From knowledge sharing to 'moments of truth'

The marketing concept of 'The Moment of Truth' refers to the decisive moment when customers come into contact with a product, brand or service and form an opinion that influences their buying decision. The members of the Belgium Hospitality Club pool their knowledge and experience to maximise the capture of those decisive moments in the hospitality industry. Co-founder Filip Helssen explains how this club came about and what its strengths are.

Underlying the creation of the Belgium Hospitality Club is the Master of Marketing at Tias, the Business School of Tilburg University, which Filip Helssen started in 2016. As the business manager of the IT company Coriotech, he wrote a thesis in 2018 on the factors that influence the purchase of technology in small and large hotels. "With my thesis, I wanted to investigate how you as a supplier - with the customer journey as a framework - acquires insights about customer needs as efficiently as possible and contacts customers during their moments of truth. In other words, how do you reduce acquisition revenue by timing it right to approach customers?"

One of the success factors for achieving this objective is to collaborate with other suppliers to gather as much valuable commercial and other info on customers and prospects as possible. "When you join forces as a supplier with players from other industries, you create leverage to open doors with customers and prospects at the ideal time," Filip points out. "With Coriotech, we offer IT infrastructure, while other companies provide specific software, sanitaryware, room furniture or food. With the creation of the Belgium Hospitality Club, we launched a platform to work together, in order to build qualitative and sustainable relationships with joint hospitality customers."

That launch happened in 2019, just before the corona pandemic broke out. "Immediately after the kick-off, I managed to get the first partners on board, including hotel software supplier Stardekk, electronic locks and furnishing supplies provider Axcess, software developer TS Software and interior design specialist Pomax," Filip points out. "During the pandemic, our networking activities were on the back burner, but anno 2023, the Belgium Hospitality Club has grown into a close-knit club of 25 members who meet at about four events a year. Every quarter we foresee a partner or customer event, as well as participation in the Horeca Expo trade fair."

One of the strengths of the Belgium Hospitality Club is its diverse membership base. "Our members are literally from all markets," Filip points out. "Industrial laundry, sanitaryware supplier, manufacturer of waterproof building elements, software supplier to even a law firm. Each member unpacks its own expertise. What is unique about our network is that there are no competitors among ourselves. As a result, we exchange information, hot leads and ideas openly and transparently, without hidden agendas. And also important: as founder, I closely monitor the quality and commitment of the members. Those who cut corners as members will irrevocably fly out."

The Belgium Hospitality Club is much more than just a platform for knowledge sharing. "Based on thorough data management and artificial intelligence, we want to link the databases of as many club members as possible, creating a powerful tool to generate leads and boost our sales productivity. After all, every member has valuable customer info. By matching all this data, we get an enriched database that as a whole is more than the sum of its parts. Pooling this info requires leadership and direction, but that effort is more than worth it."■