How Affixify can save your hotel thousands in the tech buying process

The adoption of new technology is crucial for creating efficiencies and enhancing your guest experience. Guests expect a seamless stay from the time the book to the time they check out (and hopefully, return again). Everyday, technology changes and new technology is introduced. How can hotels focus on providing the guest experience and keeping up on technology while it evolves so rapidly?

This article explores how optimizing this process can lead to substantial cost savings, using the average salary for a hotelier as a benchmark.

Tech due diligence : a collaborative effort

The tech due diligence process in a hotel involves multiple stakeholders, including C-levels, IT managers, operations managers, and finance personnel. Each role that will be using new technology to serve their guest should provide input on the features required. Their combined efforts ensure that the proposed solution aligns with the hotel's operational goals, budget constraints, and guest expectations. Here's a breakdown of the typical time investment based on our own survey recently conducted.

Team Members Involved in tech decisions: ~5 people
Time Spent Compiling Requirements: 3 hours per person, minimum
Total Time Invested:~15 hours

How much does that cost?

According to Lodging Magazine, the average hotelier’s salary is $72/hour. So let’s do some simple math. Based on this average, what is the cost of the tech due diligence process for one individual decision?

Average Hourly Wage: $72
Total Cost for 5 Team Members to conduct initial due diligence: $1,080 (5 members x 3 hours each x $72/hour…)

And, remember, a tech stack that can include up to 50+ systems…You start to see the steep cost of tech adoption.

What comes next?

After compiling the features needed, hotels typically proceed with sales demos from 1-3 companies. Each demo provides insights into how the technology can meet their needs and improve their operations. What if you knew what the technology provided before you chose to meet with them? Keep reading.

Before the demo can be tailored to the individual hotel, the software provider must first review the requirements that the hotel put together. This stage is crucial for making informed decisions, but it also adds to the overall time and cost involved in the RFP process.

Assuming each demo takes about 1 hour and involves the same team members:

Total Time for 1 Demo: 3-5 hours
Total Time for 3 Demos: 9-15 hours

The cost for attending demos, based on the same hourly wage of $72, can reach over $1k per tech decision. And that’s not counting the demos thereafter for other key stakeholders and team members.

Combining the costs of building out feature requirements and attending demos, the total investment in the RFP process can exceed $2k per tech decision, and our guess is these numbers are low.

Affixify saves time, and it saves money. How does this impact you?

Affixify was built on the idea that there had to be a better way for hoteliers to make technology purchasing decisions. Here are some tips on how we can help alleviate many of these costs and simplify the process.

Feature Library: Affixify has a pre-built feature library for each of our software categories. This saves you tremendous amounts of time. Instead of having to build your own excel spreadsheet of requirements, we’ve done the hard part for you. Who knows, maybe you’ll even find some new features you need but didn’t even know existed!
Validated Features: Each of the features in the Affixify library have been validated with the vendor prior to being available to hoteliers. What does this mean? That you can trust that the features available are in fact ready to be used within the software providers platform. No roadmap development items allowed here.
Clear Expectations: Because of our feature-first approach, Affixify allows the hotelier to see which features are a match for each software vendor and which features did not match. One of your must-haves didn’t match - maybe choose the next vendor on the list.
Hotelier Control: We know the sales demo process can be time consuming and sometimes frustrating. Affixify lets the hotelier remain in control of how many vendors to reach out to, when to initiate the conversation and remains available if you’re not quite ready to chat with anyone yet.
Cost: Did we mention Affixify is currently complimentary for hotels to use. While we cannot eliminate all costs involved in a new technology purchase, we can certainly enable a more cost-effective way to find the provider you’re looking for.

So what does this mean for you?

The RFP process is an essential part of integrating new technology into hotel operations. By understanding the time and cost implications, hotels can identify areas for improvement and implement strategies to streamline the process. Using Affixify is a key way to find substantial cost savings, enabling hotels to allocate resources more strategically and focus on what they do best - serve the needs of the guest!

By using Affixify, the feature requirements stage of the buying process does not look as daunting. The cost-savings alone could allow you to throw a celebration with your team once you implement the new tech you bought!

About Affixify

Affixify is a technology due diligence platform designed specifically for hoteliers. Our platform helps hotel professionals quickly and efficiently compare a wide range of technology vendors to find the best solutions for their unique needs. With an unbiased approach and a comprehensive database of hotel technology platforms, Affixify ensures that hoteliers can make informed decisions and select the right technology to drive their business forward. We understand that no single solution fits all, and we’re here to help you find the perfect tech fit for your hotel. To learn more, get in touch with us at www.getaffixify.com