How HSMAI Helps Hotel Sales, Marketing & Revenue Commercial Leaders - Bob Gilbert, HSMAI

Josiah: My goal with Hospitality Daily is to help you perform at your best as a hospitality professional. And my guest today is Bob Gilbert, the president and CEO of HSMAI, the Hospitality Sales and Marketing Association International. In this episode, you'll hear more about their mission, how they stay relevant and useful over time and around the world, and how the association can help you as you build your career, making you more effective and a better contributor to the company and people you work with. 

[intro music]

Bob: Back in 1927, the association started when a number of what was called hotel sales promotion people at the time got together and would talk about the ethics of how they were promoting hotels. And out of that came the evolution of sales managers, and through the 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, the organization grew. Of course, the industry was mostly independent hotels at that time, and it grew globally. Then franchising came in, marketing came in, and revenue management came in. And I think one of the things that's kept the association relevant is our ability to change. When I started, I hate to admit it, but almost 30 years ago, we didn't even have a website or email back in 1995. So you think about just what the internet did to the hotel and travel industry. And then you look at what's changing loyalty programs. And now you look at the mega brands. Today, we're talking about AI and how it's going to change what our stakeholders focus on, both from a consumer search perspective and how they find processes and do things more efficiently in terms of what they do in sales, marketing, revenue optimization, and distribution. So, 100 years is going to be a fun milestone. We're going to be celebrating that in a big way in 2027. Our foundation, or the philanthropic arm of HSMAI, has already started a century campaign to raise capital for the future. But we're excited about 2027 and celebrating in a big way in all of our regions around the globe.

Josiah: Well, I wonder if we could break down some of the factors that help you stay resilient and relevant globally in a quickly changing world. One of those that stands out is how much you engage the industry, specifically through volunteers and councils. I wonder if you could speak to that briefly about how you stay relevant and engage the industry structurally.

Bob: Well, for all associations, there's an old adage that's been around forever, and that's think global and act local, right? That's not anything really new. But the reality is that those who practice it, I think, are the ones who find success and relevance. Whether you're a hotel brand, you're a technology company trying to grow globally. or you're an association like HSMAI. And so our regions in Europe, the Middle East, Latin America, Asia-Pacific, and then here in North America have all found success in talking to key stakeholders from hotel brands, management companies, and ownership groups. listening and distilling down what their needs are into a strategy for that particular region. And then, of course, we tie it together globally through conferences and membership and things like that that we have in common. However, some people think associations just have this massive amount of staff, like the corporate headquarters of an association. Most associations don't, right? We're a non-profit. We have a very small staff. But we lean in heavily to volunteer leaders that are on the front lines of what our stakeholders need. And so through different advisory boards, subject matter experts, we're able to really listen to their point of view, get behind the scenes of what's keeping them up at night, and come up with solutions and best practices that are relevant to them. Associations are never going to help a company define a specific strategy, but we're going to talk about the pros and cons of doing this versus that, sharing best practices, and everybody learns something from that process. I think the most exciting change we've had recently in terms of our volunteer structure is we've introduced what we call rising leader councils. So this is that under-30 demographic that's so important to everybody in the industry today to make sure you understand who they are, how their point of view is different, and how they feel about working in travel and hospitality. And I think we've all learned from listening to the points of view of these rising leaders, how they see sales, how they see marketing, how they see revenue optimization, how they see distribution. And that's helped our regular advisory boards by listening to these under-30 demographics, and it's also created a sub-community just for that age demographic, where they can share in a safe space their challenges and hurdles, or where do they think they found a glass ceiling, or how do they deal with this issue or that issue. So I think that's been exciting. So that's another whole dimension of our volunteer structure that's added breadth and depth to what we do.

Josiah: I'd like to follow up on what you just said there and get your thoughts on what you are hearing. It could be for that under 30 Rising Leaders Council or just in general from these advisory boards. You've been running this organization for a while, and I'm curious: What is at the top of people's minds right now? What are they thinking about? What are some of the priorities that you're hearing?

Bob: Well, we sort of bucket those ideas into our core mission is how to grow the business at hotels through sales marketing and revenue optimization, right? That's our core mission. And so while we certainly advocate for all the commercial functions of the interdependency they have with each other. We still break down each bucket because you have to respect the science of selling, right? And the science of marketing and the science of revenue optimization. That's how our advisory boards are structured in each region around the globe. But I can tell you things like, for example, the sales advisory board. I mean, just how selling has changed through omnichannel selling and how they're measuring attribution and changes in B2B sales. These are things keeping them up at night, as well as AI and tech. customer demands, how commercial strategy is impacting their need to interact with the other commercial disciplines, the economics of selling, how there's much more focus on ROI now than there was maybe five or ten years ago. One of the common denominators between all of the disciplines we're seeing is AI and, not surprisingly, talent, which is another one. Our marketing advisory board continues to monitor the evolution of something you know well, and that's all things digital, SEO, and how to get more direct bookings to hotels. They're looking at channel optimization, which isn't anything new, but that in and of itself is a massive science these days. A lot of digital marketers invented the whole concept of ROI, but now they're changing the narrative from the return on ad spend to other aspects of ROI. They're also looking at the rising acquisition costs and budgetary constraints of that. I'm not surprised for anybody in the hotel industry that the middle of the P&L, if you will, for the average hotel, has become a huge pain point for a lot of owners today. So everybody's looking at all those types of things. You know, marketing folks are also looking at regulations around customer data, data privacy, dealing with the issues of managing all the different brands, dealing with the swings in customer demand, cultivating loyalty, all those things fall into the marketing bucket. And the third and final major bucket that we focus on is revenue. And there, certainly, total revenue optimization is something Revenue leaders have been talking about for a long time, but there's probably never been more focus on ancillary and total revenue optimization than there is right now. But revenue now has a seat at the table, right? So they're learning across the other disciplines of sales and marketing. They're also dealing with AI and talent. Owners, particularly management companies and brands, deal with multiple asset managers to make sure they're aligning with that owner's expectations. And then they've got to deal with the day-to-day issues, whether it's demand recovery, alternative lodging competition, consumer behavior, the fractured stated distribution. I mean, I go on and on. I mean, there's a long list of issues. that each of these groups of subject matter experts are monitoring for us, and that's where content generation comes from the association perspective because these advisory boards are constantly sharing points of view that we publish and helping design educational programs and things that are really relevant for HSMAI. So that's a long way to go, but it's a big question because each one of those has its own set of unique challenges and issues they're trying to stay focused on.

Josiah: I love it. And one of the items that you mentioned there was talent. I wonder if you could speak a little bit to the talent mission that you have, the foundation. You do a lot of work in this area. Tell our listeners a little bit about HSMAI's talent mission. Where are you focused and why?

Bob: We have, like many associations, a foundation, which is the philanthropic arm of the association. And our foundation's mission is all about how do we attract, develop, and engage talent. Very simple. So we look at those three pillars of how we build that pipeline, develop the pipeline, and engage people currently in sales, marketing, and revenue positions currently. And so that's really a fun group of very passionate people around talent, where the association's really the educational arm. That's what core associations do that are professional societies like us. But the foundation has a number of initiatives that they do, ranging from some research. We just commissioned an exciting project on AI and the impact it's going to have on talent in the future. on how to use source or recruit talent and those types of things. We also work with a lot of the hospitality schools globally. We've identified faculty that teach a sales marketing or revenue class in these schools because we really want them to be our ambassadors. We have scholarships and grants that identify students and give them mentorship. But one of the signature items that the foundation produces every year is an annual state of talent report. And that's really unique. That's never been done before in our swim lane of sales, marketing and revenue.

Josiah: What do you think it takes to succeed in hospitality today? If you had to generalize, are there traits that come to mind for you?

Bob: Well, I think in the commercial space, which is our specialty, right? Sales, marketing, revenue, distribution, loyalty. It's like a broken record when it comes to that. A lot of people get into the industry, they say, oh, it's because I love people and love travel and so forth. Yeah, that may be a side. gig or benefit of this industry, but to be successful in an industry where the landscape continues to change very rapidly in all of the commercial functions, people have to have, number one, I think, that inquisitive nature we talked about. Number two, they've got to have a commitment to lifelong learning and education. Nobody is ever going to walk into a job and know everything they're going to know about that job or about that company or what they need to do. You've always got to have that lifelong learning for education. And I think the successful companies realize that the more they engage their associates in other industry events and other industry education programs, And I'm not just talking about conferences HSMAI does or our certifications or things like that. Those are examples. There are lots of other ways to do that locally or regionally. But get yourself in a community with subject matter experts similar to what you do, whether it's what you do in another industry or in hospitality. But just get out of your bubble. You've got to have that inquisitive nature and the desire to be a lifelong learner. And that's going to be good for the individual personally, good for the individual professionally, and it's going to be good for your company. And I think more and more companies are embracing what they need to invest in terms of development for their people more than ever before. So, certainly capture that opportunity. And if somebody's stuck in a company that doesn't have that culture, and they're just not going to invest in their people, then candidly, you may be very well at a dead end, and it might be time to move on.

Josiah: Yeah, something to think about. I'm curious what you're seeing or hearing that excites you the most. You have this global perspective, you see a lot, you've been watching trends over time. What gives you the most hope, either broadly in hospitality or specifically in the commercial function that you're seeing unfolding right now?

Bob: Well, I think that the one thing that's most exciting right now is that, and this is almost a byproduct of the pandemic because we've been talking about it for years, right? We've talked about the silos. Again, I'm speaking in our space, sales and marketing revenue. For years, we've talked about the silos that exist within those departments or those teams or those people. In the pandemic, it came in and it leveled them in most companies. And so it's the interdependency now that people have come to benefit from and realize how critical it is for them to communicate on a regular basis and to have maybe a commercial leader now, you know, the number of titles we're seeing in our membership that are now a chief commercial officer. I forget the statistics, but a year ago, we realized that grown like tenfold in the two previous years. So somebody coming together, making sure they're on the same incentive plan, they've got aligned objectives and so forth, that's transformational within an organization. And people that have that commercial alignment I mean it's been proven through research that they're more profitable, they're customers, they have a higher customer satisfaction rate, they have a higher retention rate. We did a whole program on this a couple of years ago, looking at the key drivers in a commercial organization whose commercial functions are all aligned. One of the resources we published just recently is actually a self-checklist that companies can go through and assess themselves on the 12 key drivers in a commercially successful organization. But the core answer to your question is I think the excitement is the elimination of those silos. has led to this commercial centricity now that everybody's focused on because they realize the synergies, time savings, and economic savings of being aligned strategically to move an organization forward.