How Pricing Manager streamlines pricing effortlessly and saves time for independent hotels

Time is your most valuable resource as an independent hotelier. There are only a certain number of hours in the working day, and it’s important to dedicate them wisely. When your daily to-do list is as long as yours inevitably is, there’s got to be a compromise somewhere.

Or does there?

You're juggling guest check-ins, managing staff, and overseeing maintenance issues all while ensuring every guest has a memorable experience. Amidst these critical tasks, finding the time to monitor and adjust room prices can feel like an impossible feat.

The reality is that setting the right price requires constant vigilance, deep market insights, and timely adjustments - tasks that can easily consume your entire day.

But what if you didn't have to compromise? What if there was a way to manage your hotel’s pricing strategy efficiently without sacrificing other important aspects of your hotel operations?

Well, there is!

Pricing Manager is a powerful tool designed to minimize the time and effort needed to set the right price for your small hotel - giving you time back in your day to focus on other priorities.

As your pricing co-pilot, Pricing Manager lets you easily automate pricing. It provides tailored and transparent pricing recommendations, that reflect the unique characteristics of your property, while still giving you complete control of this critical aspect of running a hotel, by letting you set the rules.

Pricing Manager

• independently generates 365 days of optimal rates for your hotel based on market demand, competition and more

• can automatically send these rates direct to your booking channels

• allows you to easily adjust rules and shape your strategy, without having to adjust price by price

• get started quickly and easily, without the need for expertise or training

• even offers a free trial so you can understand the benefits before you commit

The importance of data in pricing your hotel room

At the heart of all decision-making in hotel revenue management, is data and analytics. But, how long does it actually take you to adjust your pricing every day?

For many hoteliers, the answer is far too long!

You’re already stretched thin, balancing all sorts of responsibilities that crop up each day. Keeping an eye on market trends, assessing competitor rates, and adjusting your pricing strategy can often seem like a luxury. Yet these tasks are critical for staying competitive and maximizing revenue.

The daily struggles of independent hoteliers

Consider your daily routine: your attention is constantly pulled in different directions from the moment you start your morning staff briefing; there’s meeting and greeting guests, check-ins, check-outs, room turnovers, walkthroughs, and that’s before you’ve had a chance to tackle the mountain of administrative tasks that come with running a small hotel.

Bombarded with so many priorities, the thought of dedicating precious time to monitor and tweak room prices seems almost laughable.

Yet, that’s what running a successful hotel requires.

Why dynamic pricing matters in the hotel industry

Why does this matter though?

Take your peak season. Perhaps in times gone by, you have stuck to a static, seasonally-based pricing strategy.

It’s worked before, why change it?

But what if you moved beyond just high versus low seasons and weekdays versus weekends? Continuously adjusting your hotel room rates to match demand means you could make more from every available room during high-demand periods and, importantly, avoid underpricing them during those peak periods.

By the same token, during low-demand periods, when your priority might be to simply cover costs, you can be more strategic with your discount rates and promotional strategy which will help to stimulate demand.

By always pricing correctly, relative to the available demand, you can ensure your hotel is competitive all year round, and that you are maximizing your room revenue potential, and avoiding a low-season panic situation when you see you are performing below your budget.

The complexity of setting the right price

However, setting the right price is more complex than just keeping an eye on your competitors. It requires a thorough understanding of market conditions, seasonal trends, and specific factors affecting your property.

This complexity can be overwhelming, especially when, in all likelihood, you don’t have the resources that those larger hotels enjoy - like a dedicated revenue manager, focused solely on setting and managing rates to maximize occupancy and revenue, aided by advanced analytical tools to make data-driven decisions and employ a dynamic pricing strategy.

Independent hoteliers, on the other hand, often face the daunting task of doing it all themselves. And manually.

As if it wasn’t challenging enough, maintaining competitiveness in today’s market requires (almost real-time) access to the freshest pricing data.

According to Lighthouse research, the global rate of price changes has jumped by 20% since 2019, and hoteliers are employing more than double the rate codes they used to in 2019!

Running a hotel, no matter how big, has become not only more time-consuming, it’s become a whole lot more complex.

Embracing automated solutions in the hospitality industry

That’s why an increasing number of accommodation owners are turning to automated solutions.

Thanks to advancements in technology, automating your pricing is now universally accessible (and affordable) for properties that historically, haven’t had the resources or the in-house expertise and know-how to handle this task.

The overarching aim of hotel revenue management - which is to sell the right room, to the right customer, at the right price, and at the right time, through the right distribution channels - hasn’t changed.

Fortunately, with technology as your co-pilot, you can now ensure it’s done the right way: effortlessly and efficiently.

Quick and easy onboarding with Pricing Manager

The transition to automated pricing might seem daunting, but with Pricing Manager, it’s a breeze.

At Lighthouse, our focus is on making the onboarding process as smooth and straightforward as possible, so you can start reaping the benefits right away.

From the moment you log in, you’ll be able to start automating your pricing strategy for every single day in the next 365 days.

You'll be greeted by the calendar view (showing the whole month), displaying your current prices, recommended rates, and the prices of your competitors, as well as other key information, such as upcoming events, and holidays.

The calendar is color-coded for ease of use, allowing you to quickly identify issues and effortlessly hone in on opportunities.

Your hotel, your rules

Instead of digging through rates data, your hotel data, your competitor pricing and market data, and historical data to understand to make sure you are selling at the right rate, Pricing Manager brings all these data points together into a recommended price point that you can either act on, by accepting the recommendations, or automate.

Your hotel, your rules.

When it comes to pricing your inventory, you should have clear insights into how and why a pricing recommendation was made, much like you would from a colleague handling your room rates.

Pricing Manager lets you spot, control and automate the optimal price point for your hotel, effortlessly and efficiently.

Detailed insights with Pricing Manager

When you hover over any date on the calendar with the Pricing Manager tooltip, you can instantly see why that pricing recommendation was made.

This includes occupancy, performance against forecast, competitor price changes, booking pick-up, and additional context like local events and holidays - all the variables that revenue managers use when changing a price.

Perhaps your on-the-books for that particular date is lower than forecasted, for example. Or other properties in your compset are pricing lower than what they typically do in an effort to drive pickup to their property, rather than yours. These factors, along with the rules of engagement you have set (such as specific thresholds for weekdays or weekends) help to recommend the optimal price point for any given date in the future.

Effortless efficiency with Autopilot

Once integrated with your PMS, Pricing Manager ensures your room rates are always in sync with current market conditions so that your pricing becomes more dynamic, responsive, and aligned with your business goals.

To make optimizing your pricing even more efficient, by switching on Autopilot, Pricing Manager automatically pushes its recommendations to your PMS (provided it's integrated with Pricing Manager).

This automation ensures your prices are always up-to-date without you having to lift a finger, allowing you to focus on other important aspects of your hotel operations.

Every hotel is unique, and so are its pricing needs. Need to keep control over specific days? No problem.

Autopilot can be customized to skip Fridays and Saturdays, or any other days you choose, ensuring that you remain in control of your pricing strategy.

This flexibility means you can manage your rates effortlessly, tailoring them to your specific needs.

For example, you can set specific conditions for when prices should be updated. You might want Autopilot to only send new prices through if the recommended rate differs by at least 10% from the current one, or if your occupancy (OTB) is at a certain threshold.

This ensures that price changes are meaningful and impactful, helping you maintain competitive rates without constant manual intervention.

By leveraging Autopilot’s customizable settings, you can optimize your pricing strategy effortlessly and efficiently, yet still retain full control with a simple click of a button when quick adjustments are needed. You can also disable Autopilot for specific dates directly from your calendar, giving you the freedom to adapt quickly and efficiently.

Future-proofing your hotel with ease

Transitioning to a more efficient and effective pricing strategy doesn’t have to be daunting. With Pricing Manager, the process is simple, and the benefits are immediate.

With minimal training required, it’s never been easier for small independent hotels to turn guesswork into revenue growth. Whether you’re a tech-savvy professional or someone who prefers straightforward solutions, you’ll find that Pricing Manager meets your needs.

Our comprehensive tutorials and best-in-class support team ensure that you can confidently manage your pricing strategy from day one, freeing up your time to focus on delivering exceptional guest experiences and driving your hotel’s success.

Whether you’re dealing with market fluctuations, seasonal demand, or varying booking patterns, Pricing Manager helps you make data-driven decisions, and automate the mundane task of implementing a pricing strategy that adapts to market conditions. This proactive approach ensures that your hotel remains competitive, profitable, and ready to meet the demands of today’s guests.

Ready to take control of your pricing strategy? Get started with a free trial of Pricing Manager today and discover how effortless and efficient hotel revenue management can be.