MarketScale Hospitality 02/13: Finding the Right Rewards Formula

 

There’s no magic bullet for success in the hospitality industry. The challenge is finding the correct combination of the right ingredients. This is true whether you’re running a restaurant, hotel, or airline. On today’s episode of the MarketScale Hospitality Podcast, we take a look at the recipe for success in both restaurants and reward programs.

A DASH OF SOCIAL ATTENTION WITH TWO TEASPOONS OF DATA

Some of the most closely guarded secrets in the world are food recipes. (Take a certain “military” man’s zeal at protecting that combination of 11 herbs and spices for over 85 years. That’s dedication.) There are, however, other types of professional recipes that are common knowledge, but they’re challenging to execute properly. That’s where David Scott Peters, the founder of TheRestaurantExpert.com, lives.

“If you don’t have passion, you’re out. If you do, you’re gonna learn some expensive lessons, but you’re ultimately there to take care of the guests and that’s going to bring you success,” Peters said. On today’s podcast, Peters discusses finding just the right balance of social and professional energy in a restaurant, how low unemployment affects the industry, and how a relatively recent social behavior complicates staffing.

WHAT IS THE SWEET SPOT FOR REWARDS PROGRAMS?

In his latest piece as part of his Office Hours series for MarketScale, Dr. Michael McCall assesses the challenges that rewards programs face as they move forward. He raises three specific questions for companies to consider when it comes to these types of programs. MarketScale Chief Digital Editor Geoff Short joins this episode of the podcast to help explore these questions in more detail.

“It’s not enough to just have a rewards system. You have to engage with the customer,” says Short. What this engagement looks like, along with the need to determine what behaviors are deserving of rewards, are two of the major questions facing companies with rewards programs.

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