Last year, Jurys Inn published results from a study into whether we are at risk of losing the art of communicating face-to-face. The study concluded that today’s business leaders should take responsibility to ensure that the next generation learn how to conduct meetings both face to face and over the phone to ensure a productive and profitable outcome.
Practising what it preaches
Since those findings were revealed, the company has seen a significant increase in its corporate bookings which Head of Sales, Marc Webster, attributes to the company practising what it preaches.
Along with considerable investment placed in upweighting the sales teams, much emphasis was also placed on the importance of increasing face-to-face meetings with clients as well as attending more trade shows. The results speak for themselves with bookings from local businesses alone having doubled.
Success of face-to-face
Says Marc Webster: “Over the last two years, we have been looking at how best to structure our sales function and we have invested considerably in ramping up the team at grass roots level and improving efficiencies and productivity. As a direct result we saw our sales team improve client activity by 30% which resulted in a 17% year on year increase in direct and managed corporate business which now accounts for 50% of room sales across the Jurys Inn Group. We are very pleased with this positive growth and we attribute much of this success to our teams getting out and meeting our existing and new clients face-to-face.”
Jurys Business Booker
The sales teams have also been encouraging clients to use Jurys Business Booker, an online tool which offers an easy to use platform for managing corporate hotel requirements.
Jurys Business Booker, which this month rolls out a new improved look, allows corporates to access both their negotiated rates as well as any available promotional rates real-time. They also receive instant booking confirmation, reporting tools for tracking travel spend and will now benefit from new features, which include free Premium WiFi upgrade for all bookings, as well as the ability to earn and redeem loyalty points
13% revenue increase for Jurys Meetings
Jurys Meetings has also performed well with the company seeing a 13% rise in revenue since the product launched in 2012. The company attributes this to the great value, inclusive day delegate packages as well as to the introduction of dedicated Events, Meetings and Sales Co-ordinator roles now reporting into the Sales Managers providing a more cohesive approach.
Says Marc Webster: “We are now a far stronger team and our aim is to continue to build on the successes of 2013 and look to grow our corporate and meetings business by a further 14% over the next year.”
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