Why marketing automation is becoming increasingly important for hotels

Why is marketing automation indispensable for hotels today?

“Marketing automation is a decisive success factor for hotels today. It enables personalized communication with less effort - a great advantage in times of increasing guest demands and scarce human resources. Guests expect individually tailored offers and communication, which is almost impossible to implement without automation. Automation creates a clear competitive advantage over less digitized competitors, as it minimizes wastage, addresses target groups more specifically and thus enables a more efficient use of the marketing budget. Last but not least, automation ensures that teams can focus on other important tasks, such as direct guest contact or strategic developments.”

How does marketing automation help to improve the guest experience?

"A key benefit is that guests receive relevant information at exactly the right time - be it before arrival, during their stay or after departure. This makes communication more personal and professional and increases guest satisfaction and loyalty."

Which marketing processes can be optimized through automation in hotel operations?

"Marketing automation can make many recurring processes in hotel operations more efficient. These include automated email campaigns, such as welcome or follow-up emails, as well as upselling and cross-selling offers - for room upgrades or spa services, for example. Personal events such as birthdays or anniversaries can also be taken into account automatically, which strengthens guest loyalty. Feedback requests after the stay and the reactivation of previous guests can also be efficiently automated and controlled in a targeted manner."

How can marketing automation increase direct bookings from guests?

"Marketing automation can make a decisive contribution to increasing direct bookings in hotels. Personalized offers with clear call-to-actions target potential guests and motivate them to book. Automated reminders for abandoned bookings also help to win back lost bookings.

Another advantage is the segmentation of the target groups, which enables an individual approach - for example for regular guests, business travelers or families. Integration with the booking system makes the entire booking process easier and faster for the guest. Bonus or discount programs can also be communicated automatically, which creates additional incentives for direct bookings."

What role does data analysis play in marketing automation in the hotel sector?

"Data analysis is the foundation of successful marketing automation in the hotel sector. It enables targeted and personalized communication by identifying patterns in booking behavior and guest preferences. This allows offers to be better tailored to individual needs. Campaigns can be continuously optimized through A/B tests and performance tracking. The analysis also supports the segmentation of target groups and clearly shows which offers work well - and which work less well. This ensures more efficient measures and better marketing results."

How important is the integration of marketing automation with other hotel management systems?

"Targeted segmentation and personalization can only take place if guest data is centrally available and up-to-date. Seamless interfaces also ensure smooth processes, reduce manual errors and enable trigger-based actions, such as an automated welcome email at check-in. The quality of automation stands and falls with the depth and reliability of the available data - good system integration is therefore essential."

What challenges do you see when implementing marketing automation in hotels and how can these be overcome?

"Successfully introducing marketing automation is often associated with hurdles - as a digitalization service provider, we know these from our daily practice and develop suitable solutions:

Large amounts of guest data are often already available, but in practice this is often incomplete, outdated or inconsistent, which can significantly limit the effectiveness of automated campaigns. Regular data maintenance is an important first step, but is not enough on its own. What is needed is a systematic cleansing, standardization and validation of the existing data in order to create a reliable basis for segmentation, personalization and performance analyses. This is the only way to exploit the full potential of marketing automation in hotel operations.

Technical know-how is also not available in every hotel team; external consulting or targeted training is therefore often necessary.

Fully integrated marketing automation solutions with comprehensive personalization, system networking and data analysis are often associated with higher initial investments. But you don't have to start at this level straight away. Many hotels start with a small, clearly defined use case - such as automated emails or simple campaigns - and expand the solution step by step. Over time, additional functions can be integrated, interfaces to PMS or CRM can be created and an increasingly efficient, networked system can be set up, which not only saves costs in the long term, but also increases turnover.

Another hurdle is acceptance within the team - here it is important to involve employees at an early stage, show them the concrete added value and provide them with practical training to make the benefits transparent and tangible.

Finally, possible interface problems should be considered at an early stage when selecting systems - modern solutions generally offer web-based interfaces, but the decisive factor is whether the existing systems can also be reliably connected. Only well-integrated systems provide the necessary clarity, stability and future-proofing right from the start."

Author: Dario Waechter