Most marketing and distribution leaders are already focusing on retargeting efforts, the most classic example of which is to pursue website visitors on their social media feeds. Other examples include email and social media campaigns retargeting previous guests and those who inquired via email.
However, often overlooked is the opportunity to retarget the hottest prospect of all: those who inquire by the voice channel but are not yet ready to book during their initial call.
Perhaps this is because the job of a hotel reservations agent has always been viewed as fielding inquiry calls, answering questions and attempting to close the sale on the first inquiry. Surely a well-trained reservations agent will also know to create urgency and remove barriers to booking now when callers hesitate.
Yet sometimes callers are just not ready to book. The following factors may increase their hesitancy:
- planning a longer stay and therefore having special needs;
- booking multiple rooms for a larger party in which others must be consulted before a final decision;
- when significant deposits are required and/or more restrictive cancellation penalties apply;
- traveling to a destination with an especially high number of resorts or hotels to select from;
- preferring to book air transportation first before lodging; or
- booking at properties with a large number of accommodation types and packages to select from.
As I say in our training workshops: The higher the rate, the longer the stay. Most importantly, the more emotionally engaged they are in their travel plans, the less likely callers are to book on their first call.
Sure, it is a good thing to ask for the caller’s email address and add them to a list for future email campaigns. Yet when you consider you now have a qualified “hot” lead at this point, it makes sense to pursue the direct sales effort further. This is especially true at destination-type resorts with significant potential revenue-per-guest potential and for any hotel with higher rates and longer stays.
The first step in implementing a retargeting effort for the voice reservations channel is to shift the mindset from “sales fishing” to “sales hunting.” In the “sales fishing” paradigm, reservations agents wait for the digital “bait,” such as the website, SEO optimization and OTA presence to lure in the digital bookings. Alternatively, agents with a “sales hunting” mindset view every call, email inquiry and inbound chat as a potential sales lead worthy of proactive follow-up.
After changing the mindset, your team will need a process for tracking inbound leads for outbound, proactive follow-up. These days there are several cloud-based sales CRMs that make it easy to turn inbound calls into leads. The ideal system requires an investment, but also offers features that allow agents to:
- complete a pop-up lead inquiry form that makes it easy for agents to select the best follow-up email from a list of templates then enter the caller’s information;
- trace the lead on the agent’s “lead stream” to remind them to place a follow-up call and — if necessary — also later send a follow-up email; and
- present any agent who answers an unexpected call-back with a pop-up text box with details the caller had shared previously.
However, if you are not yet ready to invest in such a system, it is easy to get your agents in the game with something as easy as a tracking sheet you can create in Excel or Sheets to record:
- the caller’s name, email, phone and dates/rooms requested;
- the date of their inquiry and first email sent afterward;
- the date of follow-up call;
- the date of follow-up up email; and
- whether the caller ended up booking.
To truly measure the last point, it's also important to check if the guest ended up booking online, likely having been encouraged do to so by agent’s extra effort.
Finally, the ability to become a “sales hunter” and to execute a proactive follow-up effort requires training on a new skillset. Here are some training “best habits” for your sales hunters:
Getting the email is most important, so go for that first. Don't ask, “Would you like me to email those to you?” or “Did want to give me your email?” Instead, ask assumptively, “OK Mr. Kennedy, let me get your email address so I can send you these links along with my direct contact information.”
Next, try to get their phone number and implied permission to call to follow-up. Do not ask if they want a follow-up call.
Instead, say, “Super. I’ll shoot over an email with my direct contact information. I’ll also check back with you to see what questions you have and what else we can do. May I have the best phone number to reach you?”
Personalize follow-up email templates by restating something specific you learned about “the story” behind their plans, something like, “It was wonderful to hear about the plans for your (insert special reason for travel)…”
End all emails and calls by expressing interest and offering personal assistance, such as, "Again, my name is Doug with in-house reservations. Let us know what else we can do to assist you with planning this important trip.”
You should generally follow-up at least two times. The first should be one to three calendar days after the initial inquiry, depending on their “story.” Reach out again three more days after that, unless they state a longer decision-making timeframe.
Doug Kennedy is president of the Kennedy Training Network, Inc. Contact him at doug@kennedytrainingnetwork.com.
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