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SWOT Strengthens Ties Between Greece’s Small Hotels and Industry Professionals

By Nikos Krinis

SWOT CEO George Constantinides.

SWOT CEO George Constantinides.

Hospitality consultant Simple Way Of Tourism (SWOT) recently held the 1st Forum for Small Lodgings in Greece in an effort to bring the country’s small lodgings in direct contact with travel agencies and hotel suppliers to expand partnerships and boost sales.

The forum, organized for the first time in Greece, followed SWOT’s Business Travel Professionals Forum (BTPF) series that focuses on building bridges between large hotels and Greek and international travel agencies and airline companies.

“The 1st Forum for Small Lodgings in Greece came as a natural continuation of our larger BTPF events… We wanted to give the opportunity to Greece’s small accommodation units to come in contact with the market, to discuss and to develop partnerships,” SWOT’s CEO George Constantinides told the Greek Travel Pages (GTP), adding that the initiative will be repeated as participation numbers revealed the necessity of such events for the industry.

“The response and demand for participation of tourism professionals, showed that this event should be established annually and we will carry this out since the purpose of the forum is to help Greek small lodgings, which form the backbone of Greek tourism, to come into direct contact with the market and expand their partnerships to increase their annual occupancy numbers,” an announcement by SWOT said.

In total, 25 hotel enterprises that represented 37 hotels had enrolled in the forum and held over 700 B2B meetings with some 80 travel agencies and more than 30 suppliers of hotel equipment and products.

The 1st Forum for Small Lodgings in Greece also included a very informative seminar entitled “Direct Sales in the Hospitality Industry” which included presentations by SWOT, Webhotelier, the Greek Travel Pages (GTP) and Mysterious Greece that aimed to give the owners of small hotels tips on which sales techniques to follow in order to receive more publicity and attract more visitors.

Greek Tourism 2017

Constantinides agrees with the encouraging forecast on incoming tourism to Greece in 2017.

“What we see through our hotel members is that 2017 will really be a good year for Greek tourism,” he said.

“However, we hope that the increase in arrivals will go even further and show growth in turnovers, as many times more tourists does not always mean more revenue,” Constantinides underlined, adding that the industry must be on alert and make efforts to achieve higher revenue figures. “But the messages are positive and we are optimistic.”

Launched in 2013 by a team of respected Greek tourism professionals, Athens-based SWOT specializes in the fields of Hospitality Management, Sales Representation in Greece and abroad and Marketing for tourism enterprises.

“Our activities are constantly in the direction of developing tourism in a simple way, which is what our initials stand for,” Constantinides said.

SWOT’s next action will come on November 2 with the organization of the 5th Business Travel Professionals Forum (BTPF) in Athens which once again will be focused on boosting the business of Greece’s large hotels.

The company is also planning to hold seminars to help in the promotional efforts of Greek tourism enterprises in Greece and abroad and will also attend local and international tourism trade shows.

GTP was a media sponsor of the 1st Forum for Small Lodgings in Greece.

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