SHAIP010 - On-Campus Capstone - Advanced Hotel Revenue Management

Course Description

This session takes place June 13-16, 2022 on campus at the Cornell Hotel School in Ithaca, NY. Sessions run from 8:00am-5:00pm ET each day.

Days 1 and 2: Strategic and Competitive Pricing

Revenue management has historically been focused inward; you’ve used historical transaction data to generate a forecast and manage prices and inventory. As information has become more readily available, you need the ability to more directly model and take into account the pricing and inventory actions of your competitors when contemplating revenue management decisions. In this intensive session, you’ll take a strategic and competitive look at revenue management and pricing decisions with a focus on both understanding the reactions of others as well as how to use today’s tools to make pricing and inventory decisions to drive profitable revenue. Using a strategic pricing simulation, you’ll develop an understanding of the interplay between pricing and digital marketing in competitive markets and refocus your efforts on profit versus revenue.

Days 3 and 4: Driving Profit Through Performance and Demand Management

Defining the “revenue performance” of a hotel has traditionally involved a series of benchmarking approaches like comparisons to last year; budget; forecast; and, of course, the competitive set. As the discipline evolves, performance metrics need to evolve as well. Metrics such as RevPAR Index will likely remain crucial for the foreseeable future. That said, the role of revenue management is to make tactical and strategic decisions to further the goals of a hotel or set of hotels, and these goals extend far beyond revenue maximization; in fact, some of these goals are actually counter to revenue maximization. In this session, you’ll examine the often-competing goals of customer acquisition, customer retention, engagement and loyalty, and channel choice, along with the corresponding revenue management approaches. You’ll also examine a “balanced scorecard” approach, which presents a much more comprehensive assessment of revenue performance. You’ll leave equipped with the tools to excel in today’s more active revenue management environment.

Faculty Author

Benefits to the Learner

• Develop a fundamental understanding of competitive pricing
• Examine the role of segmentation in an effective revenue management and distribution strategy
• Explore the dynamics of revenue versus profit optimization
• Analyze the moderating role of digital marketing in low-demand environments
• Review the importance as well as the limitations of “traditional” revenue metrics
• Utilize today’s forward-looking demand signals
• Practice balancing competing priorities and their associated metrics

Target Audience

• General managers, revenue managers, marketing managers, and other hospitality professionals who are responsible for the financial performance of their organization