Ever been sent a message or an email that said something along the lines of “Hey, great to connect. My company is featuring the top 50 entrepreneurs in your industry and we think you’d be a great fit. Can I send you more info?” Initially, this sounds great. Even an honor to be included! Only to find out, this isn’t a true “top 50” at all…This is a paid marketing opportunity. Pay us, and we’ll feature you. If you have, you’re not alone. Pay to Play is everywhere and it goes well beyond the scope of hospitality. It can be seen in virtually every industry across every demographic.
Similarly, have you ever used a software review or search platform, and wondered how the vendor that contacted you was “matched” to your hotel or business? Then you realize: they weren’t deemed a real match for you at all. They were simply the highest bidder. Unfortunately, this is the ecosystem that so many face when making software decisions for their hotel: the higher the budget, the more in-your-face the vendor can be. And, while being in front of you at the right place at the right time isn’t necessarily a bad thing (marketing 101), there is very little evidence that those vendors paying the most money are truly the best fit for YOU and your business needs.
Advertising vs. Marketing
Ok so isn’t pay-to-play just a good advertising strategy? In this case, we aren’t comparing apples to apples. According to Forbes, there’s a key difference in pay-to-play versus paid advertising “On the surface, pay-for-performance is similar to advertising, which involves brands buying spots on TV, social media and print but with a slight difference: It's usually not disclosed as such. Instead, pay-to-play frequently misleads the audience and, sometimes, the company into believing it's legitimate press…Pay-to-play can be especially risky considering companies struggle with consumer trust in a post-pandemic world”.
There is that tricky trust topic creeping in again. The truth of the matter is- the more our industry engages in pay-to-play tactics, the further we will get to building a bridge of trust between buyer and seller.
How we are bringing change
When Affixify was founded, the initial model was that a vendor would receive a hotel lead, and pay for it. As we dove into the landscape that hoteliers are facing today- as are many businesses searching for new tech- we eventually realized that this model wouldn’t work. Why? Because it creates more distrust.
If we are going to exalt big change in a space that is dealing with heavy pay-to-play issues, our only choice is to run the other direction. So what are we doing? First and foremost, we made the decision to at this time remain free for hoteliers to use. Period. And for our vendors, we determined the better way was a flat subscription model, for unlimited hotelier conversations. We ditched any semblance of “pay to play” in favor of a consistent and predictable fee with value in return.
So why is this important enough to write an article about? Transparency. We aim to be a safe space for both vendors and hoteliers to find the best partnerships for them. And the very first step in that is to create trust, by eliminating any opportunity for one player to have advantage of the other. If a buyer (hotelier or otherwise) is matched to a software provider using Affixify, it’s because the match is the best fit for them- not because someone paid us more.
Do you have an experience- bad or good- with pay to play models in hospitality technology? We’d love to hear it! Reach out to us at sales@getaffixify.com and let’s chat more.
So long for now,
Team Affixify
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