Chris Anderson is a professor at the Cornell School of Hotel Administration. Prior to his appointment in 2006, he was on faculty at the Ivey School of Business in London, Ontario, Canada. His main research focus is on revenue management (RM) and service pricing. He actively works with industry, across numerous industry types, in the application and development of RM, having worked with a variety of hotels, airlines, rental car and tour companies, as well as numerous consumer packaged goods and financial services firms. Anderson’s research has been funded by numerous governmental agencies and industrial partners. He serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Revenue and Pricing Management and is the regional editor for the International Journal of Revenue Management. At the School of Hotel Administration, he teaches courses in revenue management and service operations management.
Segmentation and Price Optimization
COURSE OVERVIEW
Segmenting your customer base is critical to developing a variable pricing scheme. By identifying core groups of customers and their purchasing habits, you can target them accordingly by setting prices that will help you win their business over your competition. Without proper segmentation, however, dynamic pricing can backfire, which can alienate consumers and turn them into perpetual deal-seekers.
This course expands upon the central concepts in revenue management—RevPAR (Revenue Per Available Room) and RevPASH (Revenue Per Available Seat Hour)—with the goal of selling the right room or reserving the right table for the right person at the right time. Get your organization properly managing inventory and using market-based pricing to maximize revenue.
If you can achieve a workable segmentation and variable pricing scheme, you won't need to adjust prices as often. Many hotels and hospitality organizations have used stable prices to create a marketing advantage, by providing stable rates for customers who appreciate consistency. Finding the right mix in variability and stability in pricing, and setting upgrade policies, are what generate repeat business from happy customers and create an environment for sustained profitability.
- Make smart pricing decisions based on market segmentation
- Evaluate the relationship between segmentation and discounting
- Understand variable versus dynamic pricing
- Predict the diluting impact of poor segmentation
- Use inventory management, price optimization and market-based pricing techniques
- Develop an upgrade policy, and evaluate its marginal value
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