Inside the mind of a 6 star resort General Manager

The only person who thinks more about the travel experience you aspire to – and more often – is the general manger of the hotel which hopes to provide it. In Australia, one of the people who’s been thinking hardest about the luxury market during the last decade is Joost Heymeijer, General Manager, Wolgan Valley Resort and Spa.

He speaks to John O’Neill.* (This article was first published in SPRING 2011 edition of Australia's Luxury Travel Magazine)

When Emirates Airlines determined to spend what became more than $100 million to create Wolgan Valley Resort and Spa, a luxury resort near Sydney in Australia’s Blue Mountains, it was taking a 50-year view of its relationship with the country and its appetite for luxury.

“We looked at what happens in South Africa where investors work closely with national parks to provide an incredible wildlife experience; where it’s not all glitz and glamour. People come back and say ‘that was extreme luxury’ and they actually slept in a tent,” explains Joost Heymeijer, General Manager, Wolgan Valley Resort and Spa.

“We looked at how it is that a small country like New Zealand, with a population of five million, can have such an array of incredible lodges and what it is that they do that makes guests come back time and again. We looked at what Aman resorts do: luxury based on an incredible location.”

Heymeijer, formerly of Hilton Hotels, learned that whatever the location, “when people from the luxury segment come they want to engage and leave with an experience they can’t get at home.”

Heymeijer says his guests are typical of the luxury segment – “they trust us with their time. “We provide an experience which is quintessentially from that area – food from that area, nature-based, something we can be ambassadors of ...”

Aman Resorts has pioneered the model.

“Including the Aman junkies, they now have a 300,000 mailing list that on average visits two properties a year. They have openings around the world in wonderful and weird locations – Croatia, Greece, Turkey and the new Amangiri in Utah.

"Guests get an experience and genuine cultural interaction they wouldn’t normally get at a five-star hotel.” In terms of trends, Heymeijer says “sustainability is huge. I don’t know if it’s a trend or more of an awakening.”

To be discrete is to be successful. “We don’t want to be the hotel that says ‘Kylie Minogue stayed here’ or ‘Russell Crowe had a great time’. We warrant exceptional luxury and privacy.

“We host not just the celebrities in sport, movies and music, but also people from the business world.

“[Our staff] treat our guests like they are your parent’s best friends. When you do that it doesn’t matter whether you are Rupert Murdoch or a guy who arrived in Australia from Lebanon 20 years ago and have done tremendously well in construction.“

“We profile our guests. We have an exceptionally good guest profile system and we know what they like and don’t like. If we don’t know them, we Google them to learn about who they are.”

Nevertheless, the biggest challenge for Wolgan Valley and luxury operators in Australia more generally is the dramatic shift in the global economy, exchange rate and locus of wealth and power.

“We don’t get a lot of Arabic guests but if we do we know not to throw one of our six course degustation menus at them because they won’t eat it. We know to sit down and say what would you like to eat, is it a simple grilled fish?” he explains.

“Americans – we cook the living daylights out of the bacon in the morning because if it isn’t burnt to a crisp they don’t like it.

“When I wrote the business plan six years ago the dollar was 55-65 cents and now it’s $1.10.

“For me the percentage should be 60 per cent to 70 per cent international and at the moment its 20 per cent. They’re not there. And Australians at an exchange rate of $1.05-1.10 have got choice. They can stay three nights at Wolgan or fly seven nights to Fiji or Bali or Hawaii."

*John O’Neill is chairman of Luxury Travel Magazine’s advisory board and Managing Director of the digital marketing agency Komosion.

Luxury Travel Magazine's Chairman's Lounge: Ralph Norris

I interviewed Ralph Norris for the January-March 2011 edition of Luxury Travel Magazine. Here's the article, as published (the magazine includes an accompanying picture of Ralph in his office):

Ralph Norris, the chief executive of Commonwealth Bank, may have earned $16.2 million in the last year but, when it comes to travel, Australia’s highest paid executive has subtle taste.
“I’ve just spent a week at Kruger National Park on the border of Mozambique,” he says. “The animals were the stars of the show. We got to see the leopards and the lions and elephants and giraffes in their natural habitat.
“And it was very environmentally structured accommodation. If they ever took it down you wouldn’t see any sign it had been there.”
Norris says, first and foremost, he likes to make sure “that I’ve got a good bed and food that’s edible”. “I’m not into over-the-top luxury but something that’s comfortable,” he says, also citing Six Senses Vatulele Island Lodge in Fiji as a “good example of understated luxury”.
Norris is as literate as any destination marketer in the world of tourism and travel, courtesy of an unusual detour on what has otherwise been a lifelong career path in banking.
The detour was his appointment in February 2002 to the role of chief executive of Air New Zealand, a position he held until becoming Commonwealth Bank’s CEO in September 2005. Bankers are as notoriously risk-averse as the tourism and travel industry is risky, so how did such a divergence, after 29 years in banking, come about?
The answer is almost by accident, or, as he puts it, as a consequence of a “confluence of events”. “During my last five or six years as CEO of Auckland Savings Bank I chaired Tourism Auckland,” Norris explains. “As a result of that, I became a director of Air New Zealand. “After the Ansett debacle [its 2001 collapse and that of Air New Zealand with it] forced Government recapitalisation of Air New Zealand I got the opportunity to become chief executive primarily, by default. It was very difficult to fi nd anyone who was willing to risk their reputation in such a difficult set of circumstances.
So why did he? “I saw that very much as being a contribution to New Zealand,” he says. “If I could bring some expertise to help resuscitate the airline I saw that as something worthwhile doing. In New Zealand, the economy has a very strong contribution that comes from tourism.”
As a result, Norris has thought deeply about the tourism successes of his native New Zealand and pondered the travel and tourism market in Australia. He has been surprised at the limited offering in the luxury segment in Australia when compared with New Zealand. Australia, he says, has five times the population of New Zealand and an average income that is probably 25 to 30 per cent higher.
“So, if you looked at some of those numbers as to how New Zealand is able to sustain all of those [luxury] lodges - I would suspect pretty close to half the people that visit those are locals, or a significant proportion, I think there is a strong market here in Australia to tap.”
So why does Norris imagine Australia has not yet catered to the luxury marketplace to a greater degree?
“I think a lot of players in Australia want to play the scale game. When you look at the beaches, the climate, those natural endowments that travellers like, I think the focus has been much more of the style of the large hotels of a Las Vegas or Florida.”

RALPH’S FAVOURITES …

WAIHEKE ISLAND, OFF AUCKLAND:
“I’ve got a property on Waiheke. I’m very fortunate. We’ve got our own private bay. There are more than 50 vineyards on the island. If you want to go to a good restaurant, try Mud Brick. What a fantastic view back to the city. Te Whau’s got great architecture. It’s on a point, very high, with the best wine cellar of any restaurant in New Zealand and the food is extraordinary.

CINQUE TERRE ON THE ITALIAN COAST: “Magnificent weather, walking the coast, looking at the way the local olive growers and grape growers effectively grow their crops on a vertical plain - stress the vines and you get great wines.”

... AND HIS BUCKET LIST

ANGKOR WAT IN CAMBODIA:
“To go and see something that was built one thousand years ago and be there in the early morning in the mist, there’s an ethereal quality that’s been described to me and it’s something I’d like to experience.”

ROUTE 66 FROM LA TO CHICAGO:
“Even though I’m told it’s overrated, I’d like to drive it. I remember the old Route 66 TV program when I was a kid back in the early 60s, two guys driving it in a Chevy Corvette.”

Komosion opened its new office in Melbourne last week

Broadband, cloud computing and smart phones

The reasons for my being upbeat are really sort of twofold," says Accenture’s Country Managing Director for Australia and New Zealand, Jack Percy.
"One is that the Australian economy is doing a lot better than other Western economies around the world, and is doing pretty well on an absolute basis as well as doing very well on a relative basis.

"In addition to that, the convergence of three components of technology that, over the years, have been developing but are not at a level where they’re coming together in a way that can really transform the way technology’s used to drive business.

" Those three things are almost ubiquitous, almost unlimited broadband; the development of cloud computing, which in effect means the almost unlimited access to processing and data storage capacity, from anywhere in the world, and then the third thing is the intelligence that exists in the new smartphones.

"I mean, the obvious one that is really taking off now is media, but there are opportunities for almost every business to look at how that convergence of those technologies can really transform the way that they reach their clients and the way that they communicate between themselves."

- interviewed for the Qantas inflight program Talking Business.

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER - KOMOSION

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER - KOMOSION

COMPANY BACKGROUND:

Award-winning digital marketing and website software publishing company Komosion is looking for a Sydney-based Business Development Manager.

Komosion aims to ignite people’s experience of the digital world with creative and technical solutions supported by software that makes digital marketing easier.

Komosion has high-profile and supportive owners, directors and management with whom you will get to work closely. You will also be provided with significant formal training and career development opportunities.

The company has been recognised as one of Australia's smartest and fastest growing businesses.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

* Establish, qualify and nurture new sales opportunities through a sales funnel with leads to meet sales targets
* Identify & gain access to appropriate senior-level decision makers to gain sales
* Translate the business needs of potential clients into solutions through Komosion’s offering
* Demonstrate and present the company’s products and services to potential clients
* Represent and promote Komosion within the digital and IT industry more generally
* Provide weekly & monthly sales pipelines & projections
* Report to Head of Sales and manage staff and assume delegated authority as the company grows

KPIs:

* Secure new clients and generate sales and services subscriptions to agreed targets
* Ensure each new sale is profitable, in line with company guidelines

REQUIRED SKILLS:

* Tertiary qualified in a business or marketing discipline with four plus years experience in a sales or new business role in Digital or a related industry field.
*A strong understanding and passion for the Digital and IT industries - you need to understand Web Dev & the Digital space
* Full of energy, with self motivation & results driven
* Solid hands-on skills in Word, PowerPoint & Excel
* Experience responding to RFPs
* Ownership and responsibility with a strong client focus & ability to build long term relationships
* Exceptional people management skills and a passionate team player
* Ability to communicate and work with people in a multi-location business.
* Demonstrable business acumen, analytical and negotiation skills
* Excellent verbal and written communication and impeccable presentation skills
* Excellent attention to detail

COMPANY OFFICES:

Komosion has offices in Sydney and Melbourne (www.komosion.com).

START ASAP:

Please respond to recruitment@komosion.com with

1) A short cover letter outlining your recent sales successes and why you would be the ideal candidate for this role

2) Your Resume

Seeking Senior Digital Creative

Digital agency Komosion is looking for a Sydney based Senior Digital Creative to lead and manage its creative team. This person loves technology, usability and is fascinated by the ever changing landscape of the internet and digital marketing.

You are a problem solver and have the ability to work with clients to help them deliver their messages to their customers with compelling and award winning creative. Your an engaging and energetic person, not only in your personality but with your work ethic and style.

You will be responsible for the creative output of Komosion, creative staff in Melbourne and Sydney, contractors and creative processes as well as the quality of client projects.

Your responsibilities include:
• Directing the creative team so that the environment, culture, capabilities, processes, expectations, work style and other elements support the strategic goals of Komosion
• Ensuring the high quality of creative is upheld, maintaining consistently high standards for him/herself and other members of the team.
• Deliver cutting edge designs for a variety of clients & across various digital media
• Deliver online solutions, visual and functional designs and concept development
• Liaising with new and existing clients
• Managing outside resource including freelancers, partners and contractors
• Supporting other areas of the business through preparing job estimates & assistance with tender responses

What we're looking for:
We are looking for creative professionals who are design focussed, commercially minded, passionate and knowledgeable about the web. You will have experience and skills in the following areas:

• Solid commercial agency experience as a digital art director / senior designer
• Strong online visual design experience spanning customer facing websites, intranets and other online solutions including websites, EDM's & social media channels
• User centric design ability & strong understanding of information architecture
• Capable of owning a problem and working with minimal supervision, as well as working within a team
• Writing and presenting cohesive and persuasive rationales for concepts
• Good fundamental design skills, evidenced by relevant online portfolio of past commercial projects

Company Description
Komosion is a digital marketing and website software publishing company with offices in Sydney and Melbourne (www.komosion.com).

Please email your resume to recruitment@komosion.com

What's informing Komosion's thinking?

Here are five facts or insights which illustrate what's informing Komosion's thinking:

1. The head of Australia’s largest media agency, Harold Mitchell, described the growth of online as “phenomenal” with its share of total ad spend reaching 25% by 2013. "It took TV 25 years to get to around 20%-plus of all ad dollars, but what happened with the Internet was amazing, because at the end of 2008 it was at 14% and by the end of this year it will be over 20% (of total spend)." (March 23, 2010, B&T)

2. Budget airline Jetstar has revealed it is shifting up to 40% of its marketing budget to social media and online in the next financial year. (March 23, 2010, B&T)

3. Interactive marketing agency leaders excel at Innovation, Integration, and IT. They use technology as one of their foundations and prefer relationships to campaigns.

4. Data knowledge is key to strategy. Customer and other analytics provide insights to create business value

5. Digital organisations can enable and/or provide solutions tailored to specific business objectives. This can include marketing oriented solutions to increase the revenue for a specific product line or self-service solutions designed to increase profitability.