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CRM systems are user-friendly for customers
A hotel CRM is a single source of truth for guest information and should benefit from information about a guest learned through other systems. For example, if the guest prefers a room close to the ground floor. This information is logged both in the PMS and the CRM. That way, the guest’s preferences inform how the hotel engages with the guest both at the front desk and between stays.
In terms of usability, I really understand the difficulty in bringing in new technology into the hospitality sector. If you don’t make things really intuitive and easy to use, it’s not going to work.
One of the big things we’ve done is simplified the process for users of our systems, both business and customers, and also targeted quality customers. Every quote that gets created on the system has a call to action for the end customer, and the engagement through that is very high.
Users are able to engage with bookings and travel agents easily. To be frank, hotels still need to have good customer service and be able to respond as it is not a totally automated process.
At the same time, we’ve made our system as intuitive and simple from a navigation point of view as possible. People and hoteliers know how they operate and CRM systems help that.
CRM systems allow hotels to upsell easily
A CRM tool should allow you to store client information, identify sales opportunities and record service issues all in one central location.
Our role involves holding data for the hotel. For example, we work with travel companies who deal with bookings for both accommodation and travel for holidays. If we have that information, and a booking comes through for a standard room, we can automatically bring up all the data for upgrades. If one booking is looking for seven rooms, the system can offer discounts on the last three.
Similarly, if there are eating or spa treatment services available in the hotel, the system can show those to customers and system users automatically as long as it’s got them stored. That works really well for the businesses we work with, as the call to action results in great customer feedback and engagement with those upgrades.
Covid is changing the landscape of upselling. At least in the initial period after the pandemic, the desire to remain safe and not eat in hotels will be prevalent among guests. Upselling through CMS systems can provide safe eating plans for guests which will be so important for hotels after Covid.
Flexibility with other systems
When you choose the software that manages your customer relationships, you need to know that it’s flexible to accommodate future needs.
In our case, we’ve made an effort to make TProfile open to all. We have end points to bring data in and methods to pass data out. We are quite happy to have our CRM system work in parallel with other existing systems.
Customers can take the whole platform or they can take component parts of it. We have customers that only use core parts of TProfile and integrate with our CRM. We have others that use the documentation part of the system solely.
For example, every piece of documentation (quotes, invoice, etc) is processed through TProfile. We automate all bookings and don’t touch any of the data. Everything is branded and customised for the customer.
Tony Evans is the CEO of TProfile, which develops customer relationship management systems for hotels.
