MANILA, Philippines — With the pandemic still significantly challenging the hospitality and tourism industry, several sales and marketing leaders in the Philippine travel and tourism industry pivoted their services to focus on pandemic response.
In view of this, the annual Virtus Awards, launched by the Hotel Sales and Marketing Association last June 15, likewise said it would focus its traditional categories on the pandemic response of the businesses.
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Virtus Awards, now on its seventh edition, recognizes the most exceptional hotel marketing professionals in the country.
It has traditional four category awards with one being the special award.
'Resilience in business'
During the hybrid tradition last year, the hotel group’s traditional categories honored the performances of sales and marketing leaders in the hospitality industry pre-COVID times. To honor the industry’s efforts amid the pandemic as well as their strategies to cope with the health crisis, the group last year introduced a special award called the “Champion of Resilience.”
Margie Munsayac, HSMA board chairman, however, said that for the seventh year, they would merge traditional awards with last year’s Champion of Resilience Awards and focus these to the pandemic response.
The three individual categories would cover not only the HSMA members’ performance but also their initiatives, projects and endeavors that reflect their innovative strategies.
But apart from this, the HSMA would be introducing a special award called “Resilience in Business” awards to combine the traditional categories and last year’s special award.
“This is actually an update of last year’s Champion of Resilience team category where this time, HSMA will honor member properties that are agile and responsible practices for long-term operational ‘Resilience in business’ during the COVID-19 pandemic. Second, their properties that act for better success,” Munsayac said during the launch.
Munsayac also said that the creativity of hotel sales and marketing professionals in mitigating the economic impact to the properties brought about by the crisis and the marketing campaign which is the team award “will also cover marketing campaigns that engage the public, customers and effectively reconnecting the business with its clients and customers whose patronage have been disrupted due to the pandemic.”
In line with the new category “Resilience in Business,” the HSMA came up with a tagline “Snap out of COVID-19".
This means “Survive, Neutralize, Adopt programs” which would help bring the property to where it is now and where it is headed.
Rose Libongco, Virtus Awards chair, said the hotels adopted it since the beginning of the pandemic. She added that housing essential workers such as health workers, BPO workers and the acceptance of airline passengers and overseas Filipino workers have become the natural markets of the hospitality industry amid the pandemic.
“Hotels became safe houses. They are located very near hospitals,” she added.
Likewise, some members launched creative online sales to keep the business afloat.
Munsayac, meanwhile, said the inclusion of the special award “Resilience in business” in future editions of Virtus Awards will still depend on the tourism landscape for next year.
“We will see if it will evolve into a yearly recognition,” the hotel group’s chair said.
“It’s still subject to a lot of assessment if and when we will already be transitioning to a new normal by 2022,” she added.
Why enter the competition?
Virtus chair Libongco said that they updated the special awards as members of the HSMA remain resilient amid the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Through it all, the members of HSMA persevere and chase dwindling shares amidst the challenges of higher operating costs to abide by the required protocols and diminished revenues due to restricted markets. HSMA remains bullish and positive throughout 2020 and initiated projects that kept many properties afloat and retained staff for their valiant efforts,” Libongco said.
“It is but fitting that these courageous hoteliers in sales and marketing be recognized,” she added.
Libongco then encouraged HSMA members to field their candidates.
“The heads of sales and marketing departments should form a committee composed of the hotel's executive team to choose their nominees and work together to accomplish the nomination form,” Libongco said.
“Why enter the competition? For starters, fielding your associate sets the signal to all employees that you value hard work and dedication and instill in them the desired behaviors. Having a candidate puts your brand out there, and eventually emerging as a winner will speak volumes about your work ethics and service delivery to set you apart from the competition,” she added.
Tourism Promotions Board Chief Operating Officer Maria Anthonette Velasco-Allones lauded the hotel group for raising the bar high in the hospitality and tourism industry.
Prior to the launch of Virtus 2021, the HSMA started accepting nominations last May.
Deadline of nominations submission is on August 31 this year and the HSMA will judge the entries online on September 25.
The HSMA said the awarding ceremony would be held on October 26.