Executive Vendor Summit 2010
Arabian Travel Market 2010
BITAC Tech & Operations 2010
University Hoteliers Conference 2010
Hotel Website Marketing Conference
The Hotel Website Marketing Conference took place in Amsterdam on March 25th, 2010. The conference was dedicated to providing hotel sales managers with the latest innovations in online marketing.
The main topics included 3rd Party Websites & Distribution Channels, designing and marketing your hotel website, managing your hotel website booking engine and effectively using social media.
I attended the event as a speaker on behalf of RateTiger and spoke on “Making the most of IDS to deliver your revenue management strategy”. The idea was to outline the importance of distributing rates to third party booking websites using Internet Distribution Systems (IDS) while also examining the key tools needed to implement hotel online revenue management strategy.
With around 60 people in attendance including 35 hoteliers, the event concluded with meaningful discussions and networking. Other speakers represented companies like Expedia, Ideas, Meetingsbooker, Hoteliers.com, BeCurious and others.
The platform helped me reinforce RateTiger’s brand name in the market and it was quite clear that RateTiger is perceived as a market leader by many hoteliers.
Casey Davy is Sales Manager – UK at eRevMax and is responsible for sales of RateTiger products in the region. He is based out of London and can be reached at caseyd@ratetiger.com
INTERNORGA 2010
As every year, March is the month during which the international hospitality industry meets in Hamburg for INTERNORGA. Europe’s biggest trade fair of its kind has a remarkable tradition – in 2010 the harbor city in Northern Germany saw its 84th INTERNORGA. Between 12 and 17 March, 1,105 exhibitors from 28 countries presented their products and services to more than 100,000 trade visitors from all over the world.
However, as in past years, RateTiger has not been amongst these exhibitors but focused its sales force on ITB, which took place partly parallel to INTERNORGA. The reason is plain: the trade show has a strong focus on gastronomy rather than hotel technology. Visitors are more likely to be concerned with choosing a new kitchen or some supplier for frozen food than with optimizing their online sales channels.
Yet there have been good reasons for me to spend two days at this vibrant event – the hospitality journalists. The journalists visit INTERNORGA en masse, to find out about new products to write on, catch new advertising clients, or new subscribers for their publications. It’s a great opportunity to have so many press contacts in one place, to update them about the various developments at eRevMax and RateTiger!
Being a Hamburger born, these two days have been a home match for me, and while I believe that INTERNORGA is not likely the best place to meet software buyers, I am convinced that it’s a perfect chance to intensify press relations. Last year we’ve had several articles published after INTERNOGA, particularly our case studies. This year I’ve met with the journalists of six publications plus the editor of an online news portal, and they’re all keen to write on channel management some time this year.
Everyone agreed that it’s necessary to educate hoteliers about the potential as well as the demands of the online market. Multiple channels require constant and strategic updating, which seems frightening and impossible for certain hoteliers, but at the same time the chance exists to increase occupancy and make money.
Like last year, INTERNORGA 2010 has been a success, with us managing to divert editors’ attention to channel management and online distribution. German editors have begun to associate channel management know-how explicitly with RateTiger, proving that eRevMax’s strategy to focus on education and training works out.
Jasmin Keller is the PR Representative – Germany at eRevMax and is responsible for all PR activities of RateTiger in the region. Jasmin is based out of Germany and can be reached at ratetiger@jasminkeller.com.
Pictures from ITB Berlin 2010
Czech Hotel Association Event 2009
In the last week of November (25th – 27th November 2009) I attended an event organized by the Czech Hotel Association. As a RateTiger representative I was eager to see the kind of turnout the event would witness and I am glad to say that it was not a dismal show. With over 260 member hotels and companies present, it provided a good opportunity to meet many hoteliers.
The event included three full day conference with networking evening parties. Some of the discussion topics included recent developments in global economy and its impact on Czech Republic, tourism market in the region as well as scenario in Czech hotel industry compared to the EU states and rest of the world. The presentation hosted by STR Global turned out to be really interesting allowing hoteliers to see how others have remained resilient in tough economic conditions.
Hotel Managers from different cities in Czech Republic were present at the event with a good section of them representing Prague. I met with many of them and was glad to hear they considered RateTiger to be a leading channel management solution provider and wanted to know about our new products and features.
Overall it was a great experience with excellent networking, lots of new contacts and the opportunity to create further awareness about the products. It was good to know the importance of the Hotel Association’s event given that various senior members from many hotels were there. I look forward to attending the event next year.
Aldona Kaczmarczyk is Sales Manager – Eastern Europe at eRevMax and is responsible for sale of RateTiger products in the region. Aldona can be reached at aldonak@ratetiger.com
HITEC 2009
Hospitality Industry Technology Exposition & Conference, HITEC, is today considered one of the world’s largest hospitality technology events. It took place from June 22-25, 2009 at the Anaheim Convention Center in California USA. RateTiger was represented by Sascha Hausmann, COO and Phil Stiles, VP of Sales.
As expected the attendance was lower than in previous years by around 35 to 45%. The main theme of the event was partnerships and product launches. Many travel technology companies announced partnerships and integrations to further help the industry offer seamless connectivity and better technologies.
At HITEC we announced our integration partnerships with Trust International and Micros as the travel industry moves towards automated online distribution. Seamless connectivity remains the priority for PMS / CRS companies and channel management is now used to supplement where XML seamless connectivity cannot be established technically or from a ROI perspective for existing key players.
A new addition to this year’s HITEC was the Roundtable session, one of which was hosted by RateTiger. Sascha led a discussion on – ‘Maximizing revenue during turbulent economic times: has seamless connectivity failed?’ He considers Roundtables to be a good concept which encouraged considerable knowledge exchange and he would like to see this becoming a regular feature at HITEC.
The Twitter discussion had the most successful roundtable attendance Digital and social media is what hotels are focusing on to get those ‘more-than-ever important’ travelers’ attention. So gear up people!
RateTiger also hosted a tutorial session on ‘Channel Management and the traditional reservation system’. Phil and Sascha had a good audience who understood the relevance of the topic and requested further information to make better buying decisions.
This year’s event turned out to be more of an exhibitor-meet-exhibitor show than a visitor-meet-exhibitor show. RateTiger did meet with some hoteliers and provided product demonstrations. Their feedback conveyed their trust in our brand and made us aware of the fact that RateTiger is identified as a company which innovates constantly and has relevant new tools to offer, which is what we continually aim for. HITEC rocks!