Grow your Hotel Business with BarterZone Trade Dollars
Friday 19 February 2010, 9:50AM
835 views
Owning a hotel or motel can be quite stressful and it can seem as though new hotels are opening everyday. It’s not enough to offer the best service and comfort anymore so it is becoming more and more important to keep your hotel in the limelight. Advertising is one of those things that can help, however, this can require a lot of investment with no guarantee of a return.
Hotels also have constant expenses which cannot be cut down on even during the low
period of tourism so it is very important to reduce costs and utilize the available resources to the fullest.
Some strategies that you can adopt are:
• Trade unoccupied rooms for advertising: if you have rooms which are sometimes
unoccupied you may be able to trade them for advertising space in newspapers,
billboards, magazines, television and radio. By creating a marketing campaign
centered around your strengths, and doing so with BarterZone Trade Dollars, you are likely to attract more guests without putting cash at risk. Like any other marketing initiative, however, a BarterZone Trade Dollar-funded program requires strategic planning and precise implementation and monitoring.
• Use unused resources: Even if your hotel is always hundred percent occupied there
are lots of other resources which are often undervalued that could be sold through BarterZone Trade Dollars.
For example:
Conference rooms, gardens, ball rooms or restaurants. The conference
halls can be rented for conferences to different business in exchange for the
materials or services that you need for the smooth functioning of your hotels. The
restaurants and gardens can be hired out for weddings or parties or functions.
Hence, you will be able to tap profits from what you already have with no further
investment.
• Rent out shops within the premises:
Renting out retail space to businesses which are compatible with the ambience of your hotel within your hotel can be a good way to attract attention and provide a better “overall” feel to your facility. By creating innovative BarterZone Trade Dollar arrangements with these tenants you could turn some under-utilised
space into a new in-hotel winery which, in turn, can pay you with wine for your own
restaurant. You could also consider renting out space to a tour-guide company who
could offer a fixed amount of tour-packages to you every month in payment. If
neither of these options seems viable you could always consider renting space via a
barter exchange or Commerce Network who can structure a multi-way barter deal
whereby a third party pays you for the space in printing, laundry services or building maintenance – things you need every day simply to open the doors of your hotel.
• Trading with travel agencies:
Most people don’t have time to plan their own holidays so they use travel agencies. By entering into strategic relationships with national and international travel companies according to which they will promote your hotel to their clients in-turn you offer their clients special discounts. This is profitable at both ends. As its helps you reach you to your prospective customers and as for travel agencies, it helps them provide their customers better packages at more competitive prices.
With effective planning you can barter your unused resources for goods and services as well as advertising.
Creativity with BarterZone Trade Dollars = Profit
Creativity consists largely of rearranging what we know in order to find out what we do not know. Hence, to think creatively, we must be able to look afresh at what we normally take for granted.
So use what you have in a creative way to get what you want: Profit.
Please feel free to contact me with any questions on how your business can benefit by becoming a member of BarterZone Ltd .
Terry Cuthbert