The value of a business intelligence solution: how efficiency can lead to profitability

Time is money in the hospitality industry. Hoteliers big and small have always looked for ways to improve the operational efficiency of their properties. From a revenue management perspective, efficiency hinges on freeing the team up from insignificant tasks to focus their efforts on maximising revenue. One of the best ways to do this is through the implementation of innovative tech tools - such as a business intelligence (BI) solution which takes the data from your property management system (PMS) to deliver insights for quicker and more informed, strategic decision making.

All revenue managers have experienced the catastrophic impact of COVID-19 on the hospitality industry first-hand. Temporary closures, furlough schemes and staff redundancies were the only way for many properties to survive. Now as the reopening period is taking place in many nations around the globe, revenue teams are tackling a new challenge: having a smaller team to deal with rising demand.

A move towards automation

Having the right tech stack in place is now crucial to the role of a revenue manager and the entire revenue team - be it a rate shopper, predictive market intelligence tool or a BI solution. It's imperative that Revenue managers ground decisions in reliable and accurate business data and remove time consuming manual tasks, moving attention to positively impacting the bottom line. 

As a revenue manager there’s a lot of data at your disposal, particularly from your PMS system. Correctly analysing this data can identify opportunities for growth. However, you don’t want to get bogged down in endless streams of data which are difficult and time consuming to generate reports from. This leads to inefficiencies and greater burden on the decision making process. By looking at our Revenue Insight ROI Calculator. we found that 95 days is the number working days on average that are lost each year by spending time on manual PMS reporting.  

This is where a BI tool comes into play, adding a huge degree of efficiency to your working day. The heavy lifting of manually exporting and compiling data from your PMS is removed - instead you have the benefit of automated reporting and the ability to view insights on your performance from a clear dashboard. Again from looking at the Revenue Insight ROI Calculator, by spending just 33 minutes per day on a BI tool (which equates to 6 working days a year), you can save up to 81 working days a year by eliminating manual PMS reporting. This gives you time back to monitor for signs of demand, evaluate your channels and ultimately, strategise to drive revenue.

Where you can save time with a business intelligence tool

With the hospitality industry turned upside down in 2020, revenue managers must remain agile and act with precision to new booking behaviour and shifting demand patterns. In such challenging and unpredictable times, accurate data is a revenue manager’s greatest ally. To avoid battling through this data to get the answers you need, a BI solution gives you more time to spend on making a profit, here's how.

Elimination of manual processes

Revenue Managers analyse hotel performance on a daily basis. Without the use of an RMS or BI tool, this can create nearly 3 hours of work on average per day. A BI tool makes a revenue manager’s life far easier; automating what were previously time-consuming manual tasks. Instead of having to compile data and build a variety of manual reports from different sources, a BI tool pulls your PMS data into one dashboard. Reports are automatically generated and actionable insights are delivered, taking out the guesswork for you to make more informed revenue decisions. 

By automating labour intensive tasks, not only are they conducted flawlessly, but on average over two and half hours revenue team’s time is freed up per day for essential duties. Completely streamlining the revenue department’s day-to-day operations and keeping focus on growing the hotel’s revenue stream. 

Fewer errors and reworks

Mistakes in the present climate can come at a heavy cost for hoteliers. Human errors will always happen, especially when manually working through mountains of data. These errors will make data analysis useless to your team, costing you time and effort. Or worse, they can create ill-informed decisions and result in timely and expensive rework for your team. No matter how good a revenue manager you are, you simply can’t monitor and analyse the market, prices and performance as efficiently, and as capably as a BI solution. 

Empower team collaboration

Revenue managers regularly need to collaborate with fellow commercial departments such as eCommerce, sales, marketing, management and distribution. With an easy to read dashboard and a range of straightforward reports available, a BI solution allows you to effortlessly communicate granular information to different stakeholders. This facilitates much more efficient ways of cross-department collaboration, aligning on strategy at a time when it is needed most.

Access to real-time data

Market conditions are constantly evolving. Elements like pricing amendments by compset hotels, channel performance and pick-up need to be examined in real-time. Instead of looking back historically at different data sets, a leading BI solution like Revenue Insight is updated in real time. 

With Revenue Insight, you don’t have to export and compile data. Instead, the tool conducts real-time analysis and delivers lightning-fast insights so you can take immediate action. This enables you to pivot strategy when necessary and make proactive decisions that are grounded in data, without the need for deliberation and lengthy discussions.  

Not all business intelligence solutions are created equal

Any BI tool is only as good as the insights that are delivered. Many RMS’s and BI tools can be time consuming to learn and clunky to use - negating the gains in efficiency a BI solution is used to deliver in the first place. What you need to look for in a BI tool is a straightforward user interface and intuitive reporting.

Optimal display of data

Unnecessarily complex platforms can restrict productivity and result in job dissatisfaction. An easy to use BI solution will make revenue managers feel at ease and confident using the platform, which in turn will accelerate productivity and enhance decision making. This is where Revenue Insight excels, seamlessly integrating into your team’s day-today by leveraging and visualising hoteliers’ granular PMS data in a simple and straightforward, action orientated dashboard. The layout of data and insights is displayed optimally, so you can monitor performance with just a few clicks. 

Simplistic and intuitive reporting

Simplicity of reporting is another indispensable benefit of integrating a BI tool into your tech stack. Revenue Insight pulls the data directly out of your PMS and then standardises reporting, which makes the data far more usable for fellow commercial teams, saving valuable time when coming to crucial business decisions. 

Revenue Insight’s key reports such as channel type performance and room type performance are automatically built into the tool, resulting in complete data accuracy and time no longer spent on building manual reports. Mary Jane Hannah, VP of operations and Project Management at Days Hospitality, commented that, “Revenue Insight has slashed the time we spend on reporting and data collation by a minimum of 100 hours per hotel every year.” After using Revenue Insight for 60-days, David Gill, Director of Revenue Management at the Silverado Resort in Napa Valley said, “We can see operational hard dollar improvements in time. I have a revenue analyst that no longer has to put two hours into building a report.” 

How much time are you saving?

Looking at our Revenue Insight ROI Calculator, the industry average time spent on PMS reporting, including: pace from yesterday, pick-up and pace for the next 90 days, 90 days OTB pickup and segment forecast report, and revenue meeting reporting; amounted to 175 minutes per day. But when using Revenue Insight for only 33 minutes per day you can eliminate 162 minutes per day that was previously spent on PMS reporting. This equates to 14 hours a week of time saved. This totals out to 54 hours a month or 81 working days a year that you can get back to focus on actual revenue management!

Why not try out the ROI Calculator for yourself and see how much time you could save?

Conclusion

Business conditions are still unstable and difficult to predict. Now is the perfect time to embrace technology and integrate a BI solution. You will get a clearer picture of your hotel’s performance - saving valuable time on reporting and decision making, which can then be used to get more revenue out of every room. In this hyper-competitive landscape where you have to fight for every single booking, extra time focusing on strategy to drive profitability is worth its weight in gold.