CEO and Project Manager
August 4, 2017
Deseasonalization is an almost essential task for our success. The commitment to deseasonalize a hotel involves the improvement of both the product and the techniques we use in its distribution.
The problem of seasonality is not only for beach or snow hotels. Any rural accommodation knows that what is sold is mainly for weekends and long weekends. And that almost fills up by itself, since national tourism is already beginning to enjoy these getaways with a hopeful frequency.
If we want our sales not to be limited to Saturdays, Easter and local fairs and festivals, we should start to tackle seasonality step by step. But how?
DEFINING THE SEASONS
We need to stop and list of georgia consumer email clearly see what our off-season is. If we have only been in business for a short time, we will have to do it in a more intuitive way. But if not, we will only have to take a more or less detailed look at sales from previous years. Let us define it clearly in our management program and in the availability calendars of our website (if there are any).
And this must be clearly visible to our potential new customers. For example, those who consult the website and do not have a preference for any particular date. However, they may find the idea of travelling during periods with little turmoil interesting, especially if it saves them a bit of money. The fact of not having more than one booking tab in which only the rate according to dates appears can become a detriment to our sales.
ORGANIZING OURSELVES AND CAPTURING EMAILS “THE WAY IT’S LEGAL”
The first thing to do is to capture email addresses or similar. Of course, this is only as long as we have our clients' consent to send them promotions and/or advertising. We are referring, of course, to loyalty actions for existing clients but also, why not, to capturing new potential clients as soon as we have the opportunity: those who come "just to look", those who provide products and/or services, those who call when our establishment is full and we no longer care about them, etc.
SEGMENT BY OCCUPATION
We almost always segment by age or marital status (singles, couples, families with children, etc.), or by origin and a few other criteria. But what about each person's occupation? Isn't it important when planning our holidays? There are certain professions that "force" us to take our days off outside the typical high seasons... And if not, just ask the hoteliers! Few restaurants close on Saturdays. And for those who work in tourism in general, what is the busiest day for a tour guide? And those who work on shifts, in medicine, for example. Those who work at night and then accumulate several days... Those responsible for catering or casinos, or leisure parks... Where do they go on a Tuesday? We definitely have to encourage these groups to visit us.
