Customer relationship management (CRM) software for the hospitality industry helps hotels, bed and breakfast homes, restaurants, and event venues market operate their businesses. Hospitality CRM systems come equipped with features for obtaining online customer reviews and guest surveys, scheduling reservations, and deploying automated marketing campaigns. The best leisure and hospitality software includes those capabilities and other essential CRM features.
We evaluated dozens of hospitality CRM systems small businesses can use and identified the top eight providers:
- Best for online bookings: HotelRunner
- Best for short-term rental or vacation house owners: Guesty
- Best for luxury hotels: Revinate
- Best for Salesforce users: Hapi Guest
- Best free hospitality CRM: Freshsales
- Best central data management platform: dailypoint
- Best for managing overall hotel operations: Guestware
- Best for hotel performance monitoring: innRoad
Featured Partners: Customer Relationship Management Software
Best CRM Software for the Hospitality Industry Compared
Provider | Free Plan? | Our CRM Rating Out of 5 | |
---|---|---|---|
Custom pricing | ✕ | 4.92 | |
$7 per listing, per month | ✕ | 4.53 | |
Custom pricing | ✕ | 4.47 | |
$4.80 per room, per year | ✕ | 4.40/5 | |
Free to $9 per user, monthly | 4.34/5 | ||
Custom pricing | ✕ | 4.32/5 | |
$112 per month | ✕ | 4.24/5 | |
Custom pricing | ✕ | 4.10/5 | |
HotelRunner: Best Hospitality CRM for Online Bookings
Pros
- Powerful booking engine with online payment integration
- Advanced built-in online marketing, analytics, and reporting tools
- AI-powered reputation management capabilities
Cons
- No phone and live chat for customer support
- No option to upsell or upgrade rooms
- Lacks transparent pricing
- You need to add a seamless booking engine: Hotels can connect their websites to their HotelRunner inventory and display their rates and room availability in real time. You can integrate payment systems into your hospitality website for reservations with security, speed, and reliability.
- You need robust marketing, analytics, and reporting tools: HotelRunner has advanced online marketing, analytics, and reporting features that enhance your hotel’s online performance and increase bookings. It also has reputation management capabilities powered by artificial intelligence (AI) technology that generates personalized responses to guest reviews within seconds.
- You need a free account for your startup: HotelRunner offers a free account for small to mid-sized hospitality companies. This customer relationship manager (CR) for hotels offers free and premium channels to boost sales and online presence. The channel manager connects these sales channels in a centralized platform to manage rates and availability.
- You need a CRM that supports your upselling efforts: While HotelRunner has an excellent booking engine, marketing automation, reputation management, and guest surveys, it lacks features to upsell/upgrade rooms.
- Alternative: Revinate allows you to create targeted upsell/upgrade offers for rooms and amenities, promoting higher guest return rates and converting guests who started but didn’t complete bookings.
- You want to use a CRM solution with transparent pricing: If you’re time-constrained and have to make a decision on which CRM solution to use, the lack of transparent pricing may be annoying. While it’s not exactly a deal-breaker for many, some businesses put more trust in CRM providers that put up their plan costs.
- Alternative: Freshsales offers transparent pricing. It offers a free account, a starting plan at $9 per user, per month billed annually, and high-tiered plans.
HotelRunner Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Please contact the provider because they offer custom pricing. We update pricing information regularly but encourage readers to check current pricing here.
Our Expert Opinion
Aside from the free account, HotelRunner is the best CRM software for hotels because it offers a powerful booking engine to manage rates and availability. HotelRunner also has advanced marketing, analytics, and reporting features, helping hotel sales teams generate more leads, make smarter decisions, and promote more bookings. Hoteliers can use this platform’s artificial intelligence (AI)-powered reputation management capabilities to personalize guest responses to reviews.
Guesty: Best for Short-term Rental/Vacation House Owners
Pros
- Connect a listing imported from Airbnb
- Affordable starting price for 1 to 3 listings
- Includes reputation management and marketing automation features
Cons
- No customer service hours, live chat, or phone support
- No features to upsell or upgrade rooms
- No guest surveys or feedback forms
- You want to connect your Airbnb account to a CRM: Guesty allows short-term rental or vacation house owners to connect their Airbnb account to the platform. After connecting their Airbnb account, users can import existing and future listings into Guesty. That way, hotel sales teams can manage all listings in one, centralized location, saving them time and effort and focusing more on bringing in more guests.
- You manage one to three listings at an affordable price: The Guesty For Hosts plan is best for one to three listings, with a starting price of $34 per listing, per month. This plan includes Airbnb, Booking.com and Vrbo integrations, direct bookings, automated messaging, and task management tools. Hotels can integrate existing tools they use, quickly connect with prospects and guests, effectively manage listings in one platform, and automate hotel admin tasks to focus more on increasing bookings.
- You need affordable reporting and analytics features: Guesty For Hosts doesn’t have reporting and analytics tools. These features are only available in higher plans. If you manage more than three listings and need reporting and analytics features, you must pay for the Guesty For Pros plan—contact Guesty to get the quote.
- Alternative: Revinate has reporting and analytics tools. This hospitality CRM allows you to create targeted upsell offers for your vacation rentals using its built-in automation, marketing, and omnichannel communication capabilities.
- You want to generate feedback management reports to maximize revenue: Guesty doesn’t have the capability to generate and analyze guest surveys or feedback forms. If you want to regularly seek guest feedback for intelligence data capturing, find a CRM that allows you to create survey forms.
- Alternative: Guestware, Revinate, and HotelRunner have guest feedback tools. You can use Guestware’s comment card tracking system to manage customer feedback, improve the follow-up process, and generate valuable management reports to maximize feedback benefits.
Guesty CRM Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Pricing is based on annual billing on a per-user, monthly breakdown. Monthly billing is also available at a higher cost, and an enterprise plan is available. Guesty For Hosts comes with a 14-day free trial. We update pricing information regularly but encourage readers to check current pricing here.
Our Expert Opinion
Guesty is best for short-term rental or vacation house owners, allowing them to connect a listing imported from Airbnb, Booking.com, Rentals United, and Agoda. The starting plan offers Airbnb and other booking integrations. With Guesty, your vacation rental business can benefit from its broad range of CRM features like reputation management, marketing automation, robust accounting, and direct bookings.
Revinate: Best for Luxury Hotels
Pros
- Industry-specific CRM built specifically for hotels
- Offers omnichannel communication and engagement through email marketing, text messaging, phone, and online resources
- Supplemental call center service takes bookings when hotel staff are at capacity or offline and away from their phone
- Robust reputation management features for collecting guest feedback and posting online reviews
Cons
- Lacks transparent pricing
- No event management features
- Does not have point-of-sales (PoS) capabilities built in or by integration
- You need a robust CRM for luxury hotels: Revinate is one of the best hotel CRMs because teams can use the artificial intelligence (AI) feature to text guests, manage routine customer requests, and offer personalized upselling based on the customer profile. The built-in tools and integration options also enable a robust reputation management system where a hotel can request and manage online reviews, all from one interface.
- You need omnichannel communication and marketing options: Revinate is a data platform and marketing automation tool built into one product. It comes with omnichannel communication options to engage and nurture customers via telephone, text message, email marketing, or through the hotel’s website.
- You need a built-in payment processing or point-of-sale (PoS) system: One issue with Revinate is there aren’t any built-in payment processing or point-of-sale (PoS) systems within the platform, nor is there any third-party integration that would allow a hotel to manage and handle payments from the CRM.
- Alternative: HotelRunner is the best alternative for adding payment processing applications to the CRM platform. This CRM for hotels accepts credit cards and PayPal payments with robust integration with several online payment providers, banks providing virtual PoS, and payment gateways.
- You need event management features: Revinate lacks event management features, which businesses handling regular events like business conferences need. These features should include event scheduling and tracking to ensure synchronized room reservations and event bookings.
- Alternative: Guestware is a great alternative. It offers helpful tools for event management, such as the pre-arrival planning, email marketing, and guest recognition.
Revinate Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Please contact the provider because they offer custom pricing. We update pricing information regularly but encourage readers to check current pricing here.
Our Expert Opinion
Revinate, an industry-specific CRM software, is the best for luxury hotels. Throughout each marketing campaign, the system will collect data on targeted audiences to help enrich customer profiles, segment customer lists, and ultimately optimize campaigns for more bookings and revenue.
Hapi Guest: Best for Salesforce Users
Pros
- Seamless integration with Salesforce to synchronize data into Salesforce Cloud products for sales, marketing, and service
- Scalable pricing based entirely on the number of hotel rooms
- Customizable guest flows to help create customer journeys and marketing campaigns
Cons
- Exclusive CRM integrations to Salesforce only
- Platform only serves data management functionally—CRM capabilities require Salesforce
- Must integrate with third-party property management system (PMS) products to get hotel and property management capabilities
- You need to use all of the Salesforce features: Hapi Guest, a software native to Salesforce, lets hotels collect, track, and map customer data and then synchronize it into the Salesforce Sales, Marketing, or Service Clouds. Once integrated, teams can use all of the Salesforce features for analytics and to run their marketing campaigns, manage sales activity, and assist hotel guests.
- You need to design customer journeys: One of the main features of this is the guest data flows within Hapi Guest. This lets you design customer journeys that consider the channels they use, their transaction history, and their profiles.
- You need more than a data collection tool: Since Hapi Guest is only a data collection, mapping, and flow-generating tool, users must use the integration with Salesforce to create marketing campaigns, handle service inquiries, and oversee sales bookings. This can be an extra chore for busy hotels that may need a centralized CRM.
- Alternative: Freshsales, Revinate, and HotelRunner are better alternatives for hotels that want those features built into the system. They have automated workflows, guest feedback tools, analytics, and reporting features.
- You want to integrate more hospitality apps and systems: Hapi Guest has exclusive CRM integrations to Salesforce only. Hostels, lodges, and hotels that don’t use Salesforce tools may not fully benefit from this software.
- Alternative: Freshsales, Guesty, and HotelRunner can be integrated with several hospitality apps and systems. For instance, you can integrate Guesty with Airbnb, Booking.com, Agoda, and other vacation rental apps. On the other hand, users can connect with HotelRunner’s over 150 online sales channels.
Hapi Guest Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Pricing is based on annual billing on a per-user, monthly breakdown. Monthly billing is also available at a higher cost. We update pricing information regularly but encourage readers to check current pricing here.
Our Expert Opinion
Hapi Guest is the best hotel CRM software for Salesforce users. This CRM centralizes data from property management system (PMS) and hotel management applications that can be easily connected and used in Salesforce. As it collects data, hotel businesses can create insight-driven marketing campaigns and automate customer service strategies to give guests the best experience based on their history and priorities.
Freshsales: Best Free Hospitality CRM
Pros
- Free and low-cost paid plans available
- Excellent CRM features including contact management, built-in phone system, email marketing, and task management
- Highly customizable modules and fields to let users design for any hotel or hospitality operation
Cons
- Not an industry-specific CRM for hospitality businesses, so users need to customize the system before using its features
- No hospitality tools for events management or booking reservations
- Does not offer reputation management features
- You need a free plan: Even with its excellent lead and customer management features, Freshsales is known for its free plan. Hospitality businesses can access some Freshsales features, including a built-in phone, task management, contact management, and AI chatbots, at no cost.
- You need a customizable CRM: Freshsales is customizable because it has sales, marketing, and guest service features found in hospitality CRM software. This CRM allows teams to store contact records of their guests and keep them automatically up to date. Freshsales also has profile enrichment, automated sales sequences, and communication features to engage customers through live chat, email, telephone, and website apps like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Google Business Messenger.
- You need pre-packaged hospitality modules: Because Freshsales is a general CRM, it does not come pre-packaged with hospitality modules, such as facility maintenance and events management features.
- Alternative: HotelRunner lets users access detailed reports and a complete executive summary and organize restaurant or event layouts, like merging and switching tables for easier facility maintenance. Guestware is an all-in-one operations and sales management CRM, with housekeeping management, preventative facility maintenance, and response management for guest incidents.
- You want a hospitality CRM with reputation management features: Freshsales doesn’t have reputation management tools for hospitality businesses. You need an industry-specific CRM with this capability to ensure negative customer reviews won’t affect your lead generation rate and sales.
- Alternative: Revinate is notable for its reputation management capabilities. This CRM for hotels combines customer reviews across different digital channels, like review sites, into a single dashboard for reputation management. The mobile app gives users access to surveys, online reviews, and reputation reporting.
Freshsales Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Pricing is based on annual billing on a per-user, monthly breakdown. Monthly billing is also available at a higher cost. We update pricing information regularly but encourage readers to check current pricing here.
Our Expert Opinion
Freshsales has free-forever features suitable for hotel owners who want to learn more about what is CRM to test basic features without spending money. This CRM is a customizable, general-use CRM system that can be tailored to meet the needs of a restaurant, small hotel, or event-hosting venue. Though not ideal for operations and facilities management, the platform is great for sales, marketing, and guest service activities.
dailypoint: Best Central Data Management Platform
Pros
- Cloud-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) for centralized data management (CDM)
- Massive app integration like Airangel, Cendyn, Mews, and Medallia, available in its marketplace
- All advanced features for hotel CRM available, including a voucher system
Cons
- No pricing info available
- Phone and email ticket system are only available support
- No mobile app
- You need to access your hotel data in a CRM tool with integration capabilities: dailypoint is a dedicated cloud-based CRM software for hotels. You can choose from any of its 16 modules, which include data laundry, campaign manager, and loyalty program, to effectively manage core hospitality business operations. Complement these modules with almost 200 best-of-breed tool integrations, like Airangel for secure hotel Wi-Fi and Arvato direct services for custom loyalty programs.
- You need a hotel CRM with all advanced features: Improve every guest’s journey with dailypoint, equipped with marketing automation, reputation management tools, upsell/upgrade rooms, and guest surveys or feedback forms. dailypoint’s voucher system and loyalty program also support cross- and upselling efforts. The SmartWireless features intelligent data management and turns hotel Wi-Fi into a profit center by providing access to online activities.
- You need a CRM with a clear pricing structure: Users need to contact dailypoint because it doesn’t have an explicit pricing structure. Hospitality businesses can’t compare the platform with other providers, hindering them from making sounder and faster buying decisions—potentially leaving them feeling left out in a highly competitive industry.
- Alternative: Guestware and Freshsales are the best CRMs in terms of pricing because they offer a free account or free trial and transparent pricing structure. Both Guestware and Freshsales offer tiered plans with a list of inclusive features for each price point.
- You need a CRM for hotels with a mobile app: Hospitality staff is more productive when the CRM system they use has a mobile app feature, which dailypoint is missing. Without a mobile CRM app, hotel managers miss out on the ability to view reservations and other related metrics while on the go.
- Alternative: Guesty and Revinate are excellent providers of hotel CRM systems with mobile apps. The Revinate mobile app provides one-tap access to online surveys, reviews, and reputation reporting. Guesty’s most notable mobile app CRM feature is the all-in-one calendar view to manage reservations from a single calendar.
dailypoint Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Please contact the provider because they offer custom pricing. We update pricing information regularly but encourage readers to check current pricing here.
Our Expert Opinion
Hotel CRM dailypoint is the best central data management platform designed for hotels with intelligent data management features like SmartWireless. This CRM hotel tool collects, cleans, and consolidates hotel data in a single Central Guest Profile. The platform also has loyalty and voucher systems for direct referrals and marketing purposes.
Guestware: Best for Managing Overall Hotel Operations
Pros
- Offers guest response features for incident tracking, response management, and automated dispatch
- Platform includes facilities management tools like preventive maintenance tracking, mobile inspections, and housekeeping management
- All-in-one sales and operations management tool
Cons
- Starting pricing is expensive
- Loyalty program management not available until Guestware Plus plan
- CRM module isn’t offered until Guestware Suite plan
- You need to streamline your overall hotel operations: Like Revinate, Guestware is a hotel management software with facilities management tools and guest response features that streamline hotel operations. Between the three available plans priced based on the number of rooms at the facility, hotel teams can oversee multiple parts of the operation. These include guest and incident management, facilities maintenance, and marketing activities through email marketing, loyal program management, and pre-arrival planning.
- You need a hotel property management system: Because Guestware also acts as a hotel property management system (PMS), it’s the best CRM on the list for running hotel operations. For example, there are engineering preventive maintenance features where teams can conduct mobile inspections of the premises and schedule updates to prevent infrastructure problems down the road. Optional interactive voice response (IVR) tools allow guests to request housekeeping or incident response services.
- You need built-in sales and marketing CRM features: Guestware’s CRM features aren’t available until the Guestware Suite plan, starting at $200 per month. Also, while the system will manage and store the customer data, the communication features are limited to email marketing, which isn’t built in and demands integration with an external marketing automation platform.
- Alternative: Freshsales is the best alternative on this list regarding standard and built-in sales and marketing CRM capabilities. This CRM also comes with communication tools and email integration capabilities.
- You want a more budget-friendly hospitality software for direct bookings: While Guestware offers tiered pricing, the plans can be expensive for some small hospitality businesses. If you only need basic hospitality software for listings and direct bookings, then consider looking elsewhere.
- Alternative: Guesty’s starting plan Guesty For Hosts only costs $7 per listing, per month, with three direct booking integrations without having to pay for listing channel fees. Like Guestware, you can create and automate hotel tasks, such as cleaning the room or meeting with the guest.
Guestware Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Pricing is based on annual billing; monthly billing is also available for a higher cost. The monthly cost is based on the number of rooms in the hotel, ranging from 50 to 500 rooms. We update pricing information regularly but encourage readers to check current pricing here.
Our Expert Opinion
Guestware is a robust CRM for overall hotel operations. Because of its facilities management tools and guest response features, Guestware can be a reliable hotel sales software to manage hotel operations. This CRM empowers hotel service teams to effectively respond to guests by automating guest service requests, housekeeping, work orders, and repeat guest recognition.
innRoad: Best for Hotel Performance Reporting
Pros
- Advanced reporting with dozens of preloaded helpful reports
- 24/7 customer support
- Upsell or upgrade feature availability
Cons
- No free trial or plan available
- No marketing automation and guest survey features
- Not user-friendly group reservations and hotel channel manager
- You need a robust hotel performance reporting PMS software: innRoad comes with batch reporting capability for various business areas, such as financials, property management, reservation details, and guest compliance. Users can customize, filter, save, and share reports for quick reference. Monitor your hotel’s performance in terms of occupancy rate, revenue, and other top metrics.
- You need a CRM with an upsell or upgrade feature: Not all hotel CRMs have an upsell or upgrade feature. innRoad hotel CRM streamlines your guest reservation with its upsell or upgrade feature, which allows booking more guests based on the results of its robust reporting capabilities. Hence, hotel staff can quickly answer customer inquiries about room availability, schedules, and other booking-related concerns.
- You need 24/7 customer support: innRoad can help you any time of the day. You can reach customer support through innRoad’s toll-free number, email, or support portal.
- You want to integrate your existing tools into a hotel CRM: If you need to integrate different apps, like billing, marketing automation, and guest survey forms, it is best to find an alternative.
- Alternative: Guestware, Guesty, Revinate, and HotelRunner have expansive app integrations that are suitable for hotel businesses using several tools for various activities.
- You need a CRM that can help you generate a group business: Group booking is a bit challenging in innRoad because of the difficult learning curve. If you want to generate revenue via group bookings, you’ll need a CRM with a more intuitive and easy-to-use group reservation tool to save time and book more group guests.
- Alternative: HotelRunner and Revinate are excellent group reservation processing systems. Hotels, hostels, and lodging businesses can rely on them to handle group bookings via their website, apps, social media, and other marketing channels, diversifying and maximizing their revenue.
innRoad Pricing Plan & Overview*
*Please contact the provider because they offer custom pricing. We update pricing information regularly but encourage readers to check current pricing here.
Our Expert Opinion
innRoad is a PMS solution that can generate detailed reports of your hospitality business’ performance. With innRoad, you can view current performance and operational data (Daily Flash), helping accurately monitor and optimize the hotel’s performance. This CRM for hotels also has upselling or upgrade room features to increase booking revenue. Hotel businesses can use this platform to track occupancy rates and book more guests, with the full support they can get from a CRM provider.
How We Evaluated the Best CRM for Hotels & Hospitality Businesses
To determine the best hospitality CRMs, we evaluated the specific features and product attributes such as price, support availability, and what users say about each product. Based on our comprehensive evaluation, HotelRunner is the best CRM software for hotels, offering a powerful booking engine, AI reputation management, advanced marketing, analytics, and reporting tools. The features are the top considerations when learning how to choose CRM for hotels.
The tabs below provide insight into our evaluation process of the best CRM software for the hospitality industry:
30% of Overall Score
We also looked at overall features we feel are crucial to any CRM software, regardless of its primary purpose. Having a mobile application, for example, lets hospitality teams manage customers and sales activities, all while on the go. Additionally, we looked at the range of outside integrations each CRM had, as well as each platform’s customization capabilities to tailor a system to any unique operation.
10% of Overall Score
Pricing considered free plan availability and various scalable pricing options businesses could afford as they grow. We also looked at the availability for a subscriber to either pay monthly or save by paying annually. Finally, we looked at the costs of specifically using the hotel and hospitality management features.
25% of Overall Score
We examined each CRM in-depth regarding niche CRM capabilities that can add value to hotel and hospitality businesses. For example, features for booking reservations, obtaining guest feedback, and managing customer online reviews are specifically helpful for a hotel, restaurant, or event-hosting venue. Additionally, automated marketing lets businesses personalize campaigns to customers for a better experience and hopefully, a boost in positive online reviews.
15% of Overall Score
Extensive support and service help prevent poor user experiences and outcomes users may encounter while using these hotel CRM systems. Help and support were evaluated in terms of customer service hours and the availability of support via phone, live chat, and email. We also looked at self-service and help center resources users can access, like tutorials, forums, and training modules.
20% of Overall Score
In addition to firsthand experience with these hotel and hospitality CRM products, we evaluated what users say about each product. These criteria consider how customers feel based on their reviews. It allows us to gain more insight into value for the price paid, ease of use when operating the system, and how users feel about the CRMs.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
HotelRunner is one of the best CRMs for hotels because of its superb booking engine and advanced marketing, analytics, and reporting features. These capabilities help hotel sales teams manage occupancy rates, generate more leads, increase bookings, manage reputation, and make smarter decisions.
Yes. While a general CRM system, such as Freshsales, can be customized into a hospitality CRM, most hotel and hospitality software products are industry-specific, including lodging, recreation, travel and tourism, and food and beverage. In other words, the provider designed them to offer features for the particular vertical it serves.
While you can use a general CRM and customize it into a hospitality CRM, that can take time and doesn’t guarantee the features will adequately meet your unique needs. Hospitality CRMs have features, like reputation and reservation management, and data fields within the system that are specifically useful for a hospitality business. By keeping all workflows and data in one system, you can stay better organized and keep sales, marketing, and operations activity all in one interface.
Bottom Line
Hospitality and hotel CRMs are industry-specific platforms that let users manage reservations, events, guests, customer service, and marketing campaigns in one system. While HotelRunner was our pick for the best overall CRM for hotel businesses, other products on this list could be better suited for your business, depending on your needs. Guesty, for instance, is the best CRM for short-term rentals, while Revinate is better suited for luxury hotels.