott. He stresses what he says is the most important point of all. “Technology has been a double-edged sword,” he says. “On one level, it makes us more efficient. But on another level, it commoditizes that which relationships used to create preferences for.” Nour agrees with Schmidt and Graham that relationships have been reduced to mere transactions. “The e-mail you get today is, ‘We’re looking for a hundred 61

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Marketing Review - Spring 2008

HSMAI Marketing Review - Spring 2008 Contents COLUMN: The Online Marketer COLUMN: Success Stories COLUMN: Guest Column Ten Trends Now Shaping the Future of Hospitality Turning the 2008 Consumer Tax Rebates into Hospitality and Travel Sales 25 Extraordinary Minds in Hospitality and Travel Sales and Marketing The Lure of Lore: Connecting with Customers Through a Unique Brand Story A Careful Balancing Act A Meaningful Relationship: How Technology Affects the Connection Between Hospitality Marketers and Meeting Planners SPECIAL SECTION: The 2007 HSMAI Adrian Awards Building Five Star Imagery

Marketing Review - Spring 2008

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