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Benu AggArwAl roBert Arnold dAvid Atkins ursulA Boll Mi-chelle Bozoki george BrennAn kAthleen cullen MichAel doMin-guez MichAel doMinguez JAck eAs-dAle steve enselein AMir eylon JAnet gerhArd loren grAy Adele gutMAn Milne christiAn kuhn theresA lewis JAclyn loo glen MAcdonell Joey MArtin lArry Mogelonsky kAsey o’leAry hAr-old Queisser Andrew ruBinAcci Mickey schAefer noAh PAul trAttBenu AggArwAl roBert Arnold dAvid Atkins ursulA Boll Mi-chelle Bozoki george BrennAn kAthleen cullen MichAel doMin-guez MichAel doMinguez JAck eAs-dAle steve enselein AMir eylon JAnet gerhArd loren grAy Adele gutMAn Milne christiAn kuhn theresA lewis JAclyn loo glen MAcdonell Joey MArtin lArry Mogelonsky kAsey o’leAry hAr-old Queisser Andrew ruBinAcci Mickey schAefer noAh PAul trAttBenu AggArwAl roBert Arnold dAvid Atkins ursulA Boll Mi-chelle Bozoki george BrennAn kAthleen cullen MichAel doMin-guez MichAel doMinguez JAck eAs-dAle steve enselein AMir eylon JAnet gerhArd loren grAy Adele gutMAn Milne christiAn kuhn theresA lewis JAclyn loo glen MAcdonell Joey MArtin lArry Mogelonsky kAsey o’leAry hAr-old Queisser Andrew ruBinAcci Mickey schAefer noAh PAul trAttBenu AggArwAl roBert Arnold dAvid Atkins ursulA Boll Mi-chelle Bozoki george BrennAn kAthleen cullen MichAel doMin-guez MichAel doMinguez JAck eAs-dAle steve enselein AMir eylon JAnet gerhArd loren grAy Adele gutMAn Milne christiAn kuhn theresA lewis JAclyn loo glen MAcdonell Joey MArtin lArry Mogelonsky kAsey o’leAry hAr-old Queisser Andrew ruBinAcci Mickey schAefer noAh PAul trAttBenu AggArwAl roBert Arnold dAvid Atkins ursulA Boll Mi-chelle Bozoki george BrennAn kAthleen cullen MichAel doMin

to P 25 e xt rA o r d i n A ry M i n d s 2013

We reached out to this dynamic group of achievers to get their take on the greatest changes and opportunities facing the industry and profession, as well as their thoughts on marketing to consumers and what salespeople need to do to be successful. Here is what many of them had to say.

“The complexity created with multi-generational consumers and employ-ees is pushing every traditional model and thought process,” notes Michael Dominguez, senior vice president, hotel sales, MGM Resorts Internation-al. “The opportunity is being able to strategically find solutions that are not ‘one size fits all’ while being effective communicating and utilizing a variety of channels of communication.”

It’s about being unique offers Larry Mogelonsky, president and founder, LMA Communications. “Hotels still aren’t fully grasping the opportunity to be truly exceptional amongst their comp set.” As an example he cites the F&B resurgence. “Everyone eats and this is increasingly becoming a way not only to differentiate a hotel and build a stronger emotional connection with guests but also to develop a local following and to become a com-munity leader. Another untapped opportunity is providing smaller, more ergonomic rooms which are in vogue, as is hybrid, social spaces around the lobby which mix work and play.”

“The consumer is now in charge,” states Mickey Schaefer, CEO/founder, The EXPERIENCE Institute®. “Their tweets, posts and texts tell the true story of a destination’s overall visitor experience, which has tremendous impact on whether a meeting planner books the hotel, or not. ‘Will my attendees have a good experience there?’ is now a dominant part of the decision mix.”

Joey Martin, director, regional marketing, Choice Hotels International, agrees about not taking a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach to marketing. “It seems like we’ve been hearing ‘this year will be the year of mobile marketing’ for the past three years. And while mobile marketing is very important, it is still not the main way that consumers book travel (yet). There are a variety of avenues people take to make their travel decisions. We have to meet them where they are, not just jump on the latest trend.”

He adds: “Taking a well-rounded approach to marketing by testing and measuring we can make sure our sales and marketing efforts are as effec-tive as they can be for our brands. However, we also have to keep in mind that what is the most efficient vehicle today could change tomorrow, so we

Benu Aggarwal President and Founder, Milestone Internet Marketing

robert ArnoldVice President of Sales, Vizergy

david Atkins Principal and co-Founder, digital dnA Infusion, LLc

it takes passion, drive, talent and creativity to achieve

success in hospitality sales and marketing. For the 11th year running,

HSMAI paid tribute to an impressive group of individuals who define

and embrace those qualities. They are the “25 Most extraordinary

Minds in Hospitality Sales & Marketing” as chosen by their peers.

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Ursula BollPresident, Miles Hospitality division, Miles

Michelle Bozokidirector of Marketing & e-commerce, Marriott carib-bean & Latin America resorts

George Brennanexecutive Vice President of Sales & Marketing, Interstate Hotels & resorts

need to be nimble enough to follow our customers’ buying habits. Keep an open mind and test new things but make sure we keep our bases covered while we are trying to catch the next big wave of reservations.”

For Janet Gerhard, founder/principal consultant, Hospital-ity Gal, opportunity lies in con-stant evolution. “New entrants into the marketplace, greater technology and connectedness mean consumers’ expecta-tions are increasingly complex. Guests may desire an effort-less experience, but to achieve that means sales, marketing, operations, HR, etc., are all in sync. Data sitting in one depart-ment and not shared across the organization adds complexity to our ability to meet and en-gage with guests. ‘You should know me, and if you don’t shame on you,’ is the attitude many guests are subscribing to today. Our ability to match the increasingly diverse traveler, which grows more so every year, in the face of constant attacks on who owns loyalty (i.e., the brand versus a technology player), remains the greatest challenge and opportunity for the hospitality industry as a whole.”

Andrew Rubinacci, vice president, distribution strategy, IHG, believes that the area of distribution and channels will provide constant change, oppor-tunity and risk over the next few years. “It has already changed the way we market to and interact with customers, and it will force the industry to reassess how we approach sales and revenue management.”

According to Adele Gutman, vice president of sales, marketing & revenue for Library Hotel Collection, the greatest opportunity related to revenue generating is the ever-increasing ease with which consumers can share their experiences via social media. “Hoteliers need to understand that the path to phenomenal demand is not treating this as just a PR opportunity. Instead, let social media be your free real time focus group, allowing you to listen to your customers. If you are ready to redesign your product and service to create enthusiastic brand ambassadors, they will reward you by marketing your business in a way you simply cannot pay for. Once the demand and traffic to your site is there, today hospitality marketers have more information than ever at their disposal so that they can test revenue generating merchandizing tactics and revise their strategies quickly based on data, not theory.”

The consumer is now in charge… Their tweets, posts and texts tell the true story of a destination’s overall visitor experience, which has tremendous impact.

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Kathleen cullen Vice President, revenue & distribution, commune Hotels & resorts

Michael dominguez Senior Vice President of corporate Hotel Sales, MGM resorts International

Jack easdale Vice President of yield Management, Venetian and Palazzo Hotel and casino

Loren Gray, vice president of digital strategy, Standing Dog Interactive, sees opportunity in “the internalization of our marketing and the blending of traditional disciplines into a new infrastructure. We as an industry are way behind the redevelopment of our infrastructure as to how we do business. We’re still settling into what revenue managers’ roles are and what author-ity level they have. In general we are of the belief that we operate hotels and outlets and anything marketing or communicating with the guests we ser-vice are separate and assignable to others. Nothing could be further from the truth. By allowing OTAs and outside services to control what and how a guest sees us and our product is to surrender control of a most precious prod-uct, our voice. We must learn to integrate what and how we do marketing, whether we assign it as digital or not, along with how we optimize revenue and how we sell our segments of business into the day-to-day operations of our industry. Not doing this would lead to commoditization for us as hote-liers and to simply taking orders and waiting for business. We have had no greater time in history than today to know more about our guest and more importantly the ability to communicate directly one on one with them.” Kathleen Cullen, senior vice president, revenue and distribution, Commune Hotels + Resorts, believes “One of the greatest challenges in the sales and marketing landscape is the fact that the industry is still referencing itself as ‘sales & marketing.’ We all have to wrap our minds around the fact that it is a ‘revenue optimization’ driven landscape now. Sales and marketing are critical components but all is about driving revenue and optimizing profits. Then there’s the cost of acquisition — hoteliers need to get a true under-standing of how much it is costing to drive net new customers.” She adds: “A huge challenge continues to be finding the right talents in the area of revenue management professionals. This has been a long time struggle with little improvement. The position now requires two different types of people to optimize the revenue: those with talent for creating strat-egies and those adept at tactical execution. Most cannot excel in both but the majority of hoteliers still have just one person in the role with the ex-pectation of delivering both needs.” For Benu Aggarwal, president/founder of Milestone Internet Marketing, Inc., opportunity lies in leveraging online channels and focusing on the conver-sion funnel. On the other hand, George Brennan, executive vice president, sales & marketing at Interstate Hotels & Resorts, says it’s building strong personal trust with customers to overcome the neutrality of technology. On the evolving integration of revenue management and sales & marketing “It’s really all marketing when you get right down to it,” states Ursula Boll, president of hospitality for Miles. “Revenue management is the strategic evaluation of data and the ability to determine the right rates, packages, promotions and campaigns at the right time in the right distribution chan-nels to have the greatest revenue impact. I never really understood why

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Steve enselein Vice President catering & convention Services — Americas, Hyatt Hotels corp.

Amir eylonVice President, Partner engagement, BrAnd USA

Janet Gerhard Founder / Principal consultant, Hospitality Gal

revenue management was considered an operational position. The revenue management position has always reported to me as the head of sales and marketing long before this was the accepted norm. Having the benefit of this natural integration and a dedicated process consisting of diagnose, prescribe, execute and measure, this strategic and interactive process has ensured maximizing revenues and rate parody in all distribution channels.”

“There are no longer distinct lines between digital and traditional sales and marketing efforts,” says Michelle Bozoki, director of marketing and eCommerce, Caribbean & Latin America Resorts, Marriott Internation-al. “The best approach is to be relevant to the customer you are target-ing. If your customer is active in social and other digital channels, then that’s where your message needs to be. Direct sales and traditional mar-keting efforts are still important and can complement the digital piece, but having relevant content pushed out in native channels that target your customer will yield the best long-term results. Revenue management has always been an important part of the sales and marketing process and always will be. In the digital environment where pricing and inven-tory are much more dynamic, a sound and strategic revenue approach is key to yielding an optimal business mix and RevPar index growth.”

“Never before has a hotel’s service levels been as transparent as in to-day’s digital world,” states Jack Easdale, vice president of yield manage-ment, Venetian and Palazzo Hotel & Casino. “Exceptional service drives revenue and our guests must feel that their individual needs are real-ized from site selection to check-out. Our systems must be redefined to ensure that personalized service is provided throughout our hotels, and that also requires innovative partnerships between revenue manage-ment, sales, operations and technology to set internal expectations and strategies that empower our associates to maximize customer relation-ships as a revenue driver. These strategies to provide exceptional service can include everything from implementation of an advanced CRM tool to deliver guest preferences before they arrive to the hotel, to simply re-sponding to a review the guest provided on a travel site to show we are listening to their feedback. All variables considered, trends and evolution in the revenue management discipline have certainly taught today’s rev-enue management professional that it is important to learn consumer behavior, listen to the voice of our customers and appreciate their value.”

According to Cullen, “Revenue management and digital marketing must work very closely with sales and marketing. Again, all are revenue driv-ers. Revenue management understands the opportunities and need peri-ods. This information should be shared with both sales and marketing to create specific tactics to help achieve goal, which is the optimal and most profitable revenue. Digital marketing has quickly become a function of revenue management, and both roles need to work with marketing to ex-ecute initiatives using brand guidelines such as look and feel of campaigns.”

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Loren Gray director of e-commerce, Ocean Properties, LTd

Adele Gutman MilneVice President Sales, Marketing and revenue, Library Hotel collection

christian Kuhn VP extended Stay Marketing, Homewood Suites and Home2 Suites, Hilton Worldwide

It is an integrated world, says Rubinacci. “All disciplines must work together seamlessly in order to take advantage of opportunities and satisfy custom-er needs. If you don’t do it, someone else will, usually to your detriment.” He also notes that revenue management needs to continue to evolve. “In many hotels there is not enough focus on the cost of distribution and lack of a nuanced approach to managing channels. New metrics need to be developed beyond RGI if we are going to properly maximize hotel profits.”

“Digital marketing is not just knowing about search and web — it is about understanding the entire conversion funnel,” states Aggarwal. “You need to ask how do customers search online? What is your customer buying behavior? What does the conversion funnel look like and what are the main touch points? Which channels do they use to become comfortable with your brand? Which chan-nels do they use to book on-line? What is the value of user generated content and how do you get more trusted reviews?”

Gutman believes that revenue management, digital market-ing and sales are all disciplines of the same goal, which is rev-enue generation and revenue optimization. “Everyone on the revenue optimization team should work in a collaborative way with a unified vision. We have been successful discussing challenges in a group setting and coming up with creative solutions en-compassing PR, social media, distribution, digital marketing, service train-ing, as well as sales and revenue management strategies to resolve those challenges. The result is that everyone at the hotel understands how the business functions, how we solve problems, and how everyone’s contri-butions impact the financial success of the company. Our people are ex-posed to the entire process and therefore develop multiple areas of exper-tise allowing them to contribute more and move up within the company quickly. If we had staff members only doing one thing we would be limit-ing the potential of our staff to make contributions to the hotel’s success. We would be doing our staff a disservice by not preparing them to master the diverse range of disciplines needed to become a leader in hospitality.”

it is an integrated world… all disciplines must work together seam-lessly in order to take advantage of opportunities and satisfy customer needs. if you don’t do it, someone else will.

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Theresa LewisVice President, Market research, Wyndham Hotel Group

Jaclyn LooSenior Marketing Manager Lodging, Google Inc.

Glen MacdonellManaging director, Loyalty & Partnership Marketing, Best Western International

“People with strong revenue management skills have become more rare while their contribution to a hotel’s financial success is more critical,” says George Brennan, adding: “In this high demand market environment, rev-enue management accelerates profit growth.”

On being successful “Be flexible and current,” urges Bozoki. “In today’s digital marketing and so-cial media environment, things can change hourly. A salesperson needs to have a clear picture of what success looks like for them, combining tried and true approaches with a willingness to test new strategies. It’s all about the interactive process. We can’t be afraid to fail or say no to the good ideas. Keep the end goal in mind, but be flexible and innovative in your approach to getting there.

“Hotel salespeople need to understand the entire customer journey,” offers Aggarwal. “With most of today’s customers searching and booking online, in-cluding social, local, mobile, website, OTA, etc., they need to understand what their customers are searching for and how they are getting to their hotel.”

“Embrace technology but keep a watchful eye on the past,” suggests Mo-gelonsky. “Despite their costs and the efficiency of digital communications, face-to-face meetings are still the best ways to generate sales and build genuine relationships with customers. Look beyond price. The best hotels don’t attempt to negotiate solely on price; instead they look to generate exceptional benefits and value-adds for consumers that will create a more pleasurable onsite experience. While all salespeople should be following up on requests as quickly as possible, they must understand that given the budget constraints nowadays, patience is needed to properly gain a cus-tomer’s trust on the way towards a sale.”

Gerhard states: “High performers can no longer rely on their relationships alone. Most bodies of research today speak to a seller’s need to use those relationships to push their customers. In today’s world of risk and an over-abundance of information, loyalty is driven by sellers who can help cus-tomers evaluate alternatives and make recommendations based on their customers’ needs. Sellers need to see themselves as coaches. You must un-derstand your customers’ business and use this knowledge to help them define success.”

“The maturity of the sales role is teaching us that all salespeople need to understand that their job is revenue generation/revenue growth,” explains Dominguez. “Successful salespeople today require a strong business acu-men to be part of the core competencies.”

“Sales, in many hospitality organizations, is operating the same way it has for years,” notes Rubinacci. “We need to arm our salespeople with the skills and tools to negotiate in today’s environment, as well as ensure that our organizations are fit for purpose, designed for the right level of touch in today’s environment.

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Joey Martindirector of Promotional Marketing, choice Hotels International

Larry MogelonskyPresident, LMA communications Inc.

Kasey O’LearySenior director Multi-Brands & HHonors Marketing, Hilton Worldwide

“Hotel salespeople need to be sure that they are completely informed and onboard with the hotel’s overall revenue strategies and goals, and aligned with the revenue management goals,” says Cullen. “They need to under-stand the complete booking patterns and stay usage of their groups or cor-porate negotiated accounts. Are they bringing business to the hotel during times of need? Or are they displacing higher rated business or business with ideal stay patterns? You can’t be focused on production alone.”

On marketing to consumers today“Hotel marketers who know how to communicate their key value proposi-tions or experiences and continually adjust their strategies by leveraging technology and distribution channels whether paid, owned or earned, al-ways grow market share despite market conditions,” states Boll. “Hotels and resorts that have embraced these new channels and resources, and staff to support maximizing their benefits, are positioned well to communicate and create relationships with customers and prospects by delivering the right content at the right time on the right device.”

She adds: “Never before has the landscape been so dynamic. Smart online marketing prac-tices make testing and targeting an easy and affordable option to fine tune programs quickly. Inef-fective campaigns can be elimi-nated with a keystroke and re-sources redirected to campaigns that deliver results and revenue.” “Using ‘high touch’ to counter-act ‘high tech’ is how you create a personal relationship — vital to closing a sale,” states Schae-fer. “Emails are buried, phone calls go unanswered, personal one to one sales calls are nearly impossible and everyone is time starved. High touch is on the comeback — a hand-written note can go a long way toward get one’s attention.”

Easdale observes: “Our consumers are becoming more sophisticated with ever-increasing options and resources to make purchasing decisions, there-by requiring that our systems meet demand with highly coordinated efforts in order for hotels to anticipate our customers’ needs. We need strategic sales and marketing that enables us to sell the right room to the right cli-ent at the right time for the right price—all while ensuring we are meet-ing our owner’s expectations to achieve profitability. Revenue management

never before has the landscape been so dynamic. smart online marketing practices make testing and targeting an easy and affordable option to fine tune programs quickly.

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Harold Queisserdirector of Sales and Marketing, Omni dallas

Andrew rubinacciVice President, distribution Strategy, Intercontinental Hotels Group

Mickey SchaeferceO & Founder, The experience Institute

has evolved with our business and now requires us to adapt with a new commitment to collaboration at all operational levels to exceed guest and owner expectations.”

“The worst thing we can do is transfer what we have done historically for messaging/marketing to our guests and simply inject it into these new tools and mediums,” notes Gray. “They represent a new way of crafting our mes-sage based on what these mediums represent. We now have the means to stop thinking two dimensionally (medium & message) and now have three- and four-dimensional ways of addressing our guests (medium, message, time of day, location). Add to that even more variables like demographics of the guest, context of the content of the message, the stage of acquisition of the guest and method of message distribution -- and you can see how you can create very productive ways to leverage all this data to best refine your one to one communication with your guest.”

Aggarwal says: “We need to leverage all channels, which are integrated with each other. For example, the customer may be looking for hotel/destination in both the social and local ecosystem. The client could also be using social media to get to know your brand, or to engage with you. Leveraging all these channels and using cross-marketing really helps in securing the customer and saturating the customer journey.”

TARYN SCHNEIDER, president of Taryn Schneider Communications, has more than 25 years of hospitality, travel, and tourism experience as a writer, editor, and marketing communications specialist. For the past 15 years, she has worked on behalf of a select group of clients requiring highly special-ized communications services, promotions, writing, publishing, and special events. She began her career as a writer and editor for Travel Agent maga-zine, and spent the next decade working in a diverse range of travel pub-lishing, television producing, and journalistic endeavors. Her articles have appeared in both travel consumer and trade publications. Her email ad-dress is taryn@tarynschneider. com.

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noah Paul TrattGlobal Vice President at expedia Media Solutions, expedia Inc.

Benu Aggarwal, President and Founder, Milestone Internet Marketingrobert Arnold, Vice President of Sales, Vizergydavid Atkins, Principal and co-Founder, digital dnA Infusion, LLcUrsula Boll, President, Miles Hospitality division MilesMichelle Bozoki, director of Marketing & ecommerce, Marriott caribbean & Latin America resortsGeorge Brennan, executive Vice President of Sales & Marketing, Interstate Hotels & resortsKathleen cullen, Vice President revenue & distribution, commune Hotels & resortsMichael dominguez, Senior Vice President of corporate Hotel Sales, MGM resorts InternationalJack easdale, Vice President of yield Management, Venetian and Palazzo Hotel and casinoSteve enselein, Vice President catering & convention Services-Americas, Hyatt Hotels corporationAmir eylon, Vice President, Partner, engagement Brand USAJanet Gerhard, Founder/Principal, consultant Hospitality Gal

Loren Gray, director of e-commerce, Ocean Properties Ltd.Adele Gutman Milne, VP Sales, Marketing and revenue, Library Hotel collectionchristian Kuhn, VP extended Stay Marketing, Homewood Suites and Home 2 Suites Hilton WorldwideTheresa Lewis, Vice President, Market research, Wyndham Hotel GroupJaclyn Loo, Senior Marketing Manager Lodging, Google IncGlen Macdonell, Managing director, Loyalty & Partnership Marketing, Best Western InternationalJoey Martin, director of Promotional Marketing, choice Hotels InternationalLarry Mogelonsky, President, LMA communications Inc.Kasey O’Leary, Senior director Multi-Brands & HHonors Marketing, Hilton WorldwideHarold Queisser, director of Sales and Marketing, Omni dallasAndrew rubinacci, VP, distribution Strategy, Intercontinental Hotels GroupMickey Schaefer, ceO & Founder, The exPerIence Institutenoah Paul, Tratt Global Vice President at expedia Media Solutions, expedia Inc.

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