● AI is already reshaping how travel is booked: Conference MC, Courtney Witherspoon opened the main session with one question: how many people had used ChatGPT or a similar tool to book travel in the last six months? Seventy-five percent of hands went up. The question of how hoteliers prepare for a world where AI models become primary distribution channels is no longer hypothetical.

● The three AI use cases shaping hospitality: A McKinsey presentation at NAVIGATE outlined three areas: back-office functions like HR and finance, on-property AI applications for guest experience and operational efficiency, and the disruption of traditional search and booking flows as OTAs face increasing pressure from AI-native discovery.

● Ivy is Revinate's AI intelligence layer: Running through all of Revinate's platforms, Ivy is beginning to manifest in Reservation Sales first. The initial application is automated call scoring, which Bailey notes could save reservations managers up to 30 hours per month. Colton Bean, Director of Reservations at Suncadia Resort and a Revy Award winner at NAVIGATE, describes the impact: time back in the day to focus on strategic priorities, culture, and streamlining processes.

● Sixty to seventy percent of hoteliers in pre-conference training wanted the same superpower: When asked what superpower they would choose, the overwhelming answer was time-saving. The products coming down Revinate's roadmap are designed to deliver exactly that.

● Personalization is not a merge tag: Abby Waski, Area Marketing Specialist at Pyramid Global Hospitality, describes the aha moment from NAVIGATE: enhancing guest profiles to capture real preferences, and activating those preferences in communications and front desk interactions. Bailey's framing cuts to the point: there is nothing worse than arriving at a hotel you have stayed at ten times and being asked if it is your first visit.

● AI without clean data hallucinates: Bryson Koehler, CEO of Revinate, delivered the conference's most direct caution in his keynote: AI vendors promising transformative results on top of a messy data foundation are selling something that cannot be delivered. His analogy is precise: it is like a world-class chef trying to bake a cake after someone switched all the labels in the pantry. Salt in the sugar jar, sand in the red jar. The AI does not know the difference.

● Seventeen years of data collection is now an activation asset: Revinate started in 2009 collecting reputation and survey data. Today the company connects to over 100 PMS systems and has more than 160 integrations, all synthesized through identity resolution into guest profiles. Karen's point is direct: that foundation, built over 17 years, is what makes AI activation both possible and safe. It is also what separates a hotel that can genuinely personalize from one that cannot.

● Data outbound capabilities are live: For the first time, hoteliers can activate Revinate guest data outside the Revinate ecosystem, running it through AI platforms, external tools, and third-party activations while using Revinate as the clean, identity-resolved source of truth.

● Bold decisions require a data foundation: Angelo Fernandes, CEO of Cote Hospitality, describes what the NAVIGATE conversation meant to him: the ability to make bold decisions faster and more efficiently, based on data that was previously unavailable to the companies he has led.

● The anxiety became optimism: Jennifer Barnhart, Marketing Manager at Noble House Pacific City Collection, captures the arc of the conference in a single sentence: the future of AI in the hotel industry is going to be brighter than we can ever imagine. Bailey echoes it: the hoteliers who arrived with questions left with a direction.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[04:53] From anxiety to advantage — Bailey describes the mood in the pre-conference training room at the start of the day: real questions, some anxiety, and a lot of uncertainty about what AI means for hospitality teams. By the end of NAVIGATE, the tone had shifted. "I think them being there and being able to lean on each other and lean on our team really helped calm some of that anxiety around what to do next." Karen adds the framing that ran through the entire conference: "You don't get into hotels because you love technology. You get into hotels because you love beautiful properties, guest experience, making people feel wonderful."

[08:38] The icebreaker that revealed everything — When pre-conference training opened with the question "if you could have a superpower, what would it be?", 60 to 70% of the room answered the same way: they wanted to save time. Bailey connects that directly to the products coming from Revinate's roadmap, particularly automated call scoring through Revinate’s AI intelligence layer, Ivy. Colton Bean, Director of Reservations at Suncadia Resort, makes it concrete: "Thirty hours a month is crazy. And I just am so excited that once this is online, we will have that time back to be able to focus on strategic things — helping streamline our processes and focus on culture."

[13:23] Personalization is not a first name — Abby Waski from Pyramid Global Hospitality describes her aha moment at NAVIGATE: "Getting to know our guests, enhancing their profile, getting to know their needs and what they really love when they come to the hotel, so that we can implement those guest preferences into Revinate." Karen connects it to the technology vision: "It's running behind the scenes so that the person having that interaction can easily understand — this person has been here four times, they stay in the spa, they really enjoy vanilla lattes — all of that information at their fingertips." Not AI replacing the human at the front desk. AI making that human unbeatable.

[15:30] The chef with the unlabeled pantry — Bryson Koehler's NAVIGATE keynote delivers the conference's most memorable framing of the AI data problem: "AI without data is like a world-class chef trying to bake a cake, but somebody's gone into the pantry and taken all of the labels — where the sugar was in the blue jar and the salt was in the red jar and switched all around." The AI hallucination is what happens when the ingredients are mislabeled. The vendors selling AI on top of a messy data foundation are selling a cake that will not rise. "That's the vendor who sold a bill of goods."

[17:34] The data void that no longer exists — Angelo Fernandes, CEO of Cote Hospitality, describes what made NAVIGATE meaningful for him: "The ability to make bold decisions based on the data that we're able to collect — that was a big void in our industry for many years." Revinate's 17-year foundation of reputation data, guest data across 100-plus PMS systems, and over 160 integrations synthesized into identity-resolved profiles is what fills that void. As Karen summarizes: "We saw the future, we are now in the future, we are here — and now we're all about activating."

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro
00:57 - NAVIGATE 2026 at the Wigwam, Phoenix 
02:48 - What great hospitality looks like in the wild 
04:53 - AI anxiety and AI opportunity
06:35 - McKinsey on the main stage: Three ways AI is reshaping hospitality 
08:38 -Revinate’s Ivy and Reservation Sales: what automated call scoring changes 
13:23 - Personalization beyond the merge tag: Abby Waski on knowing your guests 
15:30 - Bryson Koehler: Why clean data is the foundation of every AI strategy 
17:34 - Angelo Fernandes: bold decisions and the data void that no longer exists 
19:03 - Jennifer Barnhart: The future is brighter than we can imagine

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Amanda brings 14 years at Old Edwards — eight of them in reservations — and a holistic operation that most properties would not attempt: seven agents handling rooms, dining, spa, and golf across four hotels, three golf courses, and multiple event and dining venues. Her experience makes every benchmark number land with operational weight.

● Inbound call volume is a staffing and revenue planning tool: In peak months — June, July, August, and October through December — the benchmark sits at three inbound lead calls per room per month. For a 100-room hotel, that is 300 high-intent calls during the busiest period of the year. Understanding when volume peaks lets call center leaders optimize staffing before the season, not scramble during it.

● High-intent callers are not front desk traffic: Inbound lead calls are not service inquiries or operational requests. They are guests actively looking to make a reservation — the highest-intent contact point in the direct booking cycle. Treating them as such, with dedicated staffing and campaign-linked toll-free numbers that tell agents exactly why a guest is calling before the conversation starts, changes what is possible in every call.

● Conversion rates are the NPS of the voice channel: The benchmark shows best-performing months at 49% to 53% conversion, meaning well-trained reservations teams are closing more than half of every qualified lead they receive. When conversion dips, it is not just a revenue signal — it is a coaching diagnostic. Amanda's team uses the nightly lead demand report alongside conversion data to distinguish rate resistance from policy friction from agent skill gaps.

● Non-booked lead volume tells a different story than total call volume: June and July average 1.5 non-booked inbound calls per room per month, the highest of any period. But Amanda reads it as intelligence. Non-booked spikes reveal whether the issue is pricing, minimum stay policies, or something the marketing team is promoting that the property cannot deliver. At Old Edwards, removing nightly minimums in winter and into Q2 produced immediate improvement in the abandonment report and forecasting.

● Outbound calls generate $1,164 in incremental revenue per room annually: The benchmark finding on outbound is one of the most striking in the report. A 100-room hotel running proactive outbound calls can expect just over $116,000 in additional revenue annually. This revenue arrives with a lower acquisition cost than any OTA booking, carries no commission, and builds a direct guest data record that belongs to the property. Amanda is candid that her team's outbound focus has been constrained by inbound abandonment rates, but acknowledges that every reservations manager who has deployed true outbound strategy reports significant bottom-line impact.

● Campaign-linked toll-free numbers change the inbound experience: When an email campaign drives a call and the call comes through a campaign-specific toll-free number, the agent already knows what the caller is calling about before saying hello. No explanations, no re-establishing context — just a more personalized conversation from the first second. Amanda's team uses this in combination with targeted email campaigns to move from blanket outreach to high-context inbound conversations.

● Role-play is the training method that actually works: Amanda identifies asking for the reservation as the single most common sticking point for newer agents, not knowledge gaps but comfort gaps. The fix, in her experience, is role-play, specifically on closing language and the offer of a follow-up call. Combined with Revinate's in-person on-site training, which Old Edwards has used with measurable team impact, role-play builds the muscle memory that makes closing feel natural rather than uncomfortable.

● Scoring forms are only useful when paired with one-on-ones: Amanda's reservation manager conducts weekly one-on-ones with every agent, using scoring form data as a starting point but always going further. Half of the Old Edwards reservations team works remotely, and the one-on-ones serve a dual purpose: performance coaching and human connection that prevents silos from forming in a distributed team.

● Agents are the foundation of every guest data point: Bailey's framing for the reservation agent's role in the broader data ecosystem is one of the most memorable in the series. "They are the ones who ultimately enter that first data piece for that guest. They're like the foundation of the house. And the rest of the team builds on top of that house." When agents understand that their lead form accuracy determines everything downstream, the quality of the data, the personalization of the marketing, and the recognition of the guest at check-in, their relationship with their role changes.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Read the Hospitality Benchmark Report here: https://www.revinate.com/hospitality-benchmark-report/ 

[05:30] Inbound call volume: the number that determines your staffing season — Bailey presents the benchmark data that reshapes how reservations managers should think about planning: during peak months, a standard 100-room hotel can expect 300 inbound lead calls. Amanda's immediate response is direct — staffing is the most important thing her team pulls from this report. With seven agents managing rooms, dining, spa, and golf across four properties, knowing when volume peaks is not a planning convenience. It is the difference between capturing that revenue and losing it to an abandoned call.

[12:00] Conversion rates as a coaching tool, not just a KPI — Amanda reframes what conversion data is actually useful for when you have a newer team: "Being able to track that really helps us dig into who needs more coaching, a little more love." The benchmark's 49 to 53% conversion rates in best-performing months are a ceiling to aim for, but the nightly lead demand report sits underneath the conversion data and tells Amanda whether a dip is a rate problem, a policy problem, or an agent skill problem. Each has a different fix and conversion data alone cannot distinguish between them.

[20:44] What non-booked leads reveal about rate and policy — Amanda describes how removing nightly minimums in winter and into Q2 at Old Edwards' most economical Highlands property immediately improved both the abandonment report and revenue forecasts. "We just weren't selling in the winter time." Non-booked lead volume told her where the friction was. The nightly lead demand report told her what callers were actually asking about. The fix was a policy change, not more training.

[24:22] Outbound calls: the revenue that arrives without a commission — The benchmark finding is specific: $1,164 in incremental revenue per room per year from outbound calls, with no OTA commission attached and guest data secured directly into the hotel's own database. Amanda is candid about the challenge: "It has been my dream to have outbound-specific agents." Her team's current outbound effort focuses on returning voicemails and responding to abandoned calls, but she acknowledges that every reservations manager who has deployed dedicated outbound reports it as transformative.

[29:04] Role-play and one-on-ones: the coaching combination that sticks — Amanda identifies the most common agent sticking point as the moment of asking for the reservation — not a knowledge gap but a comfort gap. "That seems to be the biggest block for newer agents." Her solution is role-play, specifically on closing language and the proactive offer of a follow-up call. Combined with weekly one-on-ones that go beyond the scoring form, this approach keeps remote agents connected to their manager and continuously improving. "Not just doing the forms, but actually having the catch-up one-on-ones."

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro 
00:52 - About the 2026 Benchmark Report Leadership Series 
02:30 - Old Edwards Hospitality Group: four hotels, three golf courses, one team of seven 
05:30 - Inbound lead call volume: 300 calls per month at a 100-room hotel 
12:00 - Conversion rates: the NPS of the voice channel 
18:20 - Non-booked lead volume: what summer spikes are really telling you 
22:37 - Outbound calls: $1,164 in incremental revenue per room annually 
29:04 - Coaching, scoring, and building agents who close

 

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Throughout the conversation, Adam and Karen emphasize treating FIFA preparation as systems-building for any future compression event, from rate strategies to voice channel optimization to targeted direct offers.

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[00:00] FIFA as a systems-building opportunity - Adam frames the approach: "It's easy to look at FIFA as a one-off event, but there're tons of things that we can do to capture as much demand as possible for this one-off event, and then apply those systems and processes to any future event that goes forward."

[04:26] Lead time volatility operational challenges - Adam explains pandemic impact: "When we look at the confluence of Internet-borne bookings, digital bookings combined with relatively easy refundable policies that all came about during the pandemic, we've essentially trained a lot of our guests to expect that as the norm. People have been trained to book relatively close to the intended date. When you see such a large ADR premium from landmark events like FIFA, there is an increased expectation for service quality. Everyone knows the city will be more expensive, but they're going to be looking at it and going, well, you know, I'm staying in this branded hotel, I'm paying $700 a night when regular rates after that week are $300. What else am I getting?"

[08:01] Non-refundable versus refundable rate balance - Adam describes the science: "The whole idea of non-refundable versus refundable rate is scientific. It's also a bit of an art form. You want to incentivize the non-refundable rate by making it more attractive in terms of a price discount. But you don't want it to be so far that it pushes your cancelable rate out of competition with your comp set. Harmonization of data and the cleansing of records to properly associate how somebody felt about their stay, what else they spent on stay, with the rate plan that they were under, is rife territory for innovation."

[10:20] Packaging operational delivery versus friction - Adam outlines the challenge: "If you ask any hotel, they'll say, 'Yes, I want to maximize total revenue and revenue per guest,' because every hotel fundamentally knows that the more a guest spends on site, and the longer a guest stays with you, the more satisfied they are. The issues are: number one, can you deliver on any packages that you promise? That's going back to the operational issue. And then number two is the sticker price, where if you're pushing packages up front, it can potentially introduce another point of friction in terms of securing that booking."

[11:28] Direct bookings fenced offer strategy - Adam emphasizes the path forward: "Direct bookings are the best way forward for every hotel in terms of reducing commissions and then either having that net revenue gain flow through to GOP, or to enhancing service to thereby enhance guest satisfaction and potentially build out your return guest profile and loyalty."

[15:02] Voice channel data richness transformation - Adam reveals the opportunity: "I'm a huge fan of the voice channel because it is the most data-rich channel, but the least harmonized or structured in that data. Humans are way better talkers than we are typers. So therefore, this whole movement with AI-driven automation is moving us back towards what's called conversational commerce. You want to know in some sort of structured way what questions they ask. And from there, you can take those questions and say, well, how do we make this information more readily available on the website in a FAQ, in a storytelling manner, so that way the calls that are arriving are more high-intent or confident bookers."

[20:42] Story-driven guest concept introduction - Adam introduces the framework: "I want to introduce a term here, called story-driven guest. It's a little bit more ambiguous than just luxury, because luxury in essence is more of a rate term. Story is emotion. When you think about a story-driven hotelier and story-seeking guests, they don't want the standard experience. They want to truly live or embody something that's unique to them."

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro 
04:26 - Lead time volatility and operational forecasting challenges 
08:01 - Non-refundable versus refundable rate science 
10:20 - Packaging strategy balancing delivery and friction 
11:55 - Direct booking fenced offers for international travelers 
15:02 - Voice channel data capture and AI search optimization 
20:42 - Story-driven guest concept beyond luxury definitions 
27:42 - Counter-programming for hotels outside FIFA markets 
33:39 - Navigating fuel crisis uncertainty with peace of mind

 

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

●Database growth is the foundation of marketing growth: North American hotels are seeing 21% to 26% database growth year over year across all property sizes. That compounding growth creates the audience that makes segmentation, personalization, and direct revenue campaigns possible, but only if the data collected is clean, complete, and structured correctly.

● Segmentation starts with knowing who your guests actually are: Casa de Campo does not have one type of guest — it has golfers, polo spectators, beach guests, equestrian visitors, marina users, concert-goers, and wedding parties, among others. Gitti describes the multi-year effort to bring disparate systems together and create distinct, actionable segments for each. "That has been our biggest challenge and our biggest task."

● A pre-arrival itinerary program raised guest satisfaction by 40%: Before Casa de Campo invested in email capture, guests would arrive with no dining reservations, no activity bookings, and sometimes discover a shooting centre on day four of a five-day stay — with no time left to use it. Now, 90% of guests arrive with a pre-built itinerary created in collaboration with a dedicated vacation planner. The catalyst was simple: having an email address to send that first outreach.

● Phone capture is the biggest global gap — and Ivy made it urgent: When Casa de Campo launched Ivy for automated on-property messaging, they discovered they had almost no mobile numbers in their database, only landlines. Building mobile phone capture into every guest touchpoint became an immediate operational priority, and the results now show up in everything from lost towel requests to real-time navigation help on a property so large that guests regularly get lost.

● 12% of North American email records are OTA-masked — and the window is closing: For every 100 guests in a hotel's database with an email address, 12 are reachable only through a temporary OTA-masked address that expires within 20 to 30 days. In EMEA, the figure reaches 34%. Gitti's team launched an OTA win-back campaign after NAVIGATE, and it outperformed expectations. The mission is to find out what makes those guests book through the OTA, and remove that reason.

● Merged profiles turned duplicate chaos into Ultra VIP clarity: Before Revinate's identity resolution tools were fully deployed at Casa de Campo, the same guest could appear four or five times in the database — each profile distinguished by a period, an extra letter, or a formatting variation. Once merged, the data told a completely different story. For the resort's 50th anniversary, the team was able to identify and segment guests who had visited repeatedly, experienced multiple facets of the property, and truly embodied the Casa de Campo guest, creating a campaign that would not have been possible with fragmented data.

● Placeholder email addresses are the silent database killer: Bailey and Gitti both flag the practice of filling email fields with dummy addresses just to satisfy a form field. Beyond the obvious deliverability damage, it corrupts the profile data that every downstream campaign relies on. Gitti's approach: teach the team not just what to do, but why it matters and what breaks when they do it wrong.

● Clean data is a team sport that starts with reservations: Casa de Campo's data SOPs cover the entire guest journey — what to request, how to ask, how to enter data without typos or inconsistent formatting, and when it is acceptable to move on without the information. Reservation agents are positioned as the foundational layer of the entire data operation, because they create the guest profile that every other touchpoint builds on.

● Understanding what you will actually use prevents data hoarding: A golf tournament contact list will always arrive with handicap numbers. Casa de Campo keeps the original file but removes irrelevant columns before importing because until you know how you will use data, you cannot know what you do not need. Reviewing marketing plans before deciding on data fields is the order of operations Gitti now recommends to anyone starting a segmentation strategy.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Read the Hospitality Benchmark Report here: https://www.revinate.com/hospitality-benchmark-report/ 

[11:50] Why database health actually matters — Gitti opens with a decade of experience compressed into a few sentences. At Casa de Campo, the challenge was never just growing a database, it was making sense of an operation where golfers, polo spectators, equestrian guests, beach visitors, and concert-goers all generate data in different systems that historically never spoke to each other. "We had to find a streamlined way to differentiate all those guests. And that has been our biggest challenge and our biggest task — how to really identify them, and then create different segments." The benchmark report's database growth figures are the foundation. What Gitti describes is the decade of work required to turn that growth into something usable.

[22:48] The itinerary strategy that changed the guest experience — Before Casa de Campo invested seriously in email capture, guests would arrive with no dining reservations, no activities booked, and no awareness of what the property even offered. Gitti describes a guest discovering the shooting center on day four of a five-day stay and leaving before ever getting to use it. The fix was a pre-arrival itinerary program,  a vacation planner assigned to each guest, an email sent immediately after booking, and a standing invitation to shape the stay before arrival. "That improved our guest satisfaction by forty percent." The operational lever was one email address captured at the right moment.

[31:15] The OTA masked email problem — and what Casa de Campo did about it — Bailey presents the benchmark finding that 12% of North American email records are OTA-masked and set to expire within 20 to 30 days. For EMEA the figure is 34%. Gitti describes how the team launched an OTA win-back campaign after last year's NAVIGATE — a newsletter sign-up invitation with no offer, just a clear call to stay connected. "I think we have more emails than I thought we were gonna get." She makes the strategic point that drives the effort: finding out why a guest booked through the OTA in the first place, and then giving them a reason they cannot find there to book directly next time.

[43:40] How merged profiles unlocked the Ultra VIP segment — Gitti describes what the database looked like before systematic profile merging: the same guest appearing three, four, or five times across different records, each separated by a stray period, an extra character, or a formatting inconsistency. Once those profiles were unified, the picture changed entirely. For Casa de Campo's 50th anniversary, the team was able to identify guests who had visited repeatedly, experienced multiple areas of the resort, and truly represented the depth of the brand. "If we didn't have all those merged profiles, I don't think we would have been able to create that specific segment." Recognition, personalization, and the feeling of being seen as a returning guest all start with data that knows who someone actually is.

[44:55] Teaching the team to own the data — Gitti's most transferable lesson is a mindset. Reservation agents who fill email fields with placeholders because a form requires an entry are not being careless. They just do not understand what breaks when they do it. "Making sure they understand why. Not just because you're gonna complete the field to make me happy or make your boss happy, but why is it important, how it connects with everything else, and how it will break something else if you do it wrong." When the team understands the downstream impact of what they capture, the data quality changes and so does how they feel about their role in the guest experience.

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro

01:14 - About the 2026 Hospitality Benchmark Report

03:03 - Casa de Campo: 50 years, 7,000 acres, and a data challenge to match

07:20 - Database growth benchmarks and what they mean for marketing

10:43 - Why personalization and segmentation start with clean data

17:08 - The itinerary strategy that raised guest satisfaction by 40%

29:12 - OTA masked emails: the 12% problem and how to win those guests back

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

● Brand is why Gucci charges 8,000% more than a basic t-shirt: Tomas uses the fashion industry's most familiar example to make a point the hotel industry consistently misses. The quality difference between a luxury brand and a generic product does not justify the price gap. Brand does. The same logic applies to ADR, and most hotels have not learned to use it.

● Margins are compressing and brand is the only sustainable fix: Costs of labor, goods, and rentals have risen sharply across the last five years. Hotel prices have not kept pace. The result is a margin squeeze that most companies respond to by cutting costs — including marketing. Tomas's argument is that the opposite approach, investing in brand to support price increases, is the one that actually works.

● Elite Hotels grew direct website booking share by nearly ten percent in five years: This is not a theoretical argument. Under Tomas's leadership, the share of bookings coming through Elite Hotels' own website has risen significantly — a result he attributes to a combination of brand investment, website usability improvements, and loyalty program development working in parallel.

● The 95-5 rule changes how you think about hotel marketing: At any given moment, 95% of potential guests are not ready to buy. Hotel marketing that focuses exclusively on the bottom of the funnel — people already close to booking — is only ever talking to existing customers. Growing means building relationships with people in all three layers of the funnel, including those who currently book elsewhere, over a long enough time frame that they are positioned to choose you when they are ready.

● Human touch is becoming the next luxury: As more hotel operations automate, Tomas predicts a bifurcation in the market between fully automated, cost-efficient experiences and premium hospitality where the human element is the product. "I think that human touch will be the next luxury. I really do."

● Retail brands outperform hospitality on brand building — despite having less time with customers: Retailers have guests for fifteen minutes. Hotels have them for twenty-four hours. And yet retail consistently produces more creative, emotionally resonant brand building. Tomas draws inspiration from Jonathan Anderson's transformation of Loewe, Demna Gvasalia's reinvention of Balenciaga, and Soho House's global name recognition built on twenty hotels. These, he argues, are the case studies hotel CMOs should be studying.

● Sweden's hotel pricing problem illustrates a global brand failure: Sweden is one of Europe's most expensive countries for almost everything except hotels. Stockholm ADR sits between Slovenia and Bulgaria in European comparisons. The reason, Tomas argues, is not market conditions,  it is a decade of under-investment in communicating why a hotel experience is worth paying for.

● Physical and mental availability both have to work: Borrowing from the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute, Tomas frames direct booking growth as requiring two things simultaneously — mental availability (brand strength, relevance, desire) and physical availability (a website that is easy to book from). Expedia employs 4,200 data scientists focused almost entirely on making their platform easier to use. Most hotels are competing against that with far fewer resources. Both sides of the equation have to be working.

● The hospitality industry recycles the same marketing ideas: Tomas observes that senior marketing executives in hospitality tend to move between the same pool of companies, producing the same ideas. His case: a former CMO of Coca-Cola or Nike would likely revolutionise hotel marketing precisely because they come from outside the circular thinking of the industry.

Dylan and Tomas also discuss the founding story of Elite Hotels — built by Bicky Chakraborty, who arrived in Sweden from Calcutta in 1966 with nothing and created one of the country's most famous hospitality brands through sheer force of personality and relentless PR — and what that founding story reveals about brand building at its most raw.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[00:00] Brand is how you charge more — Tomas opens with the idea that has shaped his five years in hotel marketing: "What I've been going around telling people in the last five years is that there's another way of doing things. If you increase your brand, you can charge more. You see this in every single industry all over the world." It is a simple argument — and one he argues the hospitality industry has consistently failed to act on.

[05:47] Why human touch is becoming the next luxury — Reflecting on the contrast between the most memorable hotel stay of his life — a 12-villa property in the Philippines run by a couple who trained every local staff member from scratch — and the worst, a visually perfect cliff-top hotel in southern Italy with terrible food and service, Tomas draws a line that runs through the rest of the conversation: "The more we go into AI and the more everything is automated, I think that human touch will be the next luxury. I really do." For premium and luxury hotels, he argues, the human element is not a cost to be optimised away — it is the product.

[11:42] The forgotten revenue lever — Tomas makes his core strategic case with unusual directness. As inflation drives up costs and margins compress, most companies respond by cutting — including cutting marketing. His alternative: "If you increase your brand, you can charge more. You see this in every single industry all over the world." He illustrates with a brand equity study run by Kantar in Sweden in 2023, where one hotel competitor ranked in the top 30 brands nationally on brand strength relative to pricing power — meaning they could raise prices significantly without losing guests. "And yet I don't see any of that happening in Sweden."

[22:00] Why the same ideas keep going round — Tomas identifies a structural problem in hotel marketing leadership: senior executives move between the same pool of companies, recycling the same thinking. "Everyone has basically the same ideas going round and round and round." His solution is to hire marketing talent from outside the industry. "If you take Coca-Cola's or Nike's former CMO — do you think they'll do a bad job in the hospitality industry? I think they would revolutionise the place. Because marketing is a different beast. You don't have to know hospitality in order to be good at marketing. You need to know marketing in order to be good at marketing."

[27:35] How to grow direct bookings — the full picture — Asked what advice he would give a hotel leader wanting to strengthen brand and drive direct bookings simultaneously, Tomas offers the most complete strategic framework of the episode. Brand investment builds desire in the 95% of potential guests not currently ready to buy. Website usability converts that desire into bookings when they are. Loyalty keeps them coming back. "The stronger the brand you have, the more people will come to you directly. And then there's the complexity — the harder it is to purchase from your own website, the less people will buy from it." All three elements have to work together.

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro 
00:42 - Tomas Bäcklund and Elite Hotels of Sweden 
02:12 - The best hotel in the world  and what made it great 
05:47 - Why human touch is becoming the next luxury 
06:58 - How a brand outsider became a hotel CMO 
11:42 - Why branding is the forgotten revenue lever in hospitality 
17:50 - Sweden's hotel pricing problem  and what it reveals about brand

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

● Open rates are determined before the email is opened: Newsletters benchmark at 33.8% open rates globally. But as Christine notes, open rates are a measure of one thing — the subject line. Citing David Ogilvy's rule that 80 cents of every marketing dollar should go to the headline, Christine argues that subject lines have moved from important to hyper-important, especially as inboxes become more competitive and direct guest relationships more valuable.

● Click-through rates validate content relevance: A click-through rate is not just a metric, it is confirmation that the content inside the email was worth opening. Christine frames it simply: "Are they actually moved to take action?" Buttons consistently outperform text-based calls to action, and the language on those buttons matters significantly. Action-oriented, outcome-specific wording drives measurably better results.

● Cart abandonment is the highest-converting campaign in the report: At 63% open rate, 13.5% click-through, and 6.8% conversion, cart abandonment is the benchmark report's standout performer. Christine's framing captures why: the guest who made it to checkout and backed out is already invested. They showed intent. The job of the cart abandonment email is to meet them where they left off, handle their objections, and make it easy to say yes again.

● Cancellation recovery is the secret weapon: At 51.4% open rate and 5.8% conversion, cancellation recovery is one of the most underused campaigns in hotel email marketing. Guests who canceled are hot leads — they wanted to come, something got in the way, and a well-timed, empathetic follow-up can recover bookings that would otherwise be lost permanently.

● Conversion rates are ten times lower without segmentation: The 2026 benchmark data is direct: segments under 5,000 recipients dramatically outperform large-volume sends. Beyond conversion, mass blasts generate volume spikes that damage sender reputation, create deliverability issues, and force hotels to work harder to recover standing with inbox providers. Christine's reframe is useful — segments are not just a marketing tactic, they are mini communities of people with shared interests and intentions.

● Six high-performing segments to build immediately: Bailey walks through practical segment criteria that require nothing more than data already held in the CRM,  local drive market guests, holiday-season returners, low-season loyalists, survey promoters, restaurant or spa visitors via Data In, and high-value bookers by room type or spend. The goal is one segment implemented immediately, not a full programme redesigned overnight.

● Confirmation and pre-arrival emails hide significant upsell revenue: These transactional emails open at 55 to 66% — among the highest rates of any campaign type — because guests are eagerly anticipating confirmation of a booking they just made. Adding a well-positioned upsell in this moment generates $93 per booking on confirmation emails and $95 on pre-arrival emails. Christine's framework: find the next-best-yes, not the biggest possible ask.

● Food and beverage leads all upsell categories globally: At 34% of global upsell activity, food and beverage consistently tops the benchmark report year over year. Early and late checkout follow, with activities and special experiences combining for nearly a third of upsell efforts. The key principle throughout: the upsell must match the guest type, or it erodes the trust that the transactional email has already built.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Read the Hospitality Benchmark Report here: https://www.revinate.com/hospitality-benchmark-report/ 

[09:05] The email metrics that actually matter — Christine reframes how hoteliers should think about the three core email metrics, drawing on a principle she attributes to David Ogilvy: "If you had a dollar to spend, 80 cents of that dollar should be spent on the headline and that is true for your subject line in your email." Open rate measures whether the subject line delivered value. Click-through rate measures whether the content was worth reading. Conversion rate measures whether the email did its job. Understanding each as a diagnostic, not just a KPI, changes how teams troubleshoot underperforming campaigns.

[16:02] Cart abandonment: the most unignorable number in the report — When Bailey presents the cart abandonment data — 63% open rate, 13.5% click-through, 6.8% conversion — Christine's response is direct: "That is unignorable. If that isn't something you're doing, there's the numbers to support why you would do that." The logic is simple. A guest who reached checkout and backed out was invested. The cart abandonment email's job is to meet their intent, handle the objection that stopped them, and make the path back to booking frictionless. Bailey adds the segmentation layer: "You could go back and remind them using merge tags to say, 'we saw you were interested in the luxury suite.'"

[22:37] Why segmentation is no longer optional — The ten times conversion gap between targeted segments and mass sends is the benchmark report's starkest finding on email strategy. Christine draws on fifteen years of watching the industry's relationship with list size evolve: "I've been around long enough to know the glory of the list size — when ownership hears we're sending to X number of people, it sounds big, it sounds effective. And that's changed." Her reframe is practical and memorable: "We use the term segments in email marketing, but I love the idea of them being like mini communities or audiences in themselves. You can say 'hey skiers' in the subject line. That stands out in an inbox of a skier beside everything else they have."

[35:48] The next-best-yes: a framework for upsell revenue — Christine challenges the hospitality industry's tendency to treat upsells as big asks. "A lot of people think upsells have to be this big offer. But I like to think of it as what would be the next easiest yes." Working through the guest's decision journey — destination chosen, hotel chosen, booking confirmed — she identifies the next logical step as something small and obvious: a dining credit, a breakfast add-on, a spa reservation for a spa the guest already knows is hard to get into. "Introduce something that they didn't know about your property. This is a moment to surprise and delight."

[41:36] When the upsell erodes trust instead of building it — Christine lands the most important warning of the upsell discussion with a single example: offering a romance package to a family traveling with small children. "It erodes trust, which is a huge concern in confirmation and pre-arrivals. People know what technology is capable of now and they just expect better. Show that you're paying attention." The right upsell in the wrong segment does not just fail to convert,  it signals to the guest that the hotel is not paying attention, undermining the trust the transactional email had already built.

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro 
01:15 - About the 2026 Hospitality Benchmark Report 
05:30 - One-time campaign benchmarks: open rates, clicks, and conversions 
09:05 - What email metrics actually tell you — and how to move them 
16:02 - Top performing recurring campaigns: cart abandonment and cancellation recovery 
22:37 - Why segmentation beats blasting and the ten times conversion gap 
35:48 - Upsell revenue by campaign type and the next-best-yes framework

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

● Five pillars, nine personalities: Art, fashion, design, music, and cinema are not marketing language at Concept Hotel Group, they are the structural framework around which each hotel brand is built. Gran Paradiso, the movie hotel, features a 30-seat cinema and a rotating gallery of commissioned video art. Los Felices, the fashion hotel, displays work from 80 fashion designers across its corridors and rooms. Every pillar lives in a different hotel, and every hotel tells a different story.

● Global inspiration, local identity: Diego draws his design references not from Ibiza itself but from the places he loves most — The Standard Hotels, Chateau Marmont, La Sirenuse on the Amalfi Coast, the Pacific coast aesthetic of Boca Chica. He travels specifically to gather visual and cultural reference before beginning each new project, most recently returning from the Pacific coast to develop the 2027 brand Acapulco Amor.

● The conceptual briefing comes first: Before architects or interior designers are ever briefed, Diego's team builds a comprehensive conceptual document covering music, photography, mood, materials, and narrative. "It's like we build a Ferrari and then maybe we finish with a Mercedes. The important thing is we have an objective and we sit down with the rest of the team." The briefing governs every decision that follows.

● Cultural programming drives direct bookings: Concept Hotel Group achieves 35 to 43% direct bookings across its portfolio. Diego attributes this to the strength of brand desire, guests who want the Cubanito or Mongibello experience go looking for it by name, not by destination. "They go into Google and they say, I like Hotel Cubanito, because they want the experience."

● Only 15% of current guests match the ideal profile — and that is the opportunity: Diego is candid that roughly 15% of current guests are the cosmopolitan, culturally engaged travelers the brand is genuinely built for. Building the Concept Society loyalty programme and increasing direct bookings is explicitly about closing that gap and attracting more guests who love the brand for what it stands for, not just where it is located.

● The Concept Society rewards loyalty, not spend: Launching in April with Revinate, the Concept Society is structured around room nights rather than revenue — recognising that a guest who can only afford to come in low season but returns every year is as valuable to the brand as a high-spending peak-season booker. Tiers run from Insider and Regular through Resident, with the Collective reserved for curated brand ambassadors.

● The Local tier extends loyalty beyond hotel guests: Ibiza locals who attend Concept Hotel Group's live music events and art exhibitions can earn Local status without ever staying in a hotel. By connecting their events platform to Revinate, Diego's team can track external guest attendance and recognise the community that keeps the cultural programme alive year-round.

● Passion is the non-negotiable foundation: Diego's closing advice for any hotelier looking to build something genuine is disarmingly simple. "The main thing is to build something that you feel passion for. If you don't feel the passion for it, then you need to find someone else that is having the passion." Authenticity, he argues, is not a brand strategy — it is a prerequisite.

Dylan and Diego also discuss Ibiza's extraordinary expansion from one five-star hotel in the 1990s to 36 today, how Concept Hotel Group manages aggressive yield management alongside brand consistency across seasons, and the upcoming Mongibello upgrade to five-star status in summer 2026.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[05:11] Bringing the world to Ibiza — Diego reveals that despite being a lifelong Ibiza native, his design references come almost entirely from elsewhere — The Standard Hotels, Chateau Marmont, the Amalfi Coast, Ocean Drive, and most recently the Pacific coast. "Work out the little details. That's how a brand feels more real, not only what you offer, but what you design." Each trip is research, each property a love letter to a specific place and era that Diego then recreates with complete commitment in Ibiza.

[13:25] Why the conceptual briefing changes everything — Diego walks through the design process that sets Concept Hotel Group apart from developers who brief architects first and think about identity later: "It's so important to pay attention to the design process because once you build, once you finish the building, then you can't go backwards and redesign everything." The conceptual briefing covers music, photography, mood, and narrative — everything about a hotel's personality is resolved before construction decisions are made.

[16:52] Cultural programming as a direct booking engine — Diego shares a striking data point: only around 15% of current guests are the cosmopolitan, culturally engaged travelers the brand is designed for, and that is exactly why the Concept Society is launching. "We want the people to feel not only part of a loyalty plan,  I want the people to feel part of the lifestyle we offer in the hotels." The goal is not more bookings from anyone. It is more bookings from the right people, through a loyalty programme that rewards belonging rather than spend.

[18:06] The Concept Society — Dylan and Diego walk through the structure of the incoming loyalty programme tier by tier: Insider, Regular, Resident, Collective, and the Local — a tier reserved exclusively for Ibiza residents who attend cultural events at the hotels without ever staying. "We see the number of nights as more important than the revenue production. Because maybe we have someone that really loves the brand but can only come in low season because they can't afford coming in August. I really appreciate that they're coming back with us."

[22:11] Passion as the only non-negotiable — Diego closes with the piece of advice he would offer any hotelier looking to build something genuine: "The main thing is to build something that you feel passion for. If you don't feel the passion for it, then you need to find someone else that is having the passion." He connects this directly to authenticity, noting that today's travellers are searching for something more — "not like in the past, where they were just looking for a comfortable bed, a minibar, good air conditioning, breakfast. Now they're always looking for something else."

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro

01:40 - Diego's journey from Ibiza to Marriott and back again

05:11 - Finding global inspiration and bringing it to Ibiza

09:39 - Five cultural pillars and how they live inside each hotel

13:25 - The conceptual briefing: how a hotel is designed before the architects arrive

16:52 - Cultural programming, direct bookings, and the ideal guest profile

18:06 - The Concept Society: a loyalty programme built around lifestyle

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

● Guest feedback is now a generative search signal: Beyond its traditional role in operations, guest feedback is central to how LLMs assign authority to hotel content. Pyramid Global Hospitality treats reputation data as both an ops tool and a discoverability asset as the industry transitions from organic search to generative engine optimization.

● The incomplete guest profile problem: A customer who loved the hotel but had a terrible restaurant experience presents as a satisfied guest in the hotel data, unless the OpenTable review is connected to the same profile. Evan illustrates exactly why bridging these silos is not just a nice-to-have but a prerequisite for accurate personalization.

● Foundations before AI: Evan draws a direct parallel between the early days of SEO promises and today's AI vendor landscape, warning against "shiny objects" that cannot deliver without proper data infrastructure underneath. "If we're building a house without the proper foundation, it's going to crumble."

● Segmentation is the difference between value and noise: Reviewing the 2026 Hospitality Benchmark Report, Evan noticed that email volume and engagement are both high — but revenue through some channels is declining. His diagnosis: undifferentiated outreach is training guests to ignore messages. Each spray-and-pray send reduces the credibility of the next.

● Revinate emails still outperform ChatGPT on last-click revenue: Evan offers one of the most grounding data points in the conversation — at Pyramid Global Hospitality, traditional email and organic search still drive the majority of direct revenue. Getting ahead of AI is important, but abandoning proven strategies to chase emerging ones would be a strategic mistake.

● Content marketing was always the right answer: The shift toward LLM-optimized content is not a new discipline — it is a natural extension of content marketing done properly. "If we're just now scrambling to say, 'Oh my gosh, we need to develop content,' then we were doing it wrong for years before this."

● Writing for LLMs as an audience: Rather than keyword-stuffing, Evan describes the new discipline as writing rich content specifically designed to answer the prompts guests are likely to ask of ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Claude. Hotels need to think of the LLM as part of their audience, not just as a channel.

● Service recovery requires segmentation too: Sending a warm, promotional email to a guest who had a deeply negative experience is a failure of data activation. Evan's approach involves excluding detractors from standard marketing flows and instead routing them to personalized recovery outreach — sometimes a personal note from the GM — before re-engaging them commercially.

● Negative review responses are a sales tool: Evan reframes the audience for negative review responses entirely: in most cases, the response is not for the guest who left it — they may never return. It is for every future guest reading that thread. The right formula is to acknowledge the specific concern, take accountability, and close with a positive description of what the experience should have been.

Karen and Evan also discuss the upcoming NAVIGATE conference at the Wigwam in Phoenix, a Pyramid Global Hospitality property, and a keynote conversation with the Head of Google Applied Analytics on consumer behavior and the future of hotel discoverability.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Read the Hospitality Benchmark Report here: https://www.revinate.com/hospitality-benchmark-report/ 

[03:10] Guest feedback as a generative search signal — Evan opens with a reframe that positions reputation management as a forward-looking AI strategy, not just an operations tool. "We know that people are using the large language models more and more for discovery, and guest feedback is central to what the models are using to give authority to websites and to content. So we need to be prioritizing it to make sure that we're present and have a strong reputation when customers are searching a market for a product." For Pyramid Global Hospitality, the same data serving ops leaders is now serving discoverability in the LLM era.

[03:52] The incomplete guest profile — and how to fix it — Evan uses a concrete example to make the data silo problem tangible: a guest who loved the hotel but had a poor restaurant experience presents as a satisfied customer in the hotel system unless the OpenTable review is pulled into the same profile. "If we are not augmenting that guest profile to understand the complete customer experience, then we are just missing a key data point there." His argument: connecting platforms like golf reservations and OpenTable to the CRM is not a technical exercise; it is the difference between knowing your guest and thinking you know your guest.

[08:02] Shiny objects and the foundation that matters — Evan draws a sharp parallel between the early promises of SEO vendors and the AI vendor landscape of today. "There are a lot of shiny objects right now in the AI space telling you that AI is your savior. And what we're really trying to focus on is making sure that we've got the right foundation, whether it's our website data structured properly, or through our CRM and CDP. Because if we're building a house without the proper foundation, it's going to crumble."

[15:31] Tried and true still wins — One of the most grounding moments of the episode arrives when Evan checks the AI excitement against actual revenue data: "Obviously our primary source of revenue is not AI or the large language models. Even our Revinate emails drive more last-click revenue than ChatGPT does at this point." His point that AI should be ignored, but that preparing for AI and abandoning what works are not the same decision. "Yes, we want to prepare and get our house in order. But it's not just preparing for AI,  in many ways it's doing marketing the right way in general."

[17:36] Spray and pray is eroding your audience — Evan's read of the benchmark report leads to a pointed observation about how undifferentiated outreach is undermining the channels that still work. "We have so much data available to us, but that doesn't mean we should just spray and pray and just send mass marketing to people all the time. It should just be crafted in a thoughtful way to make sure that the customer actually wants to act on the message we're sending them." Each message sent without genuine segmentation, he argues, reduces the value of the next one.

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro

01:06 - Evan Crawford and Pyramid Global Hospitality's data approach 
03:10 - Guest feedback as an ops tool and generative search signal 
05:13 - Connecting data silos: OpenTable, golf, and the complete guest profile 
08:02 - AI foundations: avoiding shiny objects and building for the long term 
13:38 - Content strategy for the LLM era and what NAVIGATE will cover 
15:31 - Balancing AI preparation with proven revenue strategies 
17:36 - Segmentation, service recovery, and responding to negative reviews

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

● The personalization gap is real and measurable: Twilio's State of Customer Engagement report finds that 82% of brands believe they provide good or excellent customer engagement, but only 45% of consumers agree. That disconnect is not a technology failure — it is a data activation failure.

● The booking journey has fundamentally changed: In under a decade, travelers moved from travel agents to Google to LLMs. Chris planned an entire two-week Rome family trip through ChatGPT — day-by-day itinerary, museum tickets, hotels, and restaurants. Hotels that are not preparing for an agent-mediated booking world are already behind.

● AI-to-AI negotiation is coming: The next iteration of the booking journey will not involve guests searching or calling at all. Personal AI agents with rich traveler profiles will engage directly with hotel AI agents to find the right match, negotiate, and confirm — and the hotels with the cleanest, most accessible data will win that exchange.

● The personalization bar is lower than hoteliers think: Chris's examples are not complex. Extra coffee pods. Sparkling water in the mini bar. Not leaving a bottle of wine for a guest who does not drink. A welcome-back greeting at check-in. These signals exist in the data already — the problem is getting them in front of the right team member at the right time.

● Loyalty is about comfort and familiarity, not points: For frequent business travelers, the emotional drivers of loyalty are recognition, routine, and the sense that a property understands them. Points are largely irrelevant to this segment — and yet most loyalty programs are still built around them.

● Seamless AI-to-human handoff is the next frontier: Today the handoff between AI and human agents is deeply frustrating — guests repeat their entire story from scratch. The future requires a unified data profile that follows the guest across every touchpoint, digital and in-property, so no context is ever lost.

● Technology should follow the experience, not lead it: Chris's most important advice for non-technical hoteliers is to stay grounded in the guest experience they want to deliver and let technology serve that vision — not the other way around.

● Dedicated thinking time is not optional: The pace of change in AI is too fast for part-time attention. Chris's advice is to assign people specifically to tracking and preparing for these shifts — because being caught flat-footed is a business risk.

● Traveler bifurcation is coming: The market will split between guests who embrace fully agentic experiences and those who seek out human connection as a premium. Knowing where your property sits in that spectrum — and preparing for both — is the strategic decision hoteliers need to make now.

Karen and Chris also discuss what it means to be truly ready for an AI-driven world, why clean and accessible data is the foundation of every personalization strategy, and what role Revinate and Twilio play in helping hotels reach the other side of that equation.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[04:54] The ten-time guest who still gets asked "have you stayed here before?" — Chris sets the personalization stakes with a story from the night before the recording. Checking into a boutique hotel he has visited at least ten times, the front desk agent asked if he had stayed before. "My goodness, just such an opportunity to say welcome back. And we've been talking about personalization in travel and hospitality for a very long time. One of my jokes is the only personalization we often see when we stay in a hotel is your name on the TV and nothing else." The data exists. The problem is getting it to the right person at the right moment.

[06:19] How ChatGPT replaced the travel agent — Chris walks through the full arc of how consumers find and book travel — from brick-and-mortar travel agents, to Google, to the LLM era — with a personal example that makes the shift tangible: "Last year I spent a couple of weeks in Rome with my family, and we basically trip-planned the whole thing through ChatGPT. Day-by-day itinerary, give us links to the museums, where we need to buy the tickets, what hotels should we stay in, which restaurants should we consider that are within walking distance." The next step, he predicts, is personal AI agents negotiating directly with hotel AI agents on the guest's behalf.

[13:09] The 82/45 disconnect — Chris shares data from Twilio's State of Customer Engagement report that reframes how the entire industry should measure personalization success: "82% of brands believe they're providing good or excellent customer engagement, but only 45% of consumers agree. So there's like this big disconnect around how we think we're doing as an industry, yet the consumer doesn't agree." He pairs it with the opportunity: "88% of consumers are more likely to buy from a brand if the engagement is personalized in real time."

[13:46] What personalization actually looks like — Chris makes the case that meaningful personalization does not require sophisticated technology — it requires using the signals guests are already giving. Extra coffee pods. Sparkling water. Not leaving wine for a guest who does not drink. "When I show up, just welcome me back. Little things like that. The bar's not that hard. You know what I mean? It's not that hard." His point lands because every hotel already has this data. The gap is activation, not collection.

[20:36] The bifurcation of travelers — As the conversation reaches its conclusion, Chris identifies the strategic question every hotelier needs to answer before the agentic world arrives: "Those that are gonna engage and be fully agentic, not do any of the work themselves — that's one segment. And then I think you're gonna have those that value the human touch and the human experience almost as a luxury." He sees some brands already leaning into the human-only position as a competitive differentiator — and predicts the market will split more sharply in the years ahead.

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro

02:14 - Chris Koehler's career and the psychology of customer engagement 

04:37 - Why personalization in hospitality is still falling short 

06:19 - AI agents and the transformation of the booking journey 

11:01 - The seamless handoff: AI, humans, and what guests actually want 

13:46 - What meaningful personalization looks like at scale 

18:23 - How hoteliers should prepare for the agentic world now

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

● Email still converts: Newsletters benchmark at 33.6% open rates and $1,249 average booking value globally. Voco Belfast hit 60% — nearly double the benchmark — proving what intentional segmentation can achieve.

● Double opt-in ROI: This campaign type delivers over $3,600 in booking value and averages 17 room nights booked per campaign sent, making it one of the highest-returning email types in the report.

● Intent-driven email wins every time: Cart abandonment and cancellation recovery campaigns convert above 5%-6% globally. In North America, cold lead emails convert at 6.5% with average booking values exceeding $3,300, proving follow-ups still matter.

● Voice is high-intent and hugely underleveraged: Inbound calls peak at approximately 16 per room in summer months in North America, and well-trained reservations teams are closing 49 to 53% of qualified leads. Outbound efforts generate $1,164 in incremental revenue per room annually — with Dream Inn Santa Cruz seeing nearly 40% of bookings come from voice.

● Messaging rewards relevance: Hotels globally receive over 1,000 text messages per month on average. In North America, lead engagement sits at 19.5% with opt-outs under 3%, and AI-powered automation (Ivy) handles 31% of messaging volume, freeing staff for high-impact in-person conversations.

● Reviews drive organic revenue: APAC hoteliers average 90 reviews per property — nearly double North America's 48 — and review response rates are strong globally: 58% in North America, 61% in APAC. Active response directly supports search rankings and guest trust.

● Phone capture is the biggest global gap: North America leads the world in email capture at 84%, but phone capture sits at just 53 to 58% globally — representing the single biggest opportunity for multi-channel engagement.

● Small hotels are winning on data capture: Hotels with 100 rooms or fewer are growing their databases fastest, demonstrating that hands-on team approaches outperform automated data collection when it comes to contact completeness.

● Database health connects everything: Email performance depends on clean lists, messaging needs valid contact data, voice conversions rely on calling history, and web capture feeds reputation back into your CRM. Database health is the universal connector for every channel's success.

Brenna and Bailey also preview an upcoming deep-dive series on each channel, with a North America Benchmark Leadership Webinar Series launching March 18th at 10 a.m. PST. 

Read the Hospitality Benchmark Report here: https://www.revinate.com/hospitality-benchmark-report/ 

Tune in to Agenlo’s episode here: https://www.revinate.com/hotel-moment-podcast/revenue-on-the-line-why-the-voice-channel-matters-more-than-ever/ 

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[03:36] Email is still a high-impact revenue engine — Hoteliers who have written off email as a mature channel may be surprised by what the benchmark data shows. Bailey walks through the campaign types delivering the most consistent returns, starting with a real-world benchmark-breaker. "Voco Belfast had a 60% open rate. That's huge. Our benchmark report found that newsletters lead with engagement at about 33.6% open rates and an average of $1,249 booking value — so Voco is way above average. They're almost double the average open rate." The data makes the case that well-segmented email campaigns are not just an engagement play, they are a direct revenue engine.

[04:33] Cold lead emails and the follow-up case — North America-specific data reveals an opportunity that many hotels are still missing. Brenna shares that cold lead emails in the region now convert upwards of 6.5%, with average booking values exceeding $3,300. The takeaway from Bailey is direct: "The lesson is very loud and clear — well-segmented and timely email campaigns don't just get opened. They drive direct revenue and recapture lost bookings. It was never about spamming your guests' inbox."

[05:55] Myth: The voice channel is dead — The benchmark data dismantles one of the most persistent assumptions in hotel marketing. Bailey presents the numbers: inbound calls peak at approximately 16 per room in summer in North America, conversion rates hit 49 to 53% in peak months, and outbound efforts generate $1,164 in incremental revenue per room annually. Brenna adds the property-level proof: "At Dream Inn Santa Cruz, they had nearly 40% of bookings come directly from voice efforts. That's reservation sales changing the economics of direct revenue." Bailey's verdict: "The channel isn't old school. It still proves to be a high-intent channel, and it is still hugely underleveraged."

[09:46] Reviews are doing more work than you think — The web capture data reframes how hoteliers should think about review management. APAC properties average 90 reviews per hotel — nearly double North America's 48 — and review volumes are growing year over year across all regions. Bailey connects the dots between reputation and revenue: "More positive reviews plus actively responding to reviews equals better organic traffic and more direct revenue. That's what we're all after here."

[11:53] Database health is your hotel's number one performance indicator — Brenna draws the thread that connects every channel in the report. "Data is the foundation of every channel. Email performance depends on clean lists and segmentation. Messaging engagement needs valid guest contact information. Voice conversions rely on captured calling history and context. Web capture feeds reputation and first-party data back into your CRM. Database health is without a doubt the universal connector for the success of all your channels." Bailey adds the global benchmark: North America leads with 84% email capture, while phone capture at 53 to 58% globally remains the biggest untapped opportunity for multi-channel engagement.

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro 
01:24 - Email channel: open rates, booking value, and campaign types 
04:58 - Voice channel: inbound conversions and outbound revenue 
07:52 - Messaging: engagement rates and automation 
09:18 - Web capture: reviews, response rates, and organic traffic 
10:38 - Database health: email capture, phone gaps, and opportunity 
12:11 - Connecting the dots: what the data means for 2026

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Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn:
● The direct channel opportunity: Why Charlie believes OTAs face more disruption from AI than hotel websites do, and how emerging technologies like WebMCP could give individual properties new tools to learn more about guests than ever before.

● The data quality imperative: How the difference between clean data and dirty data translates — in Charlie's words "10x, 100x, 1000x" — into the quality of every AI-powered decision your property makes.

● Guest persona strategy: Why defining five to ten clearly articulated ideal guest profiles is one of the most practical steps hotels can take now to prepare for an AI-mediated booking world.

● Metasearch and real-time pricing data: How knowing whether your property holds the best price in real time — down to a single dollar difference — transforms bidding strategy and ROI on metasearch advertising.

● The brand vs. mediocrity divide: Why hotels without a clearly defined guest profile risk becoming "a price on a pin on a map" and how clean data is the foundation of a brand that stands for something.

● Vendor API lock-in: Why Charlie worries the industry is repeating the data lock-in era, with new vendors restricting API access as private equity pressure and AI uncertainty reshape software business models.

● What actually works in AI right now: Charlie's honest assessment of which AI tools are delivering real value and which early-2026 offerings are not worth the investment yet.

● Personalization as a proven ROI driver: How segmented email and website personalization campaigns already demonstrate measurable lifts in open rates, click-through rates, and conversions without requiring new AI tools.

● Asking the right RFP questions: Why "how do you charge other vendors for data access?" has become one of the most important questions hoteliers should ask during technology procurement.

The conversation also covers Charlie's unexpected marathon career — running in North Korea and Kazakhstan in search of races he might actually win — and the behavioral psychology obsession that originally inspired TripTease. For hoteliers navigating the gap between AI promise and AI reality, this episode offers both strategic clarity and practical guidance on where to invest attention now.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[04:36] The direct channel's unexpected AI advantage — Charlie challenges conventional wisdom about who faces the biggest AI threat, arguing the direct booking channel is better positioned than many hoteliers think: "Overall, I feel pretty excited about what lies ahead in terms of the direct channel because I actually think the OTAs are the ones who are more likely to get disrupted and challenged." He explains how emerging agent technologies and WebMCP integrations could give individual hotel websites more data and personalization capability than ever before, not less.

[08:44] Know your ideal guest, or lose the AI opportunity — As AI agents increasingly mediate the booking journey, Charlie makes the case for guest persona clarity as the most urgent preparation hoteliers can make: "Understanding your ideal guest profile or your key persona — maybe five to ten different key types of guests that for your property absolutely always have a great time — and being able to really clearly articulate that leads to a really exciting future for hotels." Without that definition, agents cannot match the right guests to the right property.

[13:28] The brand vs. mediocrity divide — Charlie frames imprecise guest data not as a technical problem but as a brand identity crisis with direct revenue consequences: "If you are not clear, and precise, and accurate with your data, then either you're going to be telling agents that your hotel's right for everyone, which then means it's not right for anyone. You're like a price on a pin on a map. And that's not a great place to be."

[15:24] Data: 10x, 100x, 1000x more important — Charlie quantifies what is at stake as AI systems take over decision-making at scale: "Either you've got your data sorted and it's really high quality and you're going to be driving outstanding decisions, or you've got a data mess and you're just driving the wrong decisions consistently all the time." The AI amplification effect works both ways.

[23:34] AI as a hospitality mirror — Charlie closes with a powerful reframe for traditional hoteliers skeptical of technology: "The way you described that hotelier — they're focused on their guests. They look at them across the lobby and think: that person's stressed, or that person needs a coffee. All we're doing with AI is we finally have the tools to look for the data signals of each individual instead of walking through the lobby." Technology is not replacing the great hotelier's instinct. It is learning to scale it.

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro
01:36 - Charlie Osmond's background and TripTease origins 
04:36 - Why the direct channel should feel optimistic about AI 
08:19 - Defining ideal guest personas for the AI era 
10:10 - Where dirty data breaks your brand and your revenue 
14:36 - Vendor API lock-in and the risk of history repeating 
23:34 - AI as a tool to scale human hospitality instincts

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Throughout the conversation, Agnelo and Karen emphasize that AI doesn't like data silos with effectiveness only possible if data is clean, synthesized, and in one place, explaining why CDP foundation matters as things move faster than ever with six months potentially bringing very different conversations about possibilities, and that investments and mindset shifts separating hotels growing voice revenue from those quietly losing it center on treating voice as strategic revenue inventory versus operational cost, measuring it like hotel inventory to protect and grow the highest touch and highest profitable channel hotels can own.

Read Revinate’s 2026 Benchmark Report here: Revinate.com/hospitality-benchmark-report/ 

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[02:50] Voice as strategic revenue channel - Agnelo establishes the framework: "We treat voice as a strategic channel, that it's staffed appropriately, that it's fed by unified guest data, and then prioritized for true revenue moments rather than letting some of the operational noise drown it out, and then we lose sales."

[05:36] Peak season staffing layers - Agnelo explains the two-layer approach: "One is triaging calls into what is revenue and what is service. The calls that come in, if they're not divided between the two, then you're losing potential revenue. Second piece is scaling staffing into two layers, one being a revenue-focused layer where you have the best of the best highly trained closers, those that can upsell, and then separate that from those that know how to service and support the guests. It's like the hunters versus the nurturers."

[08:36] CDP data transforms agent confidence - Agnelo describes the impact: "Having that unified guest data and CDP and then building an orchestration layer where they're viewing the preferences of the guests based on what is needed and not what is intuition. It's absolutely critical for them to have this information at their fingertips. Otherwise it becomes more of a negotiation versus let me just truly book you this experience that you're craving for. The more information agents have at their fingertips, the better equipped they are, the more confidence that they have in terms of going for that conversion versus just making it transactional."

[10:32] Non-booker data gold mine - Agnelo reveals the opportunity: "That potential guest has likely gone somewhere else or decided not to travel. That data is extremely important in helping us build our gold mine. We've got a list of questions that agents ask them so that this way we can build continuity the next time we reach out to them. We find that a lot of folks like to hear directly from the brand, especially if you're proactive and you've got a message that resonates with them."

[14:20] Phone number capture incentives - Agnelo shares their approach: "What we try to do is incentivize our agents to make sure that the greater data you capture, the better off you are. It's not just getting email and address, but an actual phone number, then you can build your incentive bank if you're able to capture all that data. The only way to do it is to have it in the script, make sure they can ask the question at least twice without being intrusive."

[18:12] AI filtering service from revenue - Agnelo explains the structural fix: "When you think about 16% to 34% are real booking needs, the structural fix is how do you separate the responsibilities and the toolings. I would ensure that we give sales protected capacity along with the data that's built on CDP so they're not wasting time 60 to 90 minutes fishing for information. FAQ and leveraging AI to enable you to have information at your fingertips, whether it's booking confirmation, housekeeping requests, all this can be handled by AI."

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro
03:21 - Voice as premium inventory mindset 
05:36 - Peak season staffing: hunters versus nurturers 
08:36 - Unified CDP data's paramount importance for agents 
10:32 - Lead capture and non-booker data leverage 
14:20 - Phone number capture strategies and incentives 
18:12 - AI structural fix for filtering service calls 
22:06 - Mindset shifts for growing voice revenue

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Together, they discuss:

Matthijs emphasizes that while technology solutions like two-factor authentication are crucial, the human element remains the most vulnerable point in security systems. He stresses the importance of having security champions within hotels who regularly educate staff about emerging threats and best practices.

Don't miss this essential conversation about safeguarding your hotel's most valuable asset: guest data.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[02:04] The democratization of hotel technology - Matthijs reflects on how hotel technology has evolved dramatically over the past 20 years, from DOS-based systems that required extensive training to modern, flexible solutions. He notes that today, hoteliers have the freedom to build technology stacks uniquely suited to their properties and guest needs. This shift has been so profound that technology considerations are increasingly influencing brand decisions, with some properties even reconsidering their brand affiliations to gain more technological flexibility.

[09:54] The critical role of staff education in security - While discussing the growing sophistication of cyber threats, Matthijs emphasizes that technological solutions alone aren't enough. He stresses the importance of educating frontline staff who have access to sensitive data, explaining that single sign-on and two-factor authentication can reduce vulnerabilities, but proper staff awareness remains essential. Matthijs describes security as a "long-term game" that requires ongoing education to counter evolving criminal tactics.

[14:14] Strategic approaches to data access management - Matthijs outlines practical steps for protecting guest data, beginning with thoughtful control of who has access to what information. He recommends that hotels carefully evaluate whether staff members, such as housekeeping, really need access to complete guest profiles. He advocates for single sign-on as "one of the best ways to protect your company" despite the significant investment required, and emphasizes the importance of teaching staff never to Google login pages, as this is where criminals often set traps through misleading ads.

00:00 - Intro 
01:00 - The evolution of hotel technology 
03:30 - How brand dynamics are changing with technology 
06:00 - Modern security challenges in hospitality 
09:30 - Educating staff on security threats 
12:00 - Building security-focused technology teams 
14:00 - Best practices for protecting guest data 
17:30 - The role of Google in security challenges 
19:30 - Balancing data utility with security 
21:30 - Approaching tech stack design strategically 
24:00 - How Mews is investing in security 
27:30 - Closing thoughts

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn:
● Rachel's unconventional journey from 20-year trial lawyer specializing in franchise law to executive leadership at AAHOA 
● Why quitting without another job — though terrifying — became the catalyst for discovering hospitality 
● How fear of failure transformed into a career superpower through curiosity and hard work 
● What AAHOA is: the largest hotel owners association representing nearly 20,000 members and hosting the world's largest hotel owner trade show 
● Why technology vendors should connect with AAHOA to reach decision-makers as margins shrink and efficiency demands increase 
● How hospitality's slow innovation pace creates opportunities for technology education and adoption 
● The power of Personal Stories podcast: creating free access to industry leaders without membership or paywalls 
● Why "no two journeys are the same" in hospitality — and how that diversity of paths creates strength 
● How the hospitality industry itself isn't a career but an industry where any profession (accountant, marketer, lawyer, salesperson) can thrive 
● Why imposter syndrome appears at every career level — and how hearing relatable struggles from C-suite leaders empowers rising talent 
● The Women in Hospitality Leadership Alliance: a consortium of 33 organizations collaborating to elevate women into leadership  
● Why "we can no longer accept hearing people say that there are no women in those roles" when expertise exists across every facet 
● The harmful narrative that "advancement of some means demotion of others"—and why it must be dismissed 

Learn why Rachel views her legal career, AAHOA leadership, and current "retirement" work as three distinct chapters, how fear and imposter syndrome became unexpected motivators, and why representation and visibility matter critically for career trajectories.

Rachel will be moderating the Women in Leadership panel at NAVIGATE in Phoenix, April 14-16. Get tickets at revinate.com/navigate 

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[02:41] The terrifying career pivot - Rachel shares her leap from trial lawyer to hospitality: "I did the terrifying move of just going in one day and resigning... I walked away from a practice that I had been at a long time doing exactly what I knew how to do." Without another job lined up, she started exploring, which led to discovering "transferable skills" lawyers bring to association executive roles.

[07:43] Fear as career accelerator - What seems like imposter syndrome became Rachel's superpower: "When I become afraid, I lean into superpowers. I work really hard. I'm really curious. And I have an ability to learn whatever I thought I needed to learn to be successful." This fear-driven curiosity led her to learn every department at AAHOA, which eventually opened the COO opportunity.

[14:46] Why personal stories matter - Rachel explains the Personal Stories podcast mission: "One of the things I love about hospitality is that no two journeys are the same. You and I can have very different paths to leadership and still end up in a place that is very successful and very fulfilling for each of us." The podcast creates free access to leaders, making connections without barriers.

[20:21] The speaker directory revolution - Launching just over a year ago with nearly 2,000 women: "We can no longer accept hearing people say that there are no women in those roles because women have subject matter expertise really across every facet of this industry. And it was really just providing exposure."

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro 
02:41 - From trial lawyer to hospitality leader 
07:43 - Fear as a motivator vs. deterrent 
12:30 - Why technology matters for hotel owners 
14:46 - Personal Stories podcast and connection 
20:21 - Women in Hospitality Leadership Alliance 
24:00 - What hospitality needs to accelerate growth 
27:18 - Living the best professional life

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 
● Why having technology tools doesn't make you super—knowing, how to use them together does 
● The sobering revenue reality: hotels globally lost $488 in incremental revenue per room in 2025 (28% drop) despite 34% database growth 
● Regional performance disparities: APAC's 24% email revenue increase vs. North America's 14% decline 
● Why North America's top-tier data capture doesn't translate to revenue without execution strategy 
● Database health as the superhero foundation: declining rich guest profiles and rising OTA email masking (34% in EMEA, 22% globally) 
● The engagement crisis: only 16% of guests globally respond to messaging, meaning 84% of communications are invisible 
● The critical role of phone capture stuck at 56% globally 
● Four channels that unleash guest engagement: email (direct and powerful), voice (personal and revenue-driving), messaging (instant impact), and web capture (first-party AI enabler) 
● Region-specific insights for North America, APAC, EMEA, and global markets 
● Actionable benchmarks segmented by property size and hotel class 
● How AI and automation multiply impact when database health is strong 
● Why 2026 is the year strategy trumps volume as guests' attention spans shorten and wallet share fragments

Learn why execution quality matters more than tool possession and discover how top-performing hotels turn everyday technology into genuine competitive advantages through database strength, strategic activation, and precision personalization.

Read the full report at Revinate.com/hospitality-benchmark-report/ 

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[01:05] Tools don't make superheroes - Brenna sets the stage: "Having the tools doesn't make you super. Knowing how to use them together — that's what turns you into a hotel superhero." With every gadget imaginable available, from PMS to AI assistants, the real challenge is strategic alignment rather than technology acquisition.

[03:03] Database health foundation - Critical metrics reveal declining fundamentals: "North America's rich guest profiles dropped from 12% to 11%, EMEA from 9% to 8%. OTA email masking is rising — 34% in EMEA, 22% globally." Without strong database health, even the best tools deliver limited impact.

[03:52] The revenue villain strikes - The sobering global reality: "Hotels lost $488 in incremental revenue per room in 2025 compared to 2024 — that's a 28% drop. Meanwhile, databases grew 34% worldwide." More data doesn't automatically mean more revenue—execution determines outcomes.

00:00 - Intro

00:45 - Why 2026 demands hotel superheroes

01:20 - The revenue reality: global trends

02:24 - Regional performance breakdown

03:03 - Database health as your foundation

03:45 - The engagement crisis: 84% invisibility

04:26 - Four channels that matter most

05:26 - Sign up for the 2026 report

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Throughout the conversation, Aradhana challenges the industry's approach to sustainability, arguing that tourism has been fundamentally "extractive" and calling for a shift to regenerative models that give back more than they take. She delivers a controversial assessment of AI in travel, describing much of current innovation as "lipstick on legacy" systems rather than true technological advancement. Aradhana also addresses the devastating impact of geopolitical conflicts on global tourism and makes a compelling case for tourism as the world's best "agent of peace."

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[05:12] The sustainability failure of tourism - Aradhana doesn't mince words about the industry's sustainability efforts: "As travel and tourism industry, we have really fallen short when it comes to our sustainability efforts. It's failed on a structural level. It's failed at a leadership level, and what we need is systemic change." She emphasizes that the industry has been "tinkering at the edges" rather than implementing the fundamental changes needed for true regenerative growth.

[06:45] The innovation drought diagnosis - Aradhana delivers a provocative assessment of technology in travel: "As a travel industry, we are in a bit of an innovation drought. This is an industry that touches billions of lives in travel and hospitality, we have barely evolved in how we operate digitally." She argues that while interfaces look sleeker, the underlying booking and pricing mechanics are still rooted in early 2000s logic, calling much of today's AI "lipstick on legacy."

[17:17] Tourism as an agent of peace - During discussion of geopolitical challenges, Aradhana makes a powerful case for tourism's role in global understanding: "We are the best agent of peace out there. Tourism is not a casualty, it's a catalyst, and it's about time we acted as one. There is no better agent of peace because once you travel to a destination, you can never hate the place and the people." This highlights tourism's potential as a force for cultural understanding and conflict resolution.

00:00 - Intro 
03:03 - Career journey and inspiration 
05:14 - What is regenerative tourism? 
08:28 - AI and the innovation drought in travel 
14:18 - Navigating geopolitical challenges and soft bookings 
22:55 - The Middle East's luxury development boom 
25:41 - Leadership advice for women in hospitality 
27:23 - Closing thoughts

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Throughout the conversation, Dylan and Nick emphasize that Australian hoteliers don't need to chase every trend or add more tools or systems that almost integrate, but need better connections, better timing, better guest experiences feeling joined up, teams feeling connected to tech and guests, with connectivity and timing as central themes.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Connect with Nick Ellis here:

[00:00] Australia's commercial savvy necessity - Nick Ellis opens with market reality: "In Australia, we're commercially savvy, we have to be with the high cost of doing business in Australia. So personalization, we use it to get guests to book direct, knowing what they're going to buy, encouraging spending while they're on property."

[04:54] The jigsaw puzzle problem - Nick describes his GM frustration: "Every guest we had in our building would hand every single staff member a little tiny piece of that jigsaw puzzle of who they were and what they loved and what they were looking for. And everyone had these tiny little jigsaw puzzles, but no one had that complete picture and was able to put them all together and create that experience. There's such a sweet spot around using that information before arrival, during the stay, not three weeks later."

[07:11] CDP as Aussie solution - Nick gets excited: "It's so exciting for me as a career hotelier slash tech nerd. It's just practical, it's flexible, it's powerful, no unnecessary drama. I'd call it a bit of an Aussie solution. Hotel groups who run multiple properties, it means you can change parts of the stack in and out without everything falling over. Being able to surface those insights that you're collecting, it's such an awesome opportunity for hotels to really understand the guests, but then also deliver on it."

[08:36] The aircraft carrier story - Nick shares revenue lesson: "I was a GM leaving a hotel at 5 p.m. and we were sitting at 30% for the evening. Two hours later I get an automated email saying we had now sold all inventory. I walked in the next morning like, 'What happened?' Turns out the US Navy had parked an aircraft carrier in the harbor and the entire city had filled within two hours. We sold every room at lead-in rates. The bosses were like, 'Why didn't anyone react? Why didn't anyone yield?' That cost us a lot of money. If you're reviewing the performance after checkout, you've missed the opportunity."

[12:18] Real-time context for teams - Nick explains operational shift: "When you've got real-time updates happening, it just means your teams aren't guessing. They're reacting with context. You employ all these people throughout your business who are sort of best in what they do, but at the end of the day, unless they've got the picture of what's happening at the time, they're just making a decision with a little limited piece of a puzzle."

[14:52] Employee experience equals guest experience - Nick emphasizes priorities: "The biggest challenge to doing hotels in Australia is the cost of labor, but first and foremost, before that, it's where the team coming from. The quality and availability of team. That value proposition and becoming an employer of choice is more critical now than ever. Employee experience is just as important as guest experience. When the tools are connected and the tech is easy and the experience feels smoother, the team enjoy it. Smoother means more efficient and for hotels, efficient means profitable."

00:00 - Intro 
03:49 - Personalization as commercial necessity in Australia 
05:17 - The jigsaw puzzle problem with guest data 
07:11 - Customer Data Platforms as practical foundation 
08:36 - Real-time data and the aircraft carrier story 
11:50 - Privacy as front-page concern in Australia 
13:40 - Guest journey orchestration and connected systems 
16:36 - Wrap-up and 2026 benchmark report preview

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Throughout the episode, Dylan emphasizes that 2026 hospitality trends solve very real regional problems, where simplification creates value, and where activation of existing capabilities rather than new technology purchases can drive results.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

 If you want to go deeper into these trends, we have a full guide to the latest hospitality trends of 2026 with practical insights designed to help you move from strategy to execution. 

[03:00] UK and Ireland margin defense - Dylan explains the regional driver: "In the UK and Ireland, personalization is really about defending margins. The market is dominated by OTAs, high labor costs, and price-sensitive guests. So personalization isn't about being fancy, it's about driving more direct bookings, making loyalty actually feel valuable, and selling the right upsell to the right guest at the right time. If you're not activating guest data here, you're going to feel it straight in your P&L."

[03:50] DACH consent requirements - Dylan describes the different conversation: "Guests still want relevance, but they want it done with clear consent, and they want to make sure that values are driven with the communications. They don't want any creepiness. So you got to make sure that you're dropping in that line about data privacy in your conversations, your communications, and that you're leaving that opt-in button pretty prominent for those guests."

[04:37] Southern Europe revenue leverage - Dylan contrasts drivers: "In Southern Europe, hoteliers, especially in resort destinations, can use personalization as a powerful in-stay revenue lever. Basically, it's how you drive experiences, it's how you increase on-property spend, it's how you maximize peak demand without discounting. It's all the same trend, it's just completely different drivers."

[05:20] Operations-driven tech unification - Dylan reveals the unexpected insight: "Unified tech stacks sound like a trend that should be driven by the IT department, but in Europe they're actually being pushed by the operations team. In the UK and Ireland, we're seeing that teams are quite lean, in fact really lean, and there's no appetite from our customers to juggle five different systems that don't talk to each other."

[06:32] Real-time data regional priorities - Dylan breaks down survival versus precision: "In the UK and Ireland, real-time data is about survival. Labor is expensive, guest behavior changes quickly, and if you can't react in the moment, you are going to absorb unnecessary costs. In DACH, real-time data supports precision, better forecasting, and fewer surprises."

[09:07] Fragmented communication challenges - Dylan identifies the core problem: "Guest communication platforms are evolving because guests don't think in terms of systems. They're thinking in terms of experiences. And right now many hotels are still communicating in fragments. They have one system for email, another for messaging, another for feedback. Across EMEA, that fragmentation creates friction for guests and staff."

00:00 - Intro
02:14 - Five trends with regional context for Europe 
03:00 - Hyperpersonalization across UK, DACH, Northern, Southern Europe 
05:20 - Tech stack unification driven by operations teams 
06:32 - Real-time data and decisioning regional priorities 
07:30 - Privacy as brand promise across European regions 
09:07 - Guest engagement platform evolution and fragmentation 
09:58 - Strategic prioritization framework for European hoteliers

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Throughout the conversation, Karen and Brenna emphasize that 2026 represents a pivot point where initial digital adoption waves complete and the focus shifts to real-time activation, deep personalization embedded into operations, and viewing technology through added privacy and safety measures as must-haves rather than nice-to-haves.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Check out the Idea’s report here

[01:35] The action frontier - Karen sets the stage: "We've had a watershed year for digital transformation, and the next frontier is not just about adoption, it's about action. We've got to weave together guest experience, operational agility, and data-driven decision making."

[02:25] Beyond name and greeting - Karen explains evolving expectations: "Guests expect more than name and greeting. They really expect tailored stays, meaningful upsells, and experiences that anticipate their needs. It's really about show me that you know me and market to me as if you know what I'm gonna want pre, post, and during stay."

[04:20] From accumulation to activation - Brenna identifies the critical shift: "2025 has been about guest data and accumulation. 2026 will be the year of guest data activation. It's going to shift from just purely collecting the data to really translating it to actual personalization from pre-arrival to post-stay."

[08:45] Real-time decisioning emerges - Brenna highlights operational transformation: "Data has long been a hot topic in hospitality, but many hotels still use it retrospectively. In 2026, the emphasis is on growing towards real-time operational decision-making using occupancy forecasting, dynamic pricing, staffing optimization, and event-based intervention."

[13:23] Security as loyalty driver - Karen addresses escalating concerns: "Hotels are going to need to transparently explain how they use data. Opt-in, opt-out controls and secure infrastructure will gain loyalty. You've got to make sure you're using a platform that's got best-in-class security embedded."

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction to 2026 trends 
01:43 - Trend 1: Hyper-personalization goes mainstream 
05:49 - Trend 2: Unified tech stacks and microservices platforms 
09:15 - Trend 3: Data analytics and real-time decisioning 
12:57 - Trend 4: Cybersecurity and privacy escalation 
15:36 - Trend 5: Guest communication platforms as orchestration hubs 
19:01 - Recap and looking ahead to 2026

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Throughout the compilation, Brenna emphasizes the common thread connecting these diverse stories: hospitality is fundamentally about people, seeing what others need and showing up to meet that need, having the courage to do things differently when different is what's required, whether through massive financial risk based on vision, showing up daily during crisis, prioritizing culture over short-term revenue, or redefining luxury as effortless care.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[03:10] Luxury is the ability to not have to think - Jeff Wielgopolan from Meadowood Napa Valley delivers a memorable definition: "Luxury is the ability to not have to think. It's the greatest luxury that you can give somebody. From a guest perspective, all you should have to do is show up and pay." This reframes luxury away from marble bathrooms and thread counts toward anticipating needs before they're expressed.

[03:44] Moving guests through time - Jeff explains intentional interactions: "Upon arrival, I will always say that my best arrivals move the guest from the past into the present into the future. The front drive deals with the past, the front desk deals with the present, and as the bell escorts you to your room, they tell you about the future." When bell staff ask "how was your trip?" while guests enjoy beautiful views, they disconnect guests from the moment by making them think about cramped airplane seats.

[06:00] Hire people smarter than you - Sky McLean shares her scaling strategy: "The key in this whole thing is hire people smarter than you at the thing you need them to do. I knew I have no idea how to run a hotel. I ran two Airbnbs. That doesn't make me a hotelier. So I hired an operations manager and an accountant. It's always about putting the right people in the right seats."

[07:25] Hurricane Helene crisis management - Ben Campbell describes devastating conditions: "Two feet of rain in 24 hours. We had two hotels. One lost power for about a week. One hotel lost water for about three weeks. How do you stay sanitary without running water? I rented a box truck, drove up to that hotel, got all their linen, drove it down to our Embassy Suites in Greenville. The staff stayed late, did the laundry, then did all the laundry for the hotel that didn't have water."

[08:54] Operating without technology - Ben shares previous hurricane experience: "I went 14 days without internet. I went 14 days without a property management system. We were running a hotel off of a spreadsheet that I created with a room matrix." In 2025, his team ran hotels on paper for two weeks because they had no other choice during the crisis.

[11:12] Culture before revenue - Agnelo Fernandes reveals his priorities: "If you look at our strategic priorities, it starts with culture. It doesn't start with top line. It doesn't start with anything else but culture and leadership. I spent a good part of my first two years resetting culture. In some cases, minor tweaks and in some cases, major cleanses. Culture is the beginning and end of pretty much any organization."

00:00 - Intro
03:10 - Jeff Wielgopolan on redefining luxury and intentional service 
06:00 - Sky McLean on building a $600M empire through smart hiring 
07:25 - Ben Campbell on crisis management during Hurricane Helene 
11:12 - Agnelo Fernandes on culture as first strategic priority 
15:00 - People-centered hospitality

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Throughout the compilation, Brenna reinforces that great hospitality happens when human connection balances with intelligent technology, using data to enhance rather than replace intuition while building systems that free teams to make guests feel welcome, understood, and valued.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[02:20] Points are bribery - Bashar Wali delivers his bold perspective: "Points are not loyalty. Points are bribery. If I stop giving you points, are you still coming? No, that's not loyalty. I'm buying your loyalty, not earning it." His point underscores that true loyalty comes from making guests feel seen and valued, not just rewarded.

[03:05] The 75-step booking nightmare - Bashar compares retail to hotel booking: "I go on Instagram, I see a pair of shoes, I press three buttons, they're in the mail. I go on a hotel website to book a room, and on step 75, they're making me change my keyboard from Alpha to Numeric. Please don't fight me every step of the way when I'm trying to book my room on your website."

[04:16] The BMW loan origin story - Sky McLean shares her wild beginning: "I end up with a check for $38,000 from BMW. I'm like, done, sold. I'll take this car I can't afford with a $1,000 a month payment, and I'm gonna take that check and buy a piece of dirt in Canmore, which is the land where the first Basecamp Resorts now sits."

[06:44] The human cybersecurity vulnerability - Matthijs Welle warns: "We have to teach everyone who works at the frontline that has access to sensitive data how to protect that data. You can't look at an IT department to do 100% protection. That's never 100% unless you really make your teams aware of it."

[08:43] Master data management matters - Dimple Jethani emphasizes: "No one wants to talk about foundational things, but master data management matters. If I decide to implement a system and I don't integrate it, my master data has just been ruined."

[09:59] Transaction-level personalization - Dana Cariss explains hyper-targeting: "We can see quickly if the guest is using resort credit or not. Do we understand where they are actually spending that credit? Once we do, are we tailoring our ongoing messages based on that guest spend? Once you understand at a transaction level, then we can truly tailor personalized communication."

00:00 - Intro
02:20 - Bashar on loyalty and booking friction 
04:16 - Sky McLean's entrepreneurial leap of faith 
06:44 - Cybersecurity with Matthijs Welle 
08:43 - Master data management with Dimple Jethani 
09:59 - Transaction-level personalization with Dana Cariss 
11:07 - Technology for social impact with Georgine Muntz 
13:00 - Closing reflections on high-tech, high-touch hospitality

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn:

Throughout the episode, Brenna emphasizes that using first-party data to tell seasonal stories, segment smarter, nurture faster, upsell with emotion, and win back every possible OTA guest creates a connected system where December becomes the direct booking breakthrough that determines Q1 2026 performance.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Read more about The latest hospitality trends for 2026 here

[02:02] Duplication and inclusion framework - Renee Murrieta explains the recipe for success: "70% of your database wants you to talk to them in a personal way. And you do have that data. So I think there's a recipe for success that involves both duplication and inclusion. Customizing a message to a specific audience, you have the data points to do that. You can get something in front of them that you think is going to resonate with them, and the results show that it does."

[03:20] Scalable personalization strategy - Renee continues: "It doesn't mean every part of it has to say, 'Hey, I know you live in the northeast and you need to get down south to Florida pretty soon because it's cold.' You can say that once. Maybe your subject line calling out something that's gonna catch their attention. But the rest of the content could be rather evergreen. That inclusion piece means you don't want to leave big sets of your database out and untouched for months on end."

[04:10] Transactional plus emotional loyalty - Ellis Connolly breaks down loyalty components: "There's two types of loyalty that we think about. There's that parking fee loyalty, which is transactional, and then there's the emotional piece to that. What Laasie does really well is we're able to really blend those two to tie both together, your transactional and your emotional loyalty, so you get full circle on making that guest feel really good."

[06:00] OTA win back performance metrics - Brenna shares compelling data: "OTA Win Back campaigns consistently perform with 41% open rates and a $5 to $6 revenue per email sent. That's not just a marketing channel, that's a margin recovery machine. When you combine OTA Win Back with segmentation and loyalty, you reclaim holiday demand instead of losing it to commissions."

[08:31] Speed-based lead nurturing - Jason Wells from Revinate describes French Lick's approach: "They're actually leading that guest journey and getting that guest excited and wanting to book and picking up on those interests. Even if they don't book the spa, the restaurant, the golf on that initial call, it is marked on that reservation and that lead form. So when your outbound experience design team's giving them a call, they know exactly what to focus on."

[09:00] Voice-led upselling for holidays - Brenna explains the emotional closer: "Holiday guests want to feel excited. 'We notice you're traveling with kids. Want us to arrange a hot cocoa welcome? Would you like an add-on for a holiday breakfast with Santa? We have a New Year's Eve wine pairing. Should I reserve you two seats?' Digital upsells handle the scalable revenue, voice upsells capture the memory-making moments."

00:00 - Intro
02:02 - First-party data and personalization 
04:10 - Strategy one: Loyalty as emotional multiplier 
05:00 - Strategy two: Segmentation for relevance 
06:00 - Strategy three: OTA win back margin recovery 
07:30 - Strategy four: Cart abandonment capture 
08:31 - Strategy five: Speed-based lead nurturing 
09:30 - Strategy six: Voice and digital upsells 
10:45 - System integration for Q1 2026 momentum

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Throughout the conversation, Karen and Brenna emphasize that 2026 represents a pivot point where initial digital adoption waves complete and the focus shifts to real-time activation, deep personalization embedding into operations, and viewing technology through added privacy and safety measures as must-haves rather than nice-to-haves.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Check out the Idea’s report here

[01:35] The action frontier - Karen sets the stage: "We've had a watershed year for digital transformation, and the next frontier is not just about adoption, it's about action. We've got to weave together guest experience, operational agility, and data-driven decision making."

[02:25] Beyond name and greeting - Karen explains evolving expectations: "Guests expect more than name and greeting. They really expect tailored stays, meaningful upsells, and experiences that anticipate their needs. It's really about show me that you know me and market to me as if you know what I'm gonna want pre, post, and during stay."

[04:20] From accumulation to activation - Brenna identifies the critical shift: "2025 has been about guest data and accumulation. 2026 will be the year of guest data activation. It's going to shift from just purely collecting the data to really translating it to actual personalization from pre-arrival to post-stay."

[08:45] Real-time decisioning emerges - Brenna highlights operational transformation: "Data has long been a hot topic in hospitality, but many hotels still use it retrospectively. In 2026, the emphasis is on growing towards real-time operational decision-making using occupancy forecasting, dynamic pricing, staffing optimization, and event-based intervention."

[13:23] Security as loyalty driver - Karen addresses escalating concerns: "Hotels are going to need to transparently explain how they use data. Opt-in, opt-out controls and secure infrastructure will gain loyalty. You've got to make sure you're using a platform that's got best-in-class security embedded."

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction to 2026 trends 
01:43 - Trend 1: Hyper-personalization goes mainstream 
05:49 - Trend 2: Unified tech stacks and microservices platforms 
09:15 - Trend 3: Data analytics and real-time decisioning 
12:57 - Trend 4: Cybersecurity and privacy escalation 
15:36 - Trend 5: Guest communication platforms as orchestration hubs 
19:01 - Recap and looking ahead to 2026

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Discover how properties like Voco Belfast prove that connection and experience-led messaging converts OTA bookers far more effectively than discount tactics.

Sign up for the Direct Booking Mastery Certification here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[00:38] Your most expensive guest - Brenna reveals the truth: "Your most expensive guest is the guest who books through an OTA and keeps doing it. Not because they honestly prefer OTAs and not because the offer is necessarily better with OTAs, but because guests are missing a compelling reason to book direct with you."

[01:35] Invest in direct, not commissions - Kathleen Cullen from PTG Consulting makes the business case clear: "Many times we're investing in the OTAs. Why not invest those same dollars that you're currently giving to third parties and shift that investment into your own website, into your own direct booking strategy."

[02:08] The faucet metaphor - Marc Winchell from Pacific Hospitality Group offers a perfect analogy: "It's so easy just to dial it up. We're slowly turning that faucet off and we're incentivizing guests to book direct." It's about controlling the flow, not shutting it off completely.

00:00 - Intro 
00:38 - Your most expensive guest revealed 
01:35 - Why direct bookings are critical 
02:08 - OTA winback campaign performance 
03:30 - Voco Belfast success story 
04:45 - Holiday opportunity: Christmas and New Year strategy 
06:15 - Direct Booking Mastery Certification overview

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Jordi also discusses how music serves as the universal language connecting diverse guests, why purpose-driven community impact creates authentic brand value, and how their partnership with Universal Music provides access to 7,000 artists across 70 labels to create experiences impossible for independent properties to replicate.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[02:17] Music transforms hospitality - Jordi explains his revelation joining Universal Music Group: "Music could change everything. Hospitality is about emotion and how we make people feel, and music naturally amplifies that. Music is not just a theme, but it's a storytelling platform that could transform the entire guest experience from even before arriving to the hotel until they leave the property."

[04:57] The Madrid property's impact - Since opening in September 2023, Jordi shares remarkable results: "We had more than 900 events since we opened, all musical events with Universal Music artists. And these events brought more than 200,000 superfans to the property. We had three billion digital views and 35 million euros marketing media value."

[10:49] Personalization through the digital twin - Jordi describes their technology approach: "We have a digital twin, a tech platform. We learn from the client before they arrive, when they do check-in, and at different touch points. We learn what they like in terms of music. We have a music library where we can curate and craft the vinyls that they like and bring them to the room."

[13:10] Community as creative partner - Describing an emerging artist's organic performance, Jordi illustrates authentic engagement: "She just grabbed the guitar, stayed on the stage, played, and she gave those organically, naturally, because when she gets to the hotel and the way that my team personalizes her stay, she feels home. That's one of the examples on how she personalizes the stay of somebody else."

[17:38] Advice for differentiation - Jordi offers his key insight for hoteliers: "They need to find their niche. Maybe it's gastronomy, maybe it's education, it's different, but they need to find and be recognized by one thing and stand out from the rest of the competitors. If you find something unique and something different you can be known for, it's easier for guests to recognize you."

00:00 - Intro

02:17 - Discovering music's power in hospitality

03:25 - What UMusic Hospitality represents

04:57 - The Madrid property and remarkable results

06:49 - Packaging entertainment with accommodations

07:59 - Community partnerships and local integration

12:36 - Personalization through the digital twin platform

15:05 - Global expansion plans

17:38 - Advice for hoteliers: Finding your differentiation

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

The webinar also provides preparation tactics, including giving reservation teams advance access to offer details for valuable feedback, creating campaign-specific phone numbers with URLs in Revinate's platform for seamless team access, and launching early access sales to stand out before Black Friday inbox clutter overwhelms guest attention.

Links mentioned in show:
● Black Friday/Cyber Monday Landing Page
● BFCM webinar series
● Attend NAVIGATE

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[03:15] Experiential travel trend - Anisha shares critical market data: "Customers are taking longer trips, so guests are booking longer stays, and it's the experiences that are moving the needle. It's not so much about the destination, but that one coffee shop in Spain that was trending on TikTok, that's driving the demand to that city."

[12:25] Segmenting high-value guests - Angela explains CoralTree's cyber sales approach: "Are we segmenting out our highest value guests? And do we treat them differently? This can be a great opportunity to do an outbound initiative before a cyber sale goes public. How are we leaning into that highest value guest? That can be a good success strategy."

[14:00] Building effective incentives - Angela shares hard-won lessons: "Not everybody is a salesperson. Outbound sales just doesn't come naturally for a big percentage of humans. So really leaning into a profitable incentive program for our team is important. Making sure there's some gatekeepers in there, making sure we're auditing those, is really key here."

[18:00] Attribute-based upselling - Melissa provides practical tactics: "You've already got the reservation, so think through how you can maximize that revenue. Maybe you have some room types available for upgrade, or you have an open room with a mountainside view or oceanside view. These are great ways to upsell to current reservations through email or through your reservations team."

[26:40] Standing out from the crowd - Angela emphasizes timing: "We don't want to be another email on Black Friday or Cyber Monday. When you are segmenting, does your strategy look different for highest value guests? We've already launched many of our properties. We want to stand out from the crowd."

Chapters
00:00 - Intro 
03:15 - Experiential travel and F&B revenue growth 
06:17 - Everyday outbound fundamentals 
09:34 - Targeting repeat guests strategically 
12:13 - Segmenting high-value guests for cyber sales 
14:00 - Building team incentive programs 
18:00 - Attribute-based upselling tactics 
20:13 - Experience-driven package creation 
23:17 - Preparing teams for Black Friday 
25:48 - Real campaign success story

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Together, Karen and Geoffrey discuss expanding into food and beverage across 8,000 restaurants in their hotel portfolio, why frontline employees are the future leaders of your company, and how in markets with RevPAR headwinds, your people become your true differentiator over decor and amenities.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[06:44] Sales and service as two sides of the same coin - Geoffrey explains his philosophy: "When you're selling something and you're trying to sell them something they don't need, that's sales. If you're trying to provide a solution to a problem they have, that's service." He describes how a family with teenagers trailing behind them, checking into a double room, genuinely benefits from a suite or adjoining rooms, making the upsell an act of service, not manipulation.

[11:06] Why TRevPAR beats RevPAR - "RevPAR stands for revenue per available room. We actually don't prefer RevPAR. We prefer TRevPAR, total revenue per available room," Geoffrey explains. By measuring all hotel revenue instead of just rooms, properties can integrate front desk, food and beverage, and other revenue centers into one strategic approach, similar to how theme parks measure per capita guest spending.

[14:01] Agentic AI diagnosing performance gaps - Geoffrey describes their breakthrough technology: "If you're a front desk agent and you have a lot of upsells but your average rate is $30, and you have someone else that doesn't do very many but their average rate is $200, you can infer what's wrong. One is selling a one-tier product they're comfortable with. The other is only selling the highest-end suites." The AI diagnoses these opposite problems and prescribes different training for each employee at scale.

[17:13] The training paradox solved - "Most companies struggle to evaluate whether training worked or not," Geoffrey notes. Because their platform combines learning management and performance analytics in the same data structure, they close the loop that most training programs leave open, monitoring whether recommended videos actually improve specific skill deficits.

[22:02] The 42-year transformation story - Geoffrey shares how a cynical front desk veteran at an iconic New York luxury hotel crossed his arms during their first session until realizing upselling was actually service: "He said, 'For 42 years I've been doing a disservice to my guests because I haven't been educating them on what their alternatives are.' He became the number one seller in the hotel and more than doubled his income." This story captures the mindset shift that drives results.

00:00 - Intro

01:47 - Geoffrey's journey from valet to technology CEO

05:07 - Sales as a service philosophy

11:06 - TRevPAR and new revenue measurement metrics

14:01 - Agentic AI and closing the training loop

19:03 - The discretionary effort framework

22:02 - The 42-year veteran's transformation story

24:12 - Expanding into food and beverage

26:05 - Service as a holistic guest experience

28:00 - Why frontline staff are your brand differentiator

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Learn why JC Thompson emphasizes "the customer wants a human connection" and discover how properties like The Ranch at Rock Creek and Evermore Resort prove that storytelling, timing, and genuine engagement convert warm leads far more effectively than price slashing ever could.

Sign up for the Direct Booking Mastery Certification here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[01:32] Replace rigid QA metrics with one-on-one coaching to drive conversions - JC Thompson shares how strict QA scoring creates “human robots” instead of genuine hospitality. His coaching model replaces secret shops with hands-on leadership training, where managers review data and coach agents one-on-one. Evermore Resort used this approach to reduce call abandonment by 92% and generate 36% of monthly revenue through authentic, relationship-driven conversations.

[02:58] Implement triggered urgency emails within one hour of failed calls - The Ranch at Rock Creek built a “triggered send” system that automatically emails guests one hour after a failed booking call — timed while interest is still high. By classifying leads as warm or cold and tailoring the message, they drove higher click-throughs and repeat stays without discounts. Urgency plus personalization keeps guests engaged and ready to book.

[04:12] Use storytelling and brand immersion instead of discounts to drive 8x more engagement - Instead of flash sales, The Ranch at Rock Creek leaned into storytelling — inviting guests to imagine experiences like fly fishing and horseback riding. Hotels that use experience-led campaigns see up to eight times more engagement than discount blasts. Emotional storytelling builds brand value and long-term loyalty that price cuts can’t match.

[05:30] Segment and personalize your lead database to build trust and drive direct bookings - Lead nurturing works when every message feels personal. Segment leads by intent, purpose, and engagement, then tailor communication around real guest interests. Evermore Resort proved this by personalizing follow-ups with abandoned bookers, converting them into high-value stays that made up 36% of monthly revenue.

[06:42] Extend lead nurturing beyond email with proactive outbound calls - Evermore also integrated voice with digital touchpoints — training agents to follow up on high-intent leads through outbound calls. That human connection turned interest into confirmed bookings and dropped call abandonment by 92%. Voice-driven nurturing transforms data into dialogue, driving both trust and conversion.

[08:00]Build segmented campaigns before peak seasons to capture top-of-mind positioning - Don’t wait for Black Friday or Travel Tuesday. Warm up your database early with inspiring, segmented campaigns that tell your brand story. Hotels that engage leads in advance see up to eight times more engagement and book from strength — not from discount-driven competition.

00:00 - Intro 
01:32 - Human connection over criteria-driven sales 
02:58 - What active lead nurturing looks like 
04:30 - The Ranch at Rock Creek success story 
05:45 - Holiday strategies beyond discounting 
06:30 - Evermore Resort: 36% revenue from outbound nurturing 
07:07 - Direct Booking Mastery Certification

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Together, Karen and Steven discuss how hoteliers can leverage AI and CRM data to deliver personalized service at scale, why authentic voice communication remains essential for guest recovery, and how strong culture, storytelling, and purpose-driven leadership create memorable experiences that inspire loyalty and trust in the digital age.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[08:05] Pick up the phone - Steven emphasizes the importance of direct, personal communication with guests: “Service failures recovered with sincerity and excellence can turn a dissatisfied guest into a loyal advocate.” He personally calls guests identified through Revinate reviews — both those with negative experiences and top advocates — to listen, learn, and rebuild trust. It’s a powerful reminder that the voice channel remains the heart of hospitality.

[10:55] Recovering with sincerity - When a hotel faced an overbooking issue, Steven personally contacted affected guests, listened to their frustrations, and turned a potential failure into a memorable experience. “We got them front-row seats at a brewery concert — they said they felt like rock stars. The cost to us was picking up the phone.” This story captures how genuine empathy and creativity can turn setbacks into brand-defining moments.

[13:28] Personalization beyond the standard amenity - Steven shares how his team used CRM insights to deliver a personalized surprise for a VIP guest: “We found out this guest loved U2’s favorite song and had that record waiting on the Victrola player in their room.” That small detail, inspired by the hotel’s Faraway brand muse, led to the guest personally thanking the GM and declaring they’d “call Bono.” It’s personalization elevated through storytelling.

[15:54] Culture, symbolism, and mission-driven leadership - Steven explains how his company culture is rooted in open communication, empathy, and symbolism: “We have a strong mission and vision — Dream to explore, live to inspire — that connects every property and team member.” This grounding in purpose, he says, ensures consistency across locations while fostering a sense of belonging and pride among staff.

[19:58] The ‘Homecoming’ principle - “The Collared Martin swallow symbolizes homecoming — sailors knew they were close to land when they saw one.” Steven reveals the inspiration behind his company’s name and brand identity, representing exploration, return, and connection — the essence of true hospitality.

[20:18] The future of boutique hotels - Looking ahead, Steven predicts a new era of democratized data and AI-driven empowerment:“ AI now allows boutique hotels to build data dashboards once reserved for major brands — but the key is using it to enhance human connection.” He reminds hoteliers that the future of hospitality belongs to those who pair smart technology with authentic service.

00:00 - The call to bring back the soul of hospitality

03:36 - Teaching technology at NYU

04:37 - Launching Collared Martin Hospitality

06:08 - Boutique hotels and destination storytelling

08:05 - Picking up the phone: human connection through voice

10:55 - Recovering service failures with sincerity

13:28 - Personalization beyond standard amenities

15:24 - How AI enhances human service

15:54 - Building culture rooted in mission and symbolism

19:58 - The “Homecoming” story of Collared Martin

20:18 - The future of boutique hotels and data empowerment

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Beyond deliverability and email strategy, Melissa, Freya, Anisha, and Brenna also touch on measuring engagement trends, optimizing suppression windows, and capturing lessons learned for future campaigns. You’ll walk away with a robust, actionable toolkit for navigating holiday marketing—with plenty of insight into what actually works for hospitality properties worldwide.

Links mentioned in show: 

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[00:04] Deliverability is no longer optional – Melissa outlines the new industry landscape for hotel email marketing: "Microsoft has now joined Gmail, Yahoo and Apple in requiring them. So I want to reiterate here, authentication is no longer optional. It's an industry requirement for inbox placement." This sets the stage for why every hotel marketer must address technical compliance to reach guests.

[00:07] Clean lists drive revenue and engagement – Melissa breaks down the critical rules of list hygiene: "Never purchase contact lists. Not only is it a poor practice, but it also violates GDPR regulations. Using purchase lists exposes you to legal risks, potential fines, and can severely harm your email strategy in the long term." Maintaining a healthy database is foundational for both compliance and campaign success.

[00:13] Personalization multiplies performance – Anisha reveals data-backed outcomes of granular segmentation: "So what we've seen with our study is the more segmentation filters that you add, so say in the range of between four to seven, we are seeing higher conversion in terms of direct revenue. So about 4x more revenue and about 2x more engagement with these segmented campaigns." This highlights how targeted messaging can dramatically boost ROI.

[00:18] Post-holiday nurturing turns interest into bookings – Freya shares proven strategies for maintaining momentum after the holiday rush: "So these follow ups are really important to help convert those almost bookers and re-engage past guests to drive more revenue." Nurture emails and personalized reminders ensure hotels keep their brand top-of-mind and maximize campaign value.

[00:21] Small content improvements, big operational wins – Freya introduces new Revinate Marketing tools designed for efficiency and quality: "We've added a content audit to the email composer so this will flag any missing links, any empty CTA's images without alt text before their campaign goes out. So it really helps you catch those mistakes early and protect your brand and keep it looking polished." These upgrades empower hoteliers to run professional, high-impact campaigns at scale.

00:00 - Intro
00:58 - The impact of deliverability on holiday campaigns
02:20 - Webinar overview and guest introductions
04:13 - Foundations for email deliverability success
07:24 - Sender reputation and authentication protocols explained
09:23 - Best practices for maintaining list hygiene
10:56 - Practical segmentation strategies for hotel email marketing
13:01 - Using guest behavior and spend data for campaigns
14:47 - Planning timelines for Black Friday and Cyber Monday
16:38 - Post-holiday campaign nurturing strategies
18:19 - New AI and design tools in Revinate Marketing
21:39 - Top performing tactics for seasonal hotel emails
24:56 - Key takeaways and closing thoughts

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Sarah also discusses The Broadmoor's 65-year Forbes Five-Star history, training agents to upsell ancillary services authentically, and why service excellence will remain the competitive differentiator as guests become increasingly price-conscious.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[01:23] The five-star service mindset - Sarah establishes The Broadmoor's approach from the outset: "Something that we always have top of mind are the guest interactions. How can we make it special for our guests? What little clues can we pick up on that they're sharing with us in the calls to go above and beyond for our guests?" This philosophy drives every reservation conversation.

[06:33] Technology empowering team engagement - Sarah describes the transformation: "When I first started, it was a task every day to plug in an Excel sheet of what our abandonment rate was. Now those things are at my fingertips with Revinate, but the team has access too. They never knew how many calls they were taking or how much revenue they were producing. Now it's a tool they have on their screen every day. The buy-in really allows a team to feel like they're a part of something."

[08:04] The Doritos story - Sarah shares an unforgettable example of voice channel magic: "A guest called, saying this was their second stay. The first time they saved every penny and ate Doritos in their room to save money. This time, they could afford to dine in our restaurants. We made them a bag with a handwritten note saying, 'I know you've moved up in the world, but just in case you want a trip down memory lane,' with a few bags of Doritos. Those special touches you can only find when you have a great conversation are truly what make memories that last a lifetime."

[16:43] Million-dollar outbound strategy - Sarah reveals impressive results: "We started using Revinate almost 13 years ago. Outbound revenue was something we weren't tracking — we'd just let callers call us back. When that was presented as a tool, we really dug in and said, when you have a great conversation with a guest, ask to follow up. In the last three months, we were almost close to a million dollars in revenue just in outbound with the team making those calls."

[22:47] The future is service - Sarah looks ahead: "Voice is not going away anytime soon, and with people price-conscious of where they spend their money, it's going to come down to the service. Service is going to be the way forward, and if you want to be the best, you have to have that personalized service."

00:00 - Special touches through conversation 
01:41 - The Broadmoor introduction and Forbes Five-Star legacy 
02:40 - Sarah's role managing the reservations team 
04:09 - Career journey from Disney inspiration to Croatia to Colorado 
06:24 - Technology evolution in reservations management 
07:40 - Why the voice channel creates unique connections 
08:04 - The Doritos story: Listening leads to magic 
10:21 - Training agents to authentically sell experiences 
11:51 - AI's role in luxury hospitality 
13:21 - Maintaining Forbes Five-Star standards through coaching 
15:36 - Outbound call strategy generating $1M in revenue 
17:27 - The NAVIGATE conference community 
18:46 - Memorable guest interactions and surprise moments 
20:52 - The future of reservations: Service-first approach

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Learn why Bashar Wali emphasizes "the biggest luxury is time" and discover how emotional intelligence combined with guest data creates upselling that enhances rather than interrupts the guest experience.

Sign up for the Direct Booking Mastery Certification here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[01:06] Emotional intelligence in upselling - Bashar Wali delivers a masterclass in what NOT to do: "When I show up at 11 pm to check-in for a one night stay, you know I'm leaving at seven. Why are you telling me about the spa? Does it look like I care about your spa or your gym?" Effective upselling requires understanding context, timing, and guest needs.

[02:54] Attribute-based selling over discounting - Anisha Yadav, VP of Customer and Product Marketing from Revinate explains why value-building beats price-cutting: "It's not about deep discounting. It's about how do you build that value for your asset for those rooms that you have." From higher room types to better views to interconnecting rooms, attribute-based selling monetizes what you already have.

[05:30] Andronis 600% revenue increase - The Greek luxury hospitality group achieved remarkable results by sending personalized automated emails before, during, and after guest stays. Their pre-arrival and on-property campaigns highlighting spa, restaurants, and curated experiences averaged €34,600 in direct revenue per one-time campaign.

00:00 - Intro 
01:06 - Emotional intelligence in upselling 
02:54 - Attribute-based selling vs. discounting 
03:39 - Timing and placement of upsells 
05:30 - Andronis success story: 600% revenue increase 
06:45 - Direct Booking Mastery Certification overview

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

● Family business advantages: How being the only family-owned five-star hotels in Vienna and Salzburg creates authentic local experiences that international chains cannot replicate 

● Strategic technology adoption: Matthias's philosophy of "evolution without revolution" - implementing technology only when it serves clear business goals and enhances guest experience 

● Competing with global brands: How family-owned luxury hotels compete by focusing on quality, authenticity, and personalized service rather than marketing budgets 

● Omnichannel guest experience: Creating seamless experiences across all touchpoints, from AI chatbots to in-person concierge services, allowing guests to choose their preferred interaction method 

● Cultural authenticity through technology: Using QR codes for multilingual menus with recipes, historical galleries, and local stories that connect guests to Austrian culture 

● Navigating uncertainty: How family businesses can thrive by focusing on controllable factors like quality and guest experience while adapting quickly to global changes 

● The future of luxury travel: Why experience trumps product, and how the next generation's desire to "conquer the world" benefits authentic hospitality providers

Matthias also discusses his unique journey to CEO, the importance of the Leading Hotels of the World partnership, and why uncertainty has become "a member of our board" in today's fast-paced world.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[08:01] Evolution without revolution philosophy - Matthias establishes his approach to change management: "How can we make evolution happen without revolution? Because if you're too fast, if you're too quick, it might be as harmful as if you are too slow or too steady. So that's for me a question of finding the right speed for change." This principle guides all strategic decisions at Sacher Hotels.

[10:11] Purpose-driven technology adoption - Matthias explains their selective approach: "We don't use technology for technological reasons. We always have business reasons. We always have ideas. What do we want to provide as a guest experience? Is technology there to help us? Then we implement it." Technology serves guest experience goals, not the other way around.

[20:25] Authenticity as competitive advantage - Matthias highlights what family hotels offer: "People try to get the most authentic experience they could probably get. You literally come to our place where we live. You come to our home, and whatever your experience at the Sacher will be local, with local experience, local expertise." This personal connection differentiates from international chains.

[23:53] Future of luxury hospitality - Matthias identifies key trends: "Experience is more important than product. The next generations are hungry to conquer the world. People are very carefully looking at what they get for their money. Quality, quality, quality." The focus shifts from amenities to authentic, high-quality experiences.

00:00 - Intro 
02:31 - Sacher Hotels portfolio overview 
03:36 - Family ownership since 1876 
04:11 - Matthias's unique journey to CEO 
05:31 - Competing with international brands 
06:45 - Leading Hotels of the World partnership 
09:09 - Balancing tradition with technology evolution 
10:27 - Technology integration philosophy 
11:57 - Creating omnichannel guest experiences 
13:57 - On-property technology and sustainability 
16:31 - Navigating global uncertainty as a family business 
19:11 - Austrian hospitality and family culture 
22:05 - Vision for the next decade

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

The webinar also covers cart abandonment recovery, the importance of user-generated content in AI-driven search, and practical subject line examples that convert high-intent audiences into bookings.

Links mentioned in show: 

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[14:01] The dangers of panic discounting - Sara Green warns against the common mistake: "The gut reaction for many hotels is just to slash prices. We know the phrase 'heads and beds.' Yes, it's a short-term burst in occupancy, but it comes with some serious long-term consequences. It devalues your brand. When you compete on price alone, you're telling your guest that your hotel is a commodity and not a unique experience."

[09:19] Domestic demand opportunity - Anisha Yadav identifies the silver lining in declining international travel: "There is a huge opportunity for hotels in North America to capitalize on domestic demand. People are not going abroad, but they want to travel and take road trips. Segment that audience and focus on the drive market area."

[23:12] Value over discounting - Anisha emphasizes the strategic approach: "It's not about deep discounting. It's about how you build that value for your asset and for the rooms that you have." This principle guides successful revenue optimization during competitive periods.

[20:00] Personal touch differentiator - Sara highlights an often-overlooked tactic: "One thing that always stands out is an outbound call strategy. If you do have a res team on-site, imagine your staff calling a past guest to personally thank them for that stay. You can absolutely set that up with an email, but an outbound call is so much more personalized."

00:00 - Welcome and introductions
03:45 - Industry trends and consumer preferences
06:30 - Market data and forecasting insights
08:45 - Domestic travel opportunities
12:55 - Learning from past market uncertainties
14:15 - Avoiding panic discounting mistakes
16:45 - Cost-cutting consequences
18:30 - Attracting guests based on value
20:45 - Implementing value-add strategies
21:56 - Data-driven revenue tactics
25:43 - Real customer campaign examples
39:55 - Key takeaways and planning ahead
32:28 - Q&A and upcoming sessions

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Wilhelm also discusses the remarkable history of Baur Au Lac (seven generations of family ownership since 1844) and how luxury hotels have always evolved with technology while maintaining core service excellence.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[05:01] Technology as service enabler - Wilhelm establishes his core philosophy: "The key element of those choices is always how can technology complement, first of all, our DNA, our service philosophy, and how can it improve our efficiency as an organization? Technology should always be in the background. It should not move in between our clients and us." This principle guides all technology decisions at luxury properties.

[08:15] The two-week training rule - Wilhelm emphasizes the importance of intuitive systems: "If it takes more than two weeks to train staff, you've picked the wrong product. You have to excite people about systems." He advocates for technology that people can learn through exploration rather than extensive classroom training.

[12:57] The luxury experience evolution - Wilhelm identifies a crucial shift in guest expectations: "People are shifting away from a materialistic approach — the glitzy marble and golden water taps — towards more of an experience, personalized service, of a very strong recognition and respect for the guests." This trend shapes how luxury hotels must adapt their offerings.

[14:27] The future of hospitality optimism - Wilhelm shares his forward-looking perspective: "I'm very optimistic that the greatest time of hospitality is actually ahead of us because we are a sort of a bubble, kind of a land of real analog connections." As society becomes more digital, hotels offer irreplaceable human experiences.

00:00 - Intro 
01:59 - Wilhelm's 50-year passion for hospitality 
02:40 - Swiss Deluxe Hotels overview 
03:10 - The iconic Baur Au Lac and seven generations of ownership 
05:23 - Technology adoption philosophy in luxury hotels 
06:38 - Filtering framework for tech choices 
08:07 - Staff training and system implementation 
09:55 - Hiring for tech-forward hospitality roles 
12:26 - Evolution of luxury guest expectations 
17:09 - European Hotel Managers Association involvement 
18:37 - EHL (École Hôtelière de Lausanne) connections 
21:44 - Advice for exceptional guest experiences

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

Learn why Matthijs Welle emphasizes that "in a time of AI, people expect real personalization" and discover how to use guest data responsibly to create marketing that feels personal rather than invasive.

Sign up for the Direct Booking Mastery Certification here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[00:38] The personalization paradox - Brenna explores why personalization feels creepy when privacy is violated but welcomed when done respectfully. With 80% of consumers globally comfortable with personalized experiences, the key is collecting data with consent and using it to enhance rather than spam guest communications.

[02:08] Clean data drives segmentation - Matthijs Welle from Mews explains how cleaned guest profile data enables relevant communication: "In a time of AI, people expect real personalization. The email that I get in my inbox should speak to me and what my needs are and contact me at the right time."

[05:02] The revenue impact of granular data - Adam Mogelonsky emphasizes the importance of high-caliber data: "When you want to do any sort of one-to-one marketing... if all you know about them is their email and first and last name, it's going to prevent you from doing that deep dive on what are the emotional drivers behind why a guest is booking with you."

00:00 - Intro 
00:38 - Creepy vs. valuable personalization 
02:08 - Clean data enables better segmentation 
03:35 - Segmentation strategies across channels 
05:02 - The revenue impact of granular data 
06:40 - Real-world segmentation success stories 
07:30 - Direct Booking Mastery Certification overview

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Neil brings 16 years of diverse hospitality experience, having worked across South Africa and London in both branded and independent environments. His current role overseeing seven properties with 3,500 rooms in central London's Bloomsbury area provides unique insights into managing at scale while maintaining boutique sensibilities.

- Family business advantages: Neil explores how 187 years of single-family ownership across seven generations creates unique operational advantages, from long-term thinking to genuine care for both staff and guests. The company's philosophy that "we don't run seven hotels, we run seven buildings — it's only when we put people inside that they become hotels" drives every decision.

- Technology as staff enabler: Discover how Imperial London Hotels is implementing technology not to replace staff, but to free them for higher-value activities. Neil shares their strategic PMS rollout designed to reduce training time from 40 hours to 5-6 hours while providing intuitive interfaces that new generation workers can master quickly.

- AI and operational efficiency: Learn about Neil's "obsession" with AI and how it's being used to eliminate redundant work, improve reporting capabilities, and enable faster decision-making. He shares practical examples of how AI can transform routine tasks while emphasizing the importance of staff education and adoption.

- Omnichannel guest experience: Neil explains their approach to reimagining check-in as an omnichannel experience, allowing guests to choose self-service options while ensuring human interaction remains available for those who prefer it. This strategy transforms administrative tasks into genuine hospitality moments.

- Economic resilience strategies: With London facing 17% payroll increases over two years and challenging market conditions, Neil shares how independent hotels can navigate economic uncertainty through operational efficiency and strategic technology investment.

- Change management: Drawing from experience managing acquisitions and major technology implementations, Neil provides insights on leading teams through transformation while maintaining morale and service standards.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[00:12] Technology enhances human value - Neil's opening philosophy: "It's not about removing staff at all, but it's about letting those people do other stuff that adds more value to the business, whether it's talking to guests, being in front of guests."

[02:45] Family ownership creates unique culture - Neil explains the advantages: "I genuinely think we have the nicest owners in hospitality. We don't actually run and manage seven hotels. We only run and manage seven buildings. It's only when we put the people inside that they become hotels."

[11:54] Technology solving labor challenges - Neil describes their PMS strategy: "The reason to move and the product that we chose was really about a product that's simple to use, easy to train on, reduce that training time from forty hours to proficiency to a receptionist to probably closer to five or six."

[12:51] Redefining hospitality tasks - Neil challenges traditional thinking: "In hotels, we tend to have this obsession that a check-in is hospitality. But in my mind, asking for a credit card or passport and getting someone to sign a contract is more akin to buying a house than it is to hospitality."

[17:27] AI adoption philosophy - Neil shares his perspective: "I don't think AI will take your job, but people who know how to use AI will because they'll just be more efficient. They'll be able to get things done quicker."

[19:35] Data driving decision-making - Neil addresses industry challenges: "AI will teach people the value of data, where I think in hospitality, because data's been so hard to get, we're not particularly good at using it."

[26:35] Embracing failure for innovation - Neil's closing advice: "Don't be scared of failing. If we're not pushing hard enough as an industry, if we're not failing, we're probably not pushing hard enough."

00:00 - Intro 
01:31 - Neil's background and Imperial London Hotels overview 
02:45 - Family ownership advantages in hospitality operations 
04:21 - Bloomsbury location strategy and competitive dynamics 
06:01 - Career journey from South Africa to London COO role 
08:25 - Current economic challenges facing London hospitality 
11:20 - Technology as solution to labor shortages and cost pressures 
14:05 - Modern PMS implementation and intuitive user interfaces 
15:30 - Omnichannel guest experience and digital transformation 
16:29 - AI adoption and staff education strategies 
19:09 - Data-driven decision making vs. gut instinct in hospitality 
21:15 - OTA relationships and guest ownership philosophy 
23:31 - Growth strategy and major refurbishment projects
25:15 - Managing multiple major projects simultaneously 
26:35 - Final advice on embracing failure and innovation

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 

● Why you should never panic or increase OTA dependency during market downturns—and what to do instead 
● How to leverage ancillary revenue as a cornerstone strategy for both revenue recovery and loyalty building 
● Why direct bookings are the "ticket to stronger guest loyalty" and provide crucial data for personalization 
● The missing loyalty segment: how kids and teens drive family booking decisions and long-term guest relationships 
● Why 76% of customers gravitate toward brands that personalize offerings and how to use guest data effectively 
● Practical strategies for using historical first-party data to create targeted offers that drive repeat bookings 
● How to build relationships with young guests that create "locked in" family loyalty for life 
● The framework for following your data to identify guest segments and create memorable experiences for all ages

Learn why Jan Freitag emphasizes "I don't want you to come from any other channel. I want you to come to me directly, and then I'm willing to value that loyalty," and discover how personalization becomes your hotel's superpower during challenging market conditions.

Sign up for the Direct Booking Mastery Certification here.

Read about Google's new search updates here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[00:40] What NOT to do in tough markets - Brenna outlines the critical mistakes to avoid: panicking, scattering marketing funds everywhere, or pressing the "big red button" of increased OTA spending. While OTA distribution might seem like a quick guest acquisition fix, it's actually a more expensive long-term option that undermines direct relationships.

[02:57] Direct bookings drive loyalty - Jan Freitag from CoStar Group emphasizes the connection: "I don't want you to come from any other channel. I want you to come to me directly, and then I'm willing to value that loyalty." Direct bookings provide the guest data needed for personalization, which builds stronger loyalty bonds.

[03:36] The missing loyalty segment - Alicia Zur-Szpiro reveals how kids and teens are often the biggest decision makers for family trips: "If you've delighted the family and the kids, you've locked in that family for life... when you know that a holiday works for you and your children, you're just gonna go back time and time again, year after year."

00:00 - Intro 
00:40 - Market conditions and what not to do 
01:30 - Ancillary revenue as loyalty strategy 
02:57 - Direct bookings drive loyalty 
03:36 - The missing link: kids and teens 
04:36 - Data-driven personalization strategies 
05:30 - Direct Booking Mastery Certification overview

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

The team debunks the myth that the voice channel is dead, proving instead that it's simply been neglected by most properties. French Lick Resort serves as the perfect case study, having undergone a complete transformation of its reservation operations post-COVID.

● Voice channel transformation: Dean shares how French Lick shifted from reactive post-booking upselling to proactive pre-arrival engagement, calling leisure guests 14 days before arrival when they're ready to make final decisions about their stay.
● Agent development: Learn how French Lick transformed their team from "order takers" into sales professionals by improving average call handle  time, empowering agents to handle all amenity bookings, and creating a culture where agents taste new menu items to better sell dining experiences.
● OTA independence: Discover how French Lick eliminated most OTA relationships, reducing discounting pressure while maintaining direct bookings and capturing 100% of guest data for future marketing efforts.
● Data-driven marketing: Explore their customized lead form strategy that captures detailed guest interests during calls, feeding automated marketing campaigns that have doubled revenue for targeted events.
● Employee retention: With call center turnover averaging 200% annually industry-wide, learn how French Lick achieved impressive retention by empowering agents, providing comprehensive training, and creating fulfillment through meaningful guest interactions.
● Revenue impact: The session reveals measurable results, including increased ancillary revenue, higher conversion rates, and the ability to capture email addresses from 69.3% of non-booking callers for future remarketing.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[06:59] Strategic shift to proactive guest engagement - Dean explains the post-COVID decision to call guests 14 days before arrival: "When a guest is inquiring and asking about something, that's your opportunity to sell it. And that's when we found out that's when the guest wants us. We were happy to service them prior to their stay."

[08:22] Extended handle times drive revenue - Jason Wells emphasizes the counterintuitive approach: "We did not see a crazy uptick in abandonment as your team's spending more time on the phone with the guests. We did see an increase in conversion, though, which is super important because they're walking that guest through that experience, getting them excited to book."

[13:47] Transforming order takers into sales professionals - Dean reveals the core strategy: "We took, let's just call it order takers, and we needed to basically transform them into sales folks. That is not easy. But when you have to take someone from has no idea about golf to at least be able to explain golf in general, to sell golf, the guests like it."

[16:07] Eliminating OTA pressure - Dean discusses their revenue strategy: "When we were able to tell our team, 'Hey. You don't have to discount.' All of a sudden that pressure was left off them saying, 'Alright. So if I don't get the sale, I'm okay.' We'd say yes, but at the same time, build out that lead form because with automated campaigns, with follow-up campaigns, and outbound calls, we then can capture that business."

[31:36] Data-driven marketing success - Jason Wells shares the impressive results: "We've had a lot of really great success lately on some very targeted campaigns specifically for F&B events, for family days, that are generating just as much revenue and engagement from a small sample set of people... and the revenue percent has doubled. Doubled. Yes."

00:00 - Intro and partnership with Historic Hotels of America 
04:39 - Dean Blackburn's background at French Lick Resort 
05:12 - Strategic shift from post-booking to pre-arrival upselling 
06:59 - The guest experience transformation approach 
08:22 - Improving call handle times 
13:47 - Voice channel evolution and agent empowerment 
16:07 - Eliminating OTA dependency for direct bookings 
18:24 - Team restructuring and retention strategies 
22:42 - Building company culture and agent development 
24:53 - Overcoming implementation challenges 
28:28 - Data capture and lead form customization 
31:36 - Automated marketing campaign success 
36:31 - Closing thoughts and key takeaways

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

What you'll learn: 
● Why traditional points-based loyalty programs fail to create true loyalty and how they're driving modern guests away 
● The shocking statistic: 40% of business travelers prioritize personalized experiences over points accumulation 
● How Ennismore's revolutionary "Dis-loyalty" program charges a monthly fee for instant benefits instead of points 
● Why CitizenM's subscription model was so successful that it attracted Marriott's acquisition interest 
● Data-driven approaches to understanding guest spending habits and travel behaviors for better personalization 
● Proven OTA winback strategies that convert third-party bookers into loyal direct guests 
● How Kimpton Maa-Lai Bangkok successfully converts OTA guests with post-stay email campaigns 
● The framework for building an omnichannel approach to loyalty program growth that actually works

Learn why guests are "running away from points and turning toward experience-based loyalty rewards that make them feel special" and discover practical strategies for building loyalty programs designed for the modern traveler.

Sign up for the Direct Booking Mastery Certification here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[00:40] The personalization imperative - Brenna reveals that 40% of business travelers choose loyalty programs specifically for personalized experiences, not points. Hotels missing this shift are leaving loyal guests on the table by failing to deliver the value modern travelers actually want.

[03:07] Ennismore's Dis-loyalty revolution - Carlo Del Mistro explains how Ennismore's membership program uses data to drive both stays and F&B revenue: "Data is clearly at the core of what we do. One of the reasons why Dis-loyalty is such a powerful tool is because it allows us to have a clear vision of our members' spending habits and their travel habits."

[05:55] OTA winback success strategies - Kimpton Maa-Lai Bangkok demonstrates effective OTA conversion by collecting guest emails at check-in and sending automated winback emails five days post-checkout, creating opportunities for loyal guest relationships while showing the value of booking direct.

00:00 - Intro 
00:40 - Why personalization matters in loyalty programs 
01:17 - The problem with points-based programs 
03:07 - Ennismore's Dis-loyalty success story 
04:01 - CitizenM's subscription model innovation 
05:55 - OTA winback strategies that work 
07:11 - Direct Booking Mastery Certification

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Ben's journey from night auditor to CEO provides a unique perspective on hospitality operations, having held positions in revenue management, general management, and now leading a 20-hotel portfolio representing $150 million in revenue and 900 employees.

What You'll Learn: 

● Crisis management in action: Ben shares the harrowing story of how his team managed two Asheville hotels during Hurricane Helene, when one property lost water for three weeks and both lost power for extended periods, yet continued serving FEMA workers and displaced residents
● Values-driven leadership: How Hospitality America's P.E.A.C.H. core values (Passionate, Excellence, Adaptable, Community, Humble) guided their disaster response and daily operations
● Data consolidation strategy: Ben's ambitious plan to bring all hotel data in-house, from labor coefficients to revenue management, creating true cost-per-occupied-room visibility down to business segment level
● Technology innovation: Their transition to Microsoft's ecosystem to leverage AI through Copilot, enabling general managers to make faster, data-driven decisions
● Changing guest expectations: How inflation has shifted value perspectives, with guests demanding unique experiences and authentic vibrancy in return for higher ADRs
● Emergency preparedness: Why crisis management now requires both digital solutions and old-fashioned paper binders
● Growth strategy: Their focus on branded boutique properties like Tapestry and Tribute collections for sustainable expansion

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[08:22] Hurricane Helene response in Asheville - Ben details the devastating impact when Hurricane Helene hit their two Asheville properties: "Two feet of water, rain in twenty-four hours, it was unbelievable. One hotel lost power for about a week, the other lost water for about three weeks. How do you stay sanitary without running water inside of a building?" His team's response exemplified their P.E.A.C.H. values, with employees driving laundry loads between properties and serving as shelter for FEMA workers and displaced residents.

[17:27] Data-driven decision making philosophy - Ben emphasizes the importance of empowering frontline leaders: "How are we making quicker decisions where it matters, which is in the general manager seat and the directors of sales seats. At the end of the day, they're the business leaders of our hotels. They're driving that success, and sometimes not success at the properties."

[19:05] Bringing data in-house for true profitability insights - Ben explains their ambitious data consolidation project: "If we're able to take one hotel and benchmarking and say, 'You're an airport hotel, and we're able to run this labor coefficient right now. How do we apply that in other markets?' We get a true CPOR — cost per occupied room — down to the business segment level. That's the ultimate secret to success."

[25:50] Post-COVID guest value shift - Ben addresses changing consumer expectations: "Coming out of COVID, inflation has changed a lot of guests' value perspective — what they're paying for versus what they're getting. Guests are willing to pay up when they feel the value is in return when it comes to great spaces that feel warm, inviting, and vibrant."

00:00 - Intro 
01:41 - Ben's hospitality journey from sports to hotels 
04:40 - Hospitality America overview and P.E.A.C.H. values 
08:22 - Hurricane Helene crisis management in Asheville 
13:04 - Emergency preparedness lessons and paper binders 
17:27 - Technology investments and data consolidation strategy 
19:05 - Building business intelligence for better decisions 
23:15 - Growth plans and branded boutique focus 
25:50 - Changing guest expectations and value perception

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Tune in as we explore: 
● Why the "it is what it is" mentality is costing you recoverable revenue 
● AutoCamp's incredible success story: $110K+ generated in three months with cart abandonment campaigns alone 
● How AutoCamp achieved an 11x ROI and 28% conversion rate with perfectly timed, emotionally engaging messaging 
● The psychology behind effective cart recovery: staying top of mind without letting guests jump to OTAs
● An introduction to the Direct Booking Mastery Certification's comprehensive cart abandonment course 
● Jason Pirock's expert insights on retargeting strategies and creating value for potential guests

Learn how strategic timing, automation, and guest data can transform abandoned guests into confirmed bookers, and why accepting cart abandonment as inevitable is leaving money on the table.

Sign up for the Direct Booking Mastery Certification here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[00:30] The "it is what it is" problem - We challenge the defeatist mindset that accepts cart abandonment as inevitable. While this coping mechanism works for truly uncontrollable challenges, cart abandonment is absolutely something hotels can address with the right strategies and tools.

[00:56] AutoCamp's $110K success story - AutoCamp, a design-forward outdoor hospitality company with eight locations across iconic U.S. destinations, generated over $110K in just three months using Revinate's Cart Abandonment solution. They achieved an impressive 11x ROI and 28% conversion rate with 70% open rates and 11% click-through rates.

[02:45] Jason Pirock's retargeting wisdom - Jason Pirock from Springboard Hospitality shares insights on multi-touchpoint retargeting: "All of those touchpoints are getting in front of the consumer in some way, shape, or form. It's ultimately about making sure that you are getting back in front of them. And then when you are doing that, what type of value are you ultimately putting in front of them?"

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro 
00:30 - Stop saying "it is what it is" about cart abandonment 
00:56 - AutoCamp's $110K success story 
02:06 - Direct Booking Mastery Certification overview 
02:45 - Jason Pirock's retargeting insights 

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Tune in as they discuss: 

Mandi also shares her teaching experience at San Diego State University, her optimism about the next generation of hospitality leaders, and practical tips for leaders looking to build more empathetic yet assertive business relationships.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[04:52] The art of strategic negotiation - Mandi emphasizes that successful negotiation comes down to practice and communication: "The only way we get good at negotiating anything, whether it's a contract or negotiating with your partner to get better countertops when you're doing a renovation, is with practice and with talking about it." She advocates for moving beyond adversarial approaches to build long-term partnerships where both parties need to fulfill contracts successfully.

[09:51] The new landscape of group meetings - The distributed workforce has fundamentally changed meeting patterns. Instead of large annual meetings for 500-600 people, companies are organizing quarterly business reviews with 40 people across multiple regions. The content has also evolved to focus heavily on team building and teaching networking skills to workers who entered the workforce during COVID.

[15:30] Hospitality's staffing evolution - Mandi advocates for flexible leadership approaches, especially with Gen Z workers: "We've got to understand if we want to build the bench of this hospitality industry, we've got to really look at who our stars are and we've gotta work with them." This includes accommodating academic schedules and recruiting through platforms like TikTok and Instagram rather than traditional job boards.

[20:37] Introduction to Business Bedside Manner™ - Mandi explains her trademarked concept: "Business bedside manner is your approach. Who are you in business? Who do you think you are in business versus how other people see you in business, and how do you show up? There's a big disparity between who we think we are versus how other people see us."

Chapters:
00:00 - Intro 
02:48 - Mandi's hospitality origins 
04:40 - HPN Global and venue sourcing 
06:35 - The art of contract negotiation 
09:24 - Evolution of group meetings post-COVID 
13:22 - Changing dietary restrictions and mocktails 
15:30 - Addressing hospitality's staffing challenges 
20:21 - Business Bedside Manner explained 
23:41 - Adventures in Business podcast 
25:24 - Future of hospitality and Gen Z optimism 
26:43 - Closing thoughts

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Tune in as Brenna explores: 
● The reality of booking abandonment rates and their impact on hotel revenue 
● How automation can transform cart abandonment recovery into a profitable strategy 
● Columbia Hospitality's success story using Revinate Marketing to achieve 75% open rates, 12% click-through rates, and over 170 recovered room nights 
● The importance of turning potential OTA bookings into direct bookings 
● An introduction to the Direct Booking Mastery Certification, a six-month program covering cart abandonment recovery, loyalty optimization, guest segmentation, upselling tactics, lead nurturing, and OTA winback strategies

Learn how personalized messaging, strategic timing, and collaboration between marketing and reservations teams can stop the ghosting and turn abandoned carts into confirmed bookings.

Sign up for the Direct Booking Mastery Certification here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[00:15] The reality of booking abandonment - Brenna explains that most guests don't book on their first website visit, with only 10% entering the booking engine and just 2% actually converting. This represents a significant revenue opportunity for hotels that implement effective cart abandonment recovery strategies.

[01:30] Columbia Hospitality success story - Brenna highlights how Columbia Hospitality used Revinate Marketing to create automated cart abandonment campaigns triggered when guests failed to complete bookings. Their drip campaigns achieved impressive results: 75% open rates, 12% click-through rates, and more than 170 recovered room nights.

[02:45] Direct Booking Mastery Certification introduction - Brenna introduces a comprehensive six-month certification program created in partnership with Hospitality Net. The program covers six key strategies including cart abandonment recovery, loyalty program optimization, guest segmentation, upselling tactics, lead nurturing, and OTA winback strategies, with monthly modules, practical guides, and certification tests.

00:00 - Intro 
00:15 - The ghosting problem in hotel bookings 
01:00 - Automation as the solution 
01:30 - Columbia Hospitality case study 
02:15 - Direct vs OTA booking importance 
02:45 - Direct Booking Mastery Certification overview 
03:30 - Course structure and benefits 
04:00 - Call to action and outro

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Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

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Throughout the conversation, Aradhana challenges the industry's approach to sustainability, arguing that tourism has been fundamentally "extractive" and calling for a shift to regenerative models that give back more than they take. She delivers a controversial assessment of AI in travel, describing much of current innovation as "lipstick on legacy" systems rather than true technological advancement. Aradhana also addresses the devastating impact of geopolitical conflicts on global tourism and makes a compelling case for tourism as the world's best "agent of peace."

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[05:12] The sustainability failure of tourism - Aradhana doesn't mince words about the industry's sustainability efforts: "As travel and tourism industry, we have really fallen short when it comes to our sustainability efforts. It's failed on a structural level. It's failed at a leadership level, and what we need is systemic change." She emphasizes that the industry has been "tinkering at the edges" rather than implementing the fundamental changes needed for true regenerative growth.

[06:45] The innovation drought diagnosis - Aradhana delivers a provocative assessment of technology in travel: "As a travel industry, we are in a bit of an innovation drought. This is an industry that touches billions of lives in travel and hospitality, we have barely evolved in how we operate digitally." She argues that while interfaces look sleeker, the underlying booking and pricing mechanics are still rooted in early 2000s logic, calling much of today's AI "lipstick on legacy."

[17:17] Tourism as an agent of peace - During discussion of geopolitical challenges, Aradhana makes a powerful case for tourism's role in global understanding: "We are the best agent of peace out there. Tourism is not a casualty, it's a catalyst, and it's about time we acted as one. There is no better agent of peace because once you travel to a destination, you can never hate the place and the people." This highlights tourism's potential as a force for cultural understanding and conflict resolution.

00:00 - Intro 
03:03 - Career journey and inspiration 
05:14 - What is regenerative tourism? 
08:28 - AI and the innovation drought in travel 
14:18 - Navigating geopolitical challenges and soft bookings 
22:55 - The Middle East's luxury development boom 
25:41 - Leadership advice for women in hospitality 
27:23 - Closing thoughts

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

The format evolution doesn't mean less value for listeners. Instead, the bi-weekly schedule allows for more focused, high-quality episodes that dive deeper into the strategies and insights that can transform your hotel operations. Karen will maintain her commitment to exploring the topics you actually care about, whether that's understanding NOI optimization, leveraging customer data platforms, or creating exceptional guest experiences.

Additionally, listeners may hear more from Brenna Turpin, who will be dropping in to provide supplementary resources and actionable strategies. These segments will focus on practical approaches to improve operations, elevate the guest experience, and drive more direct bookings and revenue for your property.

The podcast remains dedicated to delivering meaningful conversations with industry leaders and providing insights that hospitality professionals can immediately apply to their work. Stay tuned for continued valuable content that helps you navigate the evolving hospitality landscape with confidence.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Throughout the conversation, Robbert shares insights from his extensive global career, explaining how his experiences across different cultures have shaped his leadership approach. He discusses Intercontinental Taiwan's innovative implementation of voice control technology, which has surprisingly been embraced most enthusiastically by senior citizens. Robbert also highlights their data-driven sustainability initiatives, including the successful replacement of plastic water bottles with in-room water taps and bamboo thermos flasks.

What You'll Learn:

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[07:21] Navigating leadership across cultures and continents - Drawing from his global experiences, Robbert reflects on how working in diverse regions like Europe, the Middle East, and Asia has shaped his leadership style. He explains how adapting to different cultures is key to leading effectively, as each region comes with unique expectations and work dynamics. For instance, in his native Netherlands, straightforward communication is the norm, while in the Middle East and Asia, the approach to leadership is more relationship-oriented and requires cultural sensitivity. Robbert learned to "become a chameleon," adjusting his style to build meaningful relationships and create value for each team, which ultimately drives business success.

[16:00] Voice-activated innovation - One of the most exciting innovations Robbert discusses is the introduction of voice control technology at the Intercontinental Kaohsiung. As the hotel caters to a tech-savvy clientele in Taiwan — a global hub for AI and semiconductors — he reveals how they've integrated voice-activated controls for everything from air conditioning to blinds and lighting. The system, developed with a local startup, allows guests to interact seamlessly with their room's amenities through simple voice commands. Notably, this technology is available in Mandarin, English, and Japanese, making it accessible to a broad range of international visitors. The convenience factor extends beyond comfort, as guests can also request services like extra water or information about the hotel — streamlining the guest experience.

[27:00] Sustainability through data-driven innovation - Sustainability is a key focus for the Intercontinental, and Robbert Manussen highlights an innovative initiative to replace plastic water bottles in guest rooms. After analyzing guest data, which showed high demand for bottled water, the hotel installed in-room water taps and introduced bamboo thermos flasks for purchase. This change reduced 1,200 monthly requests for bottled water in a 250-room hotel, dramatically cutting down plastic usage and enhancing the guest experience by offering eco-friendly options.

00:00 - Intro

00:43 - A global journey: From Europe to Asia

05:40 - Taiwan’s cutting-edge hotel experience

06:58 - Adapting leadership across cultures

14:30 - The global career ladder: From trainee to GM

16:00 - Innovation that wows: AI-powered guest experience

17:56 - Technology for all: AI for every guest

25:01 -  Data and personalization: The next frontier

29:27 - Sustainability by design: Water solutions and guest experience

31:03 - Navigating the tech revolution: Budgeting for the future

35:45 - Empowering teams through technology and training

41:02 - The future of hospitality: Attracting a tech-savvy generation

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

With Ojai Valley Inn’s offerings — including 307 rooms, a PGA-certified golf course, and a 3,200-square-foot spa — Miranda outlines the reservation strategies that support the property's high-touch guest service. The discussion covers how to build effective remote teams, apply SMART goals for coaching, and use tech tools to maintain service consistency.

Also featured is Revinator, Melissa McMullin, Product Marketing Manager, who shares additional insights on driving results through collaboration between the reservations and marketing teams. 

Together, Brent and Miranda,offer practical tactics for increasing conversion rates, capturing guest data, and enhancing campaign performance through proactive outreach.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[14:19] Experiential training for remote teams
Miranda explains how the Ojai Valley Inn transitioned to a fully remote reservations team while maintaining luxury service standards. Agents who excel in selling spa services earn spa day rewards worth up to $350 to experience the offerings themselves. The program also includes dining and other amenities, helping staff speak authentically about the guest experience. Remote agents visit the property for immersive training, including welcome tours and room walkthroughs. This hands-on approach makes agents feel like guests, reinforcing the resort’s high-touch service culture. The investment has been key to preserving quality across a distributed team.

[21:22] The SMART framework for coaching success
Miranda highlights the use of the SMART framework — Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound — in their coaching strategy. This method shifts coaching from correction to growth — aligning agent goals with guest needs. Supervisors and agents use SMART goals to drive performance and focus coaching sessions. Regular calibration meetings ensure consistency in expectations and evaluation standards. As a result, the team has maintained a strong 93%+ performance score across its remote staff. The structured approach fosters both accountability and development.

[23:06] Group coaching for scalable development
To scale coaching across a fully remote team, the reservations department uses Camtasia to record and archive group sessions. Supervisors lead sessions with small agent groups, addressing shared challenges and encouraging peer learning. These sessions are saved to a shared drive for easy access at any time. This on-demand library helps reinforce training and maintain consistent service quality. It also extends the reach of each supervisor’s efforts while supporting a flexible learning environment. The approach has been essential for managing and upskilling a remote workforce.

[39:56] Marketing-reservations partnership strategy
Miranda shares how strong collaboration between marketing and reservations has improved both performance and guest experience. By using dynamic phone tracking, the reservations team demonstrates ROI from marketing efforts. Advance notice of campaigns allows agents to be trained and staffing adjusted ahead of spikes in call volume. This alignment ensures consistent service during busy periods and maximizes campaign effectiveness. The partnership is built on shared goals and clear data, driving better coordination across teams. It's a model of proactive, cross-functional success.

Chapters:
00:00 - Welcome & introduction

05:46 - Inside Ojai Valley Inn: A luxury resort experience

13:05 - Managing remote teams in luxury hospitality

21:22 - The SMART framework for effective coaching

26:46 - Building a culture of continuous learning & development

33:41 - Cross-departmental collaboration & employee recognition

39:56 - Marketing-reservations partnership: Campaign success

43:44 - Guest loyalty programs & outbound strategy

47:20 - Final thoughts & NAVIGATE preview

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Jennifer presents fresh data from Kalibri Labs revealing how recent federal policy shifts have dramatically impacted hotel demand patterns in the US. With government room nights declining by 11% and corporate bookings softening, Jennifer demonstrates how these policy changes are creating new challenges and opportunities across different hotel segments and booking channels.

The conversation then shifts to actionable solutions, with Anisha showcasing how hotels can leverage first-party data collection and targeted marketing campaigns on their voice and email channels to drive incremental revenue. Through real customer examples and case studies, they explore everything from abandoned booking recovery campaigns to strategic partnerships that stand out in crowded markets.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Meet us at HITEC!

[04:13] Federal policy shifts reshape hotel demand - Jennifer Hill reveals how the February executive order eliminated government travel overnight by reducing travel card limits to just $1 for civilian DOD employees. With over 3 million federal employees affected and conference cancellations totaling $800 million in delayed grants, the impact extends far beyond direct government bookings to affect leisure travel and contractor business.

[07:44] Market adaptation creates opportunities - While government room nights plummeted 11%, promotional loyalty member rates surged 6%, demonstrating successful hotel adaptation. OTA bookings showed modest 2% growth, indicating travelers are still booking but changing their booking patterns, creating new opportunities for hotels with strong segmentation strategies.

[13:47] Voice channel drives longer stays and higher revenue - Data shows voice bookings average 2.36 nights compared to brand.com's 1.8 nights — making call centers revenue optimization tools rather than just booking channels. This personal interaction drives significantly longer stays and creates opportunities for upselling and relationship building.

[21:46] Website abandonment represents massive untapped revenue - With only 2.4% of website visitors completing bookings, the 97.6% who abandon represent enormous potential. Hotels that implement data capture and follow-up campaigns achieve 15-20% conversion rates on remarketing efforts, dramatically outperforming their first-time booking conversion rates.

[34:42] Ancillary revenue amplifies profitability - Jennifer emphasizes that capturing additional wallet share through spa, dining, and experience bookings makes a world of difference for profitability. Early seed planting through pre-arrival messaging and strategic outbound calling can significantly boost on-property spending beyond room revenue.

00:00 - Intro 
04:13 - Federal policy shifts and demand impacts 
07:44 - Market adaptation and segment performance 
11:17 - Chain scale analysis and cost of acquisition 
13:39 - Channel mix performance and profitability 
15:33 - Market turbulence report overview 
16:38 - Lessons from previous downturns 
18:54 - Industry changes: Zero-click search and Airbnb 
20:02 - Data as the foundation for revenue growth 
21:46 - Website abandonment and capture strategies 
26:04 - Campaign examples: Geo-targeting and experiences 
29:05 - Strategic partnerships and social proof 
31:29 - Top performing tactics analysis 
34:38 - Maximizing total revenue opportunities 
37:47 - Key takeaways and implementation strategies 
38:25 - Upcoming conference appearances 
39:18 - Q&A session 
41:12 - Outro

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Jeff shares the fascinating story of how he joined Meadowood after a dinner conversation with owner Bill Harlan, who asked him a question that changed his perspective: "What does a guest room look like forty years from now?" This generational thinking about hospitality excellence has shaped Jeff's approach to creating timeless experiences.

Throughout the conversation, Jeff emphasizes how employee experience directly drives guest experience — sharing innovative strategies for recognizing both front-of-house and back-of-house staff. He discusses Meadowood's unique position within Napa Valley's wine-growing community, and how the property leverages its 250-acre setting to create intimate, personalized experiences for guests.

What You'll Learn:

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[04:29] The question that changed everything - Jeff recounts the pivotal dinner conversation with Meadowood owner Bill Harlan that drew him to the property. Harlan asked him, "What does a guest room look like forty years from now?" This question revealed a generational approach to hospitality –- thinking about hotels like fine wine, building experiences that are timeless and will stand the test of time for decades. Jeff was struck by an owner who thought about hospitality not just for immediate returns, but for creating something that would remain relevant and excellent across generations. This philosophy is reflected in Meadowood's remarkable employee retention, with many staff members having 20, 25, even 35+ years of service.

[10:15] Employee experience drives guest experience - Jeff emphasizes that there should be no difference between how you treat employees versus guests. At Meadowood, every person on property, whether guest or staff member, receives the same level of acknowledgment and respect. This includes greeting everyone you see, whether on foot or from golf carts, and ensuring that back-of-house staff receive equal recognition to front-facing employees. Jeff warns against recognition programs that only reward staff mentioned in guest surveys, as this alienates 50-60% of the team who contribute essential services but don't have direct guest interaction. The goal is ensuring everyone feels seen and valued for their contributions.

[18:09] The evolution of training: From what to why - Jeff describes how training methods at Forbes Travel Guide evolved from boring, standard-by-standard presentations to experiential role-playing that explained the "why" behind service protocols. He shares the breakthrough realization that staff immediately understood and embraced standards when they understood the purpose behind them. Using the example of guest arrivals, Jeff explains how different touchpoints should move guests from past (dealing with travel) to present (current needs) to future (upcoming experiences), rather than asking random questions without purpose. This approach empowers staff to create meaningful interactions rather than acting like robots following scripts.

00:00 - Intro 
02:04 - About Meadowood Napa Valley and its unique position 
03:29 - Jeff's role as Service Director 
04:29 - The dinner conversation that led Jeff to Meadowood 
09:12 - Jeff's journey from fine dining to Forbes Travel Guide 
10:15 - How employee experience drives guest experience 
13:02 - Defining luxury as giving guests "the ability to not have to think" 
14:43 - Managing personalization for repeat guests 
17:52 - Training philosophy: Teaching the "why" behind service 
21:45 - Understanding the guest journey from past to present to future
23:02 - Turning service failures into trust-building opportunities 
27:54 - The future of luxury hospitality and avoiding the "beige" trap 
30:47 - Technology preferences across generations 
32:43 - Designing experiences from the guest perspective 
35:03 - Outro

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Sims discusses his unconventional journey from lying about his age to get a dishwasher job at 13 to managing celebrity nightclubs in Manhattan, and eventually returning home to revitalize his local hospitality scene. Foster Supply Hospitality operates small-scale hotels and James Beard-nominated restaurants throughout the Catskills — focusing on creating full-service resort experiences in intimate 12-30 room properties.

Throughout the conversation, Sims explores how the hospitality landscape has evolved, particularly with the dramatic rise of short-term rentals in rural areas. He shares candid insights about competing with unregulated inventory that operates without traditional hospitality overhead, while emphasizing how authentic human connection remains a hotels' greatest differentiator.

The discussion also highlights Sims' commitment to community impact through A Single Bite, a nonprofit organization addressing food insecurity and nutrition education that has delivered over 200,000 meals and reaches every seventh-grade student in Sullivan County.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Instructions on how to do this are here.

[10:05] The short-term rental surge and its impact - Sims discusses how short-term rentals in Sullivan County have increased sixfold over the past five years — creating an "unregulated one-key hotel industry." He explains how these property owners can operate without the regulatory oversight that commercial hotels face, while many don't understand hospitality metrics like ADR and occupancy. "The short-term rental owner doesn't have the overhead of our business. They're now affecting ADRs and occupancies, and they don't even know what those two words mean," Sims notes. This creates unique competitive challenges for traditional hotels that must find new ways to differentiate their offerings.

[13:36] Leveraging professional hospitality advantages - Karen and Sims explore how hotels can compete with "amenity adjacent" short-term rentals by emphasizing the benefits of professional hospitality service. Sims explains that many short-term rentals simply copy and paste hotel amenities in their marketing — claiming proximity to restaurants, spas, and activities. However, hotels have distinct advantages including flexible length-of-stay options, professional cleaning and maintenance standards, and the reliability that comes with trained hospitality professionals managing the guest experience.

[17:48] The power of human connection in hospitality - Sims emphasizes what he sees as hotels' greatest competitive advantage: authentic human interaction. "As much as you can brand your short-term rental and create this thing, and it feels good, when you check in, it's still an empty house as far as human beings," he explains. He describes how guests connecting with staff members like Will, Saudi, or Anastasia reminds them of "the real power and joy and specialness of staying in a hotel." This human element cannot be replicated by short-term rental properties, no matter how well-designed or branded they may be.

00:00 - Intro 
01:53 - Introduction to Foster Supply Hospitality and the Catskills 
03:37 - Sims' journey from dishwasher to hospitality entrepreneur 
05:08 - The role of restaurants in the Foster Supply experience 
06:36 - The Catskills' history and evolution 
09:28 - How short-term rentals are changing the hospitality landscape 
12:34 - Competing with short-term rentals through professional hospitality 
15:13 - Converting restaurant guests to hotel guests 
17:48 - The irreplaceable value of human connection in hotels 
17:02 - A Single Bite: Addressing food insecurity in Sullivan County 
22:52 - Advice for aspiring hospitality entrepreneurs 
25:04 - Closing

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Hotel Moment Podcast is handcrafted by our friends over at: fame.so


Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.


Are you a hospitality industry leader with insights to share? We're always looking for innovative voices to join our conversation about the future of hospitality technology.

If you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of Hotel Moment, we'd love to hear from you! Our podcast reaches thousands of hospitality professionals worldwide, and we're particularly interested in perspectives on:

Check out the three most downloaded episodes:

Stuart discusses his journey through the industry, from living in hotels as a client to leadership roles at JD Power's global hospitality practice, Microsoft, and now Forbes Travel Guide. He emphasizes how empathy and diverse life experiences have shaped his approach to hospitality as an industry focused on "experiences of joy and creating memories."

Throughout the conversation, Stuart explores the delicate balance between technology, the guest experience, and profitability. He argues that the guest must be the "true north" while warning against cost-cutting that erodes what makes hotels unique. Stuart provides a pragmatic view on AI implementation, focusing on how it can free staff from repetitive tasks to deliver exceptional hospitality. He also emphasizes the importance of centralized data systems and the fundamental distinction between service (functional delivery) and hospitality (genuine human connection).

What You'll Learn: