The hotel industry has integrated technology into its operations for approximately 40-50 years. However, they implemented various technological advancements based on their specific requirements at varying times. Let’s take the Hotel Property Management System (PMS) example here. Hotels started using this tool to automate their basic front desk and housekeeping operations in the 70s or 80s. But then look at how it has evolved. The Hotel PMS is now on the cloud, has become easy to use, and has several features to help hotels with 360-degree operations. It has become comprehensive, all-in-one to automate processes across departments. However, the Hotel PMS serves a greater purpose than just managing daily tasks. It is now essential for modern hotels as it drives revenue and growth.
How? Let’s find out.
By saving costs
I am sure you know this. When adopting a Cloud Hotel PMS, you don’t have to spend more on the license fee, AMC fee, software upgrade fee etc, and setting up costly servers. You can opt for the Cloud Hotel on subscription-based pricing. With all these, you will reduce your software ownership costs, adding to your revenue.
By enhancing the guest experience
A Hotel PMS can provide a better guest experience in many ways. It can expedite your hotel’s check-in and check-out process. It reduces guest wait time near your lobby, making them happy. It also helps you roll out several contactless services by integrating with the right solution. The point here is that automation saves staff time and lets them personally attend to guests’ needs. When your guests are happy, they tend to return to you.
By letting you know your guests
The system captures all your guest records, their likes and dislikes and stores them in one place for easy access. This way, whenever repeat guests visit your hotel, it helps you anticipate their needs based on their past records. Armed with insights into their preferences, you can offer customized services to enhance their experiences. You can also run targeted marketing campaigns and upsell other non-room items to earn more. Happy guests spend more and get you more business by recommending your property to their friends.
By helping you sell more online
OTAs are essential for generating indirect bookings as most of today’s travellers prefer to book their accommodation via those platforms. A cloud Hotel PMS integrated with a Channel Manager can play a critical role in this scenario. Apart from updating your hotel’s rates and availability on OTAs in real-time, it improves your property’s OTA rankings. Your property will be seen by a growing number of travellers on OTAs, resulting in increased bookings. More bookings lead to higher revenue for you. And, of course, it also eliminates the perils of overbooking that could have led to unhappy customers, negatively impacting your revenue.
Additionally, how can we not talk about bookings via your website and social media pages while talking about online bookings? A cloud Hotel PMS and Booking Engine integration is critical in this context. This way, you can generate more direct bookings, saving big on commission percentage.
By improving your pricing strategy
A solid pricing or revenue management strategy is vital to driving your hotel revenue. But it’s a difficult task to manually change room rates in response to many parameters in real time. However, today’s intelligent Cloud-based Hotel PMS Systems are here to help you, too. The dynamic pricing feature can change your rates automatically based on your hotel’s occupancy, demand, forecast, and guests’ length of stay. It helps you improve your occupancy and RevPAR.
By boosting your online reputation
When integrated with an Online Reputation Management tool, a Cloud Hotel PMS helps safeguard your hotel’s reputation. It lets you monitor guest reviews across hundreds of booking sites and social media platforms in one place. It promptly notifies you the moment your brand is mentioned anywhere online. You can leverage this to respond to good and bad reviews to emerge as a hotel that values guest feedback. Remember that having an excellent online reputation score can lead to higher ADR, RevPAR, and occupancy rates.
Over the last couple of years, PMS vendors have gone the extra mile to understand hotels’ needs and to make their products imperative for every aspect of their operations. Additionally, hotels nowadays seek a smart Hotel PMS to maximize their investment in digitization in terms of faster ROI and improved revenue.
