You don’t need a text book, webinars or to be sent away for training.  Being a Great Hotel Sales Manager has just a few key factors you must act on to be the best!

INSTINCT AND DRIVE

If your in Sales you must have the instinct and drive that it takes to keep up in sales and to develop clients relationships.

Not everyone can be in Sales.  A quiet and shy person would not make a good candidate to be a Sales Person.  A true Sales Person must be able to walk up to people to network, ask questions and make connections.  They must be able to comfortably walk into buildings and business parks to cold call without personal fear.  They must be creative, crafty and constantly planning the next attack on where they are going to find or steal new business.

QUALIFY

What does the client need?  How many room nights are they doing a month, quarter, annually?  Are their peak seasons where they are busier?  Who and why are their travelers coming into that location?  What hotel are they currently using?  Find out their rate by calling and making a fake reservation.  See what you are up against and find out why they use that hotel.

Get a site inspection and close the deal.

FOLLOW UP

It doesn’t make sense to cold call day after day and not provide yourself the time you need to follow up on the leads that you have found.  Make sure that you follow up and in a timely manner.

Call back every call!  This is a huge problem in our industry with incoming inquiries and no follow up call back.  Remember the early bird gets the worm!

To be a Great Hotel Sales Person you will need to have instinct and drive, qualifying skills and follow up to close on new deals.  It’s that simple.

For help and ideas check out hotelsalesmanager.com.

Good Luck!

Pure Energy

This was one of those days that you can’t wait to end. The Opera Configuration went so well that we are ahead a day. I didn’t know until today but the trainer will be coming back in late September for Phaze II Training. My stomach dropped. My God, all I want to do is sell here.

I have never experienced all of these distractions, issues and constant challenges. All of this effects my efforts and I have not run at 100% in over 2 months now. When is everything going to settle down? First the changes in the Management Team. Well at least I made it through that one so far since I was one of the few that was not fired.

Then the Sales Office renovations and by the way, they are still not done. My office desk is broken now and half of it is sitting on the floor behind me. I can’t use it. But I’m a mature women and experienced so I have found ways around some of this. If I was green, I’d be lost and I probably wouldn’t of continued my career in the Hospitality Industry.

In the meantime, there are over 800 qualified leads sitting on my desk that are burning at my soul to make contact. Although I sit quietly in the Opera Configuration Class, the rage that I hold in because I can’t do my job drives me insane. Sure, I can spend half of my night emailing clients from home. Sure I could work longer hours and believe me, I work enough hours. There are many things that I could probably do.

But, I find it rather satisfying to sit here, drink my coffee, smoke when I want, and simply rant in this blog. After this I will post my rant on digg.com, google, facebook and furl. So it’s a busy night.

I focus most of my efforts on selling rooms. If it comes with a banquet or I can sell them a breakfast buffet, then that’s great too. Catering Sales People are different. They are not rooms people. Rooms people are also different. They are not catering people. So I have seen the clash and distance between them over the years. Is worth displacing a regular meeting room client to replace it with a deal that also includes rooms? To the room person yes but to the catering person, a big fat NO. And not to mention any commission involved.

Rooms and Catering Sales Manager’s should work together. It is more fun and simply more rewarding in the end. And how many of us are doing 5 other jobs at the same time? We need to use each other’s gifts to our advantage. The Catering Sales Manager and I work together and it’s a plus that I enjoy her company. Not to mention that I admire how hard she works and how good she is. I am lucky that we do have a lot of flexible meeting space so that we haven’t really lost anything due to a meeting room booking to rooms.

And let’s talk about the Food & Beverage Director and CHEF. I write that big because they think they are “BIG”….lol…. A rooms Sales Person should partner with these two positions. Simply because, they are the ultimate decision makers on any special food discounts that your student tour group is requesting or any other type of F & B discount. You must play “nice nice” with these people. You will need them.

It’s all better to try and get along. I see a lot of great potential from most of the Operation Manager’s and Supervisors at my hotel. But I see more often great people getting burnt out because they can’t seem to get their team together. Although we are down in revenue, it just seems like we do not have enough help or staffing on. But I know with the payroll overhead, we are already looking at “red” for September. We beat September last year by $46,000. We rocked! The Market shifted, new Management with new ideas and the economy overall is affecting our property’s revenues. Probably in the same way as yours.

Although I thought I was not in training tomorrow, with the schedule changes I’m in training all morning. I have a promising appointment in the afternoon that will most likely take most of my day. I’m not sure how I will conquer all of my responsibilities tomorrow. I’m thinking I’m going to bed early, getting rest and I’m not going to dwell on it. Got to stay positive.

My advise…go in kickin’ tomorrow! Good Luck!

Pure Energy