Forecast

overview

Controlling defines the goal of forecasting like this: By generating information, deviations from planning should be identified at an early stage in order to develop measures to close these target gaps and make adjustments.

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There are forecasts for entire markets, locally speaking for individual cities, for example. Or industry-specific for holiday or city hotels. In addition, and this is probably the most important thing to mention here, can (and should!) Each hotel has its own sales/occupancy forecast.

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The following applies to all types and areas of application: The forecast is always calculated on the basis of the past and determines demand in the future.

For years, forecasts in hotels were mostly created using Excel tables. The better organized you were, the more data could flow in. Today, almost every PMS can provide hotelier with very simple occupancy forecasts. This is usually done via export to Excel or directly as reporting. But that is not enough in revenue management.

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What all forecasts have in common is that they address the question of which factors will influence demand. And which business can be expected for which period of time.

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Operational and strategic

For the hotelier and also the Revenue Management Two types of forecast are important: strategic and operational.

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The strategic forecast plans the future financial year with a calendar that shows holidays, trade fairs, events, etc. The basis for this is the booking behavior of the last year or the last few years — the history. Bookings that have already been made are also taken into account here. The potential demand is thus determined from available data.

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This makes it possible to develop action plans for specific periods of time.

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In the operational forecast, the strategy is “implemented”. This forecast is constantly being adjusted. Data for this comes, among other things, from the Pick Up Report. Booking behavior is monitored (sometimes on a daily basis), and marketing and sales measures are included here. How often you adjust the operating forecast and what goals you set exactly will certainly depend on the type and size of your own hotel. In addition to occupancy and room price/expected turnover, RevPAR and ADR defined as a goal.

Importance and digitization

Finally, it can be said that a forecast is of course always a prediction and therefore says more about what is highly likely to happen than what actually happens.

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Digitalization has helped that large amounts of data can now be processed more easily and that no one has to fill out Excel tables by hand anymore. With the help of modern forecast tools, many other factors can also be incorporated into the forecast. This plays a major role, especially in times when a lot is changing and — not only due to the corona pandemic — forecasts are becoming increasingly difficult. The more factors, trends and insights are included, the better the outcome of the forecast.

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