Considerations for Upselling tools.

📰 In This Issue

✔️ Headline: Where and why does upselling fit in?
✔️ Industry Insights: International tourists love SA
✔️ Lighthearted Humour
✔️ LuxScapapia. The home of luxury & escapism
✔️ Final Thoughts

🌟 Spotlight: Innovative Tech of the Week

🔍 Upselling apps, Guest Apps, Guest Communication – There are a bunch of them.
💡 Guest engagement and upselling has always been a hot topic. I remember learning about upselling in hotel school. Then, I started working the front desk and the strangest thing, nobody actually did it.

Many years later and here we are, still figuring out how to get a guest to pay for a room upgrade, add breakfast, or book a spa treatment or round of golf in advance.

AeroGuest, Oaky, UpsellGuru, Digital Guest, Canary and I’m sure there are many more that I have not mentioned yet. All figuring out how to increase average guest spend.

A few things stand out to me when evaluating these systems, that significantly impact the potential success.

1) Integration to the PMS: Integration allows for automation. Automation is our friend with upselling. Most of the solutions offer a 1-way integration, pulling arrivals and sending off communication. We need better. 2-way integration allows the tools to post products onto the guest reservation, upgrade rooms and manage inventory. Yes, we want this!

2) Triggers: Doubling down on the integration point. Not all guest segments are the same and our expectation should be that upselling for various segments will differ. We need a variety of triggers to send off upselling options, day before arrival, room type, number of guests, rate code, length of stay, day of the week, etc. Imaginations can run wild here. The more trigger options we have the more granular we can become.

3) Intelligence: Don’t automatically think AI. Each solution should be able to offer a good, valid option to a guest at a suitable time where they will purchase. A good combination of integration, triggers, product setup should get you over the line here. AI has the ability to shine here. Think of it as a sales assistant who knows everything about the guest and has a great sales attitude.

4) Payments: Probably the most restrictive of the considerations in South Africa. The ability to upsell and take payment immediately is a big win. You don’t want to start thinking about adding cancelation policies to upselling. Rather take a deposit. Get the guest to commit. Payments should either happen in the solution or in the PMS (see 2-way integrations).

5) Cost Structure: The big challenge here is that none of the solutions can guarantee that upselling will work or how effectively it will work. It’s a little bit like ad-spend for marketers. We know in theory it should work, but how well it works is up to the team doing it. The cost structure and deal should reflect this. Ideally, you want the expertise that comes with the solution and even better, you only want to pay when you make money.

🚀 Most people who travel have a rough idea about where they are going, very few have done all the research. I’m guilty of this. A weekend away with my wife quickly turns sideways because I didn’t book the spa, or I didn’t read that the game drives are done by a external company that I needed to book separately. Multiply this by 100’s of international tourists that don’t know how incredible South Africa is and how much there is to do and you have a massive opportunity.

Keep in mind ROI, Total revenue per guest, well trained team to execute the plan and there is significant gains on the bottom line to be made.

📢 Industry Insights: Tourism & Tech News

📰 Tourists LOVE South Africa! Great news from the Minister of Tourism this week.
📊 “September’s figures recorded 846 367 visitors, which is an increase of 26.9% compared to September 2024.”

🔗 Full Read Here. 

😂 Meme of the Week

🎯 Sponsored Partner

Luxscapia

Luxscapia is a curated collection of luxury and lifestyle hotels and places to stay. Handpicked, unique design, sustainable tourism. From vibrant urban lifestyle hotels to distinguished historic houses, we bring you the unique, bold and personal.

Send us an email if you are interested in listing with Luxscapia or want more information.

📌 Final Thoughts & What’s Coming Next

✨ It’s summer in South Africa. Focus on the guest, there are many of them. G20 will have a impact on travel, good or bad we don’t know yet. Keep an eye on news and how it might impact demand and rates.

📩 If any of this is interesting, please share with a friend.