For many revenue managers, digital media still sits firmly on the marketing side of the business. But digital media for revenue managers is becoming increasingly important as the lines between revenue, distribution and marketing continue to blur.
Revenue manages rates, forecasting, pace and channel mix. Marketing manages campaigns, audiences and media spend.
But the guest doesn’t experience those things separately – and neither does your hotel’s revenue.
The channel a guest books through affects your cost of acquisition, the value of that booking and the relationship you have with that guest. That makes digital media more than a marketing activity. It’s another lever within your wider revenue and distribution strategy.
That’s why Revenue by Design and Amadeus Hospitality created The Revenue Manager’s Practical Guide to Digital Media: a practical playbook to help revenue managers understand where digital media fits into their role, work more effectively with marketing teams and make better-informed decisions about profitable demand.
Download the Practical Guide to Digital Media
Start with the cost of the booking
Revenue managers are used to evaluating channel performance, but there’s an interesting difference in the way we often think about OTA and direct acquisition costs.
OTA commission is generally accepted as a cost of sale. Digital media spend, however, can find itself scrutinised as a marketing expense.
The playbook uses a simple example to show why that distinction matters.
Imagine a hotel generated £4 million through OTAs from approximately 5,850 bookings, with an average booking value of £684. At a 15% commission rate, that’s around £600,000 in OTA commission.
Now consider what happens if just 7% of those bookings – 409 bookings – move to Brand.com.
Using the assumptions within the guide, that could generate:
- £42,000 in commission savings
- £41,718 in additional revenue from higher-value direct bookings
- £83,718 in total additional value
The point isn’t that hotels should abandon OTAs. They remain an important part of a balanced distribution strategy.
It’s that direct acquisition deserves to be evaluated as a revenue decision too.
Why revenue and marketing need to work together
Revenue teams have booking data, pace, ADR, occupancy, lead times and channel performance, while marketing teams bring insight into audiences, campaign performance, media spend, conversion and ROAS.
Look at either dataset in isolation and you’re only seeing part of the commercial picture.
Bring them together and you can start asking much more useful questions.
If Thursdays next February are looking soft, for example, revenue can identify the need early enough for marketing to act. A particular feeder market performing strongly could present an opportunity to increase demand. And if OTAs are capturing demand that could potentially have converted directly, both teams can see it and respond.
This doesn’t require another enormous meeting in everyone’s diary either.
The playbook recommends a 45-minute monthly Revenue + Marketing review, using a shared dashboard and a consistent agenda covering performance, opportunities and the next 30–90 days.
The principle is simple: revenue brings the demand and booking intelligence; marketing brings the tools to reach and influence the right audiences. When those two things are connected, campaigns can become more closely aligned with the hotel’s rate and revenue strategy.
The digital media metrics revenue managers need to know
Getting more involved in digital media doesn’t mean revenue managers need to become digital marketers.
You don’t need to know how to build a Google Ads campaign or become an expert in paid social. You do need enough understanding to ask the right commercial questions.
Four useful metrics to start with are:
- ROAS – Return on Ad Spend
How much booking revenue is being generated for every pound spent on advertising? - Cost per booking
What does it cost to acquire a direct booking through paid media? - Conversion rate
Of the people who respond to the campaign, how many go on to book? - Media spend
How much is being invested to generate that demand?
These aren’t simply marketing metrics. Put them alongside ADR, channel mix, booking pace and cost of sale and they become part of a much wider commercial picture.
Amadeus, for example, provides hotel-specific digital advertising reporting including bookings, revenue, ADR, conversion rate, ROAS and cost of sale, allowing campaign activity to be connected back to hotel performance.
You can learn more about Amadeus Digital Advertising for Hotels and its approach to using hospitality data and digital advertising to drive qualified traffic and direct bookings.
Build the business case in revenue language
If there’s an opportunity to invest more in direct acquisition, the conversation with a GM, owner or finance team shouldn’t begin with clicks and impressions.
It should begin with cost, return and profit potential.
The playbook sets out a straightforward five-step approach:
- Understand what you’re currently spending on OTA commission.
- Estimate what could happen if a proportion of those bookings shifted direct.
- Model the potential return from digital media using an appropriate ROAS.
- Start the conversation three to six months before budget season.
- Keep the business case simple and commercial.
That’s a very different conversation from asking for a bigger “marketing budget”.
You’re asking a commercial question:
Could we invest differently to acquire more profitable business?
Digital media is part of a bigger shift in revenue management
Ultimately, this isn’t really about turning revenue managers into marketers.
It’s about recognising how much the revenue role has expanded.
As Ally Northfield, Managing Director of Revenue by Design, explains in the guide:
“Revenue centricity is the new way of working for revenue managers.”
That means looking beyond a narrow focus on rooms and rates to understand the different factors influencing total revenue – including distribution costs, digital marketing performance and how demand is being generated.
Revenue doesn’t need to take over marketing, and marketing doesn’t need to take over revenue.
But both teams need to understand what the other is seeing.
Download The Revenue Manager’s Practical Guide to Digital Media
Revenue by Design and Amadeus Hospitality created The Revenue Manager’s Practical Guide to Digital Media to give revenue managers a practical starting point.
Inside, you’ll find guidance on understanding digital media as part of your revenue toolbox, the metrics revenue managers need to understand, creating a monthly Revenue + Marketing review, identifying opportunities to drive profitable direct demand and building a commercial case for digital media investment.
There’s also a practical Revenue Manager Digital Media Checklist and plain-English glossary you can use with your own team.
Ready to put it into practice?
Download the free Practical Guide to Digital Media
Created by Amadeus Hospitality and Revenue by Design.
