While living in metro Detroit for over thirty years, I have experienced the highs and lows of the great Motor City. What is happening now is so exciting that talking about it with you brings me chills! The media has provided the nation with a plethora of perceptions, focusing on the darkest days for...read more

In the wake of the third disaster at sea in 27 months for the Carnival Corporation, discussions of safety and disaster preparedness are at the forefront. In 2013, the safety of a venue is also advertising a venue. I am a Carnival Past Guest and have a cruise scheduled this year that I continue to...read more

Watkins Research Group, a business-to-business research organization, published its  2012 Meeting and Convention Planners Survey where they polled 730 veteran planners about their love/hate relationship with CVBs and DMOs. Below is a synopsis of the research as presented in the January edition of...read more

In 2012 you promoted your hotel and may feel really great about the work you put into enhancing your social media and getting on the instant digital advertising train! Progress is good and you can pat yourself on the back for finally taking the step on that branding journey. You may be tempted to...read more

The last few weeks demanded a great deal of energy and time from you as the revenue manager at your hotel, but the 2012 reports are on the books and you have done everything you can with your team to build the bottom line most successfully. Just when you thought you could exhale, the fiscal cliff...read more

The business teeter-totter from 2008-2011 really began to level off in 2012, giving relief and hope for a better bottom line. Time spent finding new ways to fill rooms, juggling dates and rates and scrambling to stay afloat creatively has defined a more streamlined approach to group rooms business....read more

Preparing for 2013 revenue management requires a revenue management gurus that fully understand your hotel's business with exceptional analytical and mathematical prowess. Same old song, same old dance. Not in 2013. On the revenue management dance card will be sales, reservations and catering. The...read more

Meetings and Conventions Magazine recently polled 242 meeting professionals in order to find out what is a real turn off when it comes to hospitality marketing efforts. As it happens, the hard sell is probably the fastest way to make certain they never call you back.  But hotels and convention...read more

Guests who enter the front doors of your property are impressed and well they should be. Your entrance is eye catching. Your service is top notch and the decor is impeccable. The bottom line is looking much better than in 2009 and group business is booking with greater lead times! Things are going...read more

As you look down the road at 2013 group business, CVB and hotel marketing folks think they can sell their destination either through digital efforts such as LinkedIn and Facebook or by advertising a meeting venue in publications. But what about old fashioned "snail mail"? Is it passe? I say no...but...read more

Meeting planners are continuously seeking the next great idea to add excitement and ROI to their group events. Christine Born and Libby Hoppe discuss "11 Ideas Changing Meetings" in Connect magazine, some of which you can incorporate into your meetings strategy as a hotelier in 2013. Below are five...read more

Have you ever considered what you might learn from this gathering as you advertise for group travel? Here are five simple things we can all garner from this wonderful day of food, rest, and relaxation. #1: You always know the day.    Thanksgiving falls on the fourth Thursday of November. Always....read more

Some hoteliers have identified a strong playing power that wins new group business. A typical contract between a hotel and planner lists services that are contracted for the particular group. However, the hotel winning group business is the one who can add the most goods and services valuable to the...read more

For the first time in a long time, hotels hold a few of the good cards in the traditional Autumn negotiating season "hand" with corporate travel departments.  Recent years saw hotels providing generous pricing and perks in the quest to stay afloat amid the turbulent waters of the economic...read more

In the ever changing world of hospitality marketing, it appears that the following still holds true:  "The customer is always right."  The problem for most of us in this industry which is chock-full of uncertainty and chaos due to room pirating, block issues, and steep competition both within our...read more

A smart move was made on GSA’s part earlier this week. The agency made a decision to freeze government-wide per diem travel reimbursements rates at the current 2012 levels for 2013 which will save $885 million in revenue and thousands of industry jobs. Although the meetings industry has not made a...read more

79: The percent of group business travelers who say they would check-in and checkout of hotels via mobile. Based on the June survey by Smith Macro, a large majority seem in tune with mobile technology. In fact, mobile developers and marketers at hotel brands can be excited to know there’s a...read more

Summer vacation season is just tapering off, but those sweltering temperatures are still hanging on. Hard to think about the upcoming holidays, but the time is NOW to design holiday packages that will entice groups to host their special occasions at your resort! How can you create a package that...read more

You've heard the idiom, I "couldn't see the forest for the trees." Are you working your SMERF (Social, Military, Educational, Religious, Fraternal) market harder, not smarter, by missing the obvious? Who are the SMERFs among you? Let's examine SMERF opportunities that hit you where you live. The...read more

Meeting magazines are an explosion of destination and venue advertisements. But, according to Bill Lee in a Harvard Business Review article, traditional marketing is dead. Like a rat race, there’s a challenge to market a meeting venue in a unique way and win group business. To catch the attention of...read more