Hotelbeds are the world’s leading Bedbank, redefining how accommodation, transfers, activities and car rental products are distributed to a global network of travel distributors.
“The reason we chose SBR was because it felt like a partnership approach. We could trust them, open-up and explore new things. SBR did a great job delivering content in different languages all over the world, and in a short space of time. Hotelbeds have had a multi-million Euro uplift in sales as a result.”
Sam Turner, Sourcing & Sales Director of Hotelbeds.
WHAT ISSUES WERE THEY FACING?
After appointing a new Sales Director, Hotelbeds conducted an internal diagnostic of their sales function to determine if the quantity and quality of sales activity was sufficient to achieve their ambitious growth aspirations.
They realised that they needed to transform their sales culture and capability in terms of how they manage and engage with clients and how they have performance conversations with their internal teams.
In order to develop a world class capability in these areas they recognised the need for external support to transform effectively and at speed. SBR were introduced via referral as a potential partner who could support their development and proceeded to analyse, align, co-create and roll out parallel workstreams to achieve these outcomes.
THE RESULTS
As a result of applying the process, consultative sales methodology and tools that SBR developed across key sales opportunities and accounts, Hotelbeds achieved a multi-million Euro uplift in sales. In addition, the integration of 2 significant acquisitions was made easier through having a defined competency framework against which to map talent. Finally, sales activity tracking is now seen as a development tool to understand what’s working and what’s not working enabling the effective deployment and development of sales resource to maximise growth.
SBR’S APPROACH
SBR aligned with the current state through shadowing sales teams, exploratory workshops, surveys, and 1:1 interviews. Working with key stakeholders (regional leaders and top performers from the SLT level downwards), SBR co-created a sales playbook, sales competencies and development programmes that focused in Sales Effectiveness and Performance Coaching for sales leaders. In phase 1 these programmes were rolled out globally to 300 salespeople and 50 sales leaders across the retail and wholesale arms of the business.
SBR sold the value of change internally and supported the team through the mindset and capability shifts required to help them recognise the value of using data to identify development areas in themselves and their clients, and then apply the behaviours that would make them more effective as consultative and insight-led salespeople.
The Performance Coaching programmes focused on building the line manager capability to support and develop their teams and ensured alignment with the sales frameworks that had been introduced.
The initial phase was followed up with a further roll out to over 1000 of Hotelbeds buying function over a 6-week window. These sessions were delivered across the Americas, EMEA and APAC in multiple languages.
