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A wellness concept as extensive as the one implemented by the Falkensteiner Balance Resort Stegersbach is very cost-intensive. For this reason, it’s all the more important to ensure capacities are utilized well at all times so that this area can remain profitable. The hotel’s spa facility must, therefore, earn a sales revenue of at least 1,300 Euros a day. Despite a top-class reputation and strong online presence, only 40 percent of spa bookings are made in the lead-up to a stay.
The other 60 percent is made during the stay. Last-minute cancellations, making up between two to five percent, also inhibit continuous use at full capacity and therefore jeopardize profitability.
This is frustrating in two senses: Vacant appointments not only mean lost sales revenue, but they’re also a missed opportunity to convincingly showcase the overall concept to guests through top-quality treatments.
Classic advertising materials such as various stand-up displays at other hotel outlets, advertising in hotel lifts, a daily guest newspaper, and information material in rooms were used to drive the spa area’s inhouse sales. This involved considerable expense for the hotel, which cannot be directly allotted to spa sales revenue. It also means changes to the spa services or promotions take a long time to implement.
As a result, the hotel reflected on the following questions:
The hotel has used SuitePad since 2013 as a targeted communication tool to increase capacity usage at the Acquapura Spa, instantly inform guests about vacancies and services based on the wellness facility’s available capacities, as well as to stimulate sales.
The focus here was on the two measures below:
The Acquapura Spa was prominently and attractively incorporated into the digital guest directory by making the information space or “tile” larger than the other tiles on the SuitePad and positioning it in the top left corner. This instantly draws a viewer’s attention to this tile. The hotel also uses attractive images in an image slider, which sees pictures regularly rotate through the slide to show several initial impressions of the wellness facility. An “eye-catcher” stating “Request treatment here” also informs guests of the option of booking spa treatments directly.
In terms of content, all of the Acquapura Spa services were included and split into categories to give guests a clear overview and thus systematically steer them to the desired treatments. This approach also enables sales-related sections, such as “Top sellers” or “Special Acquapura Balance massages” to be created to communicate promotions or signature products in a targeted manner.
Each treatment is created as an “object” in the respective category. This object is a box showing the name, duration, and price of the treatment. If interested, the guest can open this box to receive more details about the treatment. The treatment descriptions have been written in cooperation with Acquapura Spa Manager Michaela Hösch to ensure guests are informed as authentically and competently as possible.
If convinced by this product presentation, hotel guests can request the treatment directly. The request will then be immediately processed by the spa reception and confirmed if there is availability.
The spa staff at the Falkensteiner Balance Resort Stegersbach send push notifications through the SuitePad Content Management System (CMS) to promote particular treatments or available appointments. An effective mix of one-off and regular push notifications has been created here. Guests receive these notifications as pop-up windows on their SuitePad and can open these to learn more about the offer and book it directly.
One-off notifications are sent randomly to guests by the hotel in cases of last-minute availability. The hotel uses the appointment-push function here — as this can provide the available appointments and relevant treatments; enabling guests to book the appropriate appointment directly.
Regular push notifications have been created to communicate recurring offers and services at set times. The hotel optimized this by analyzing the times of page views, which showed that a large part of the traffic on the spa tile came after 8 pm, as guests gradually returned to their rooms after dinner and started planning their activities for the next day.
As such, a page-push relating to the Acquapura Spa is sent to all guests every evening from 8 pm to directly generate interest in the spa and provide additional information on appealing treatments.
1. Based on notification type
2. Based on recipient
3. Based on message frequency
Between May 2016 and April 2017, an average of 9,000 page views per month were recorded on the SuitePads. Of these page views, approx. 19 percent were for the Acquapura Spa alone. Almost a fifth of all page views were for aspects relating to the spa, massages and beauty treatments.
The aforementioned use of push notifications also helped to achieve a positive result overall. For example, for the period from May 2016 to April 2017, an average of 51 push notifications relating to the Acquapura Spa were sent to guests every month. A total of 40 bookings could be attributed directly to this push-marketing strategy. Another reason the use of SuitePad is particularly successful is that 60 percent of all requests are made during a guest’s stay, meaning capacities which become free at short notice, and which would otherwise be impossible to sell, can be filled.
Overall, the Falkensteiner Balance Resort Stegersbach was able to secure 257 extra bookings within a year, as a result of the more coherent design, the clear logical structuring of the wellness treatments and the use of push notifications.
This meant EUR 20,774 in additional sales revenue for the hotel between May 2016 and April 2017 alone.
Of particular importance to the Falkensteiner Balance Resort Stegersbach is the fact that the hotel has increased capacity utilisation at the Acquapura Spa and can also keep boosting the already consistently high level of satisfaction among its guests.
