90% of Hoteliers Say the Group Booking Process Is Broken.

The problem is not your prices. It’s the process that’s driving clients away.

No matter how competitive your rates or attractive your offers, if the booking process feels slow, complicated or outdated, potential customers are likely to give up before the deal is done. In a series of LinkedIn polls with hotel professionals, a striking 90 % pointed to the group and M&E (Meetings & Events) booking process as the main barrier, not pricing.

Almost everyone agrees the way hotels handle group inquiries is fundamentally broken. Long email chains, sluggish response times, endless RFP forms. It’s an outdated maze that frustrates clients and hotel sales teams alike.

The result? Hotels are leaking revenue and missing out on growth in the M&E segment because ready-to-spend customers give up or go elsewhere.

Process Over Pricing: A Broken System Holding Hotels Back

For years, many hoteliers assumed lackluster group sales were due to budget cuts or high rates. But that is not actually the case. Nearly all respondents in our LinkedIn poll pointed to the clunky, manual process as the real culprit, not the price tag.

And it’s easy to see why. You fill out a form, wait days for an email response and you end up having to play phone tag just to confirm details. In 2025, that feels absurd. If booking a flight ticket worked that way, you’d abandon that website in a heartbeat.

The hospitality industry has perfected instant booking for transient guests. You can book a hotel room online in seconds. Yet group bookings still crawl forward as if technology never happened. As one industry expert put it, “Group business isn’t lost because demand isn’t there. It’s lost because hotels don’t make it easy to buy.”

When 90% of hoteliers say the process is broken, it’s a wake-up call. Every extra hour a client waits for a proposal is an opportunity for them to drop out. And for your competitor to swoop in with a faster answer.

The Hidden Cost: Unknown and Lost Revenue

What’s worse, most hotels don’t even know how much business they’re losing. In the polls, 64% of hoteliers admitted they have no idea how much group revenue slips through their fingers.

That’s a scary statistic. Picture dozens of RFPs sitting unanswered in an inbox, or tentative inquiries that never get logged. All potential events that never materialize into bookings. It’s essentially a revenue black hole.

Studies suggest that out of every 100 group RFPs sent to hotels, more than half get no response. Those could be millions in room nights, meeting room rentals and F&B spend, just vanishing. If you’re not tracking these lost opportunities, you’re flying blind.

The first step is acknowledging that leads are money on the table. Every lead that dies unanswered is cash left on the floor. Hotels need to start measuring and monitoring their group business pipeline with the same rigor as transient sales. How many RFPs come in each month? How fast is the response? What’s the conversion rate? Without this data, you can’t plug the leaks. And without fixing the process, the leaks only get worse.

Instant Booking: Small Meetings, Big Potential

Here’s the good news. The solution is staring us in the face.

Instant booking for small groups and meetings is a massive opportunity. An astounding 92% of poll respondents agreed that routing small group requests through instant booking would help drive more revenue with the same team.

In other words, let people book the simple stuff immediately, without the back-and-forth. Why force a customer who just needs a meeting room for 10 people and coffee service to submit a full RFP and wait two days for a quote? By the time you reply, they’ve moved on.

Allowing instant booking for meetings captures that business on the spot. It’s a win-win. The client gets a fast, frictionless experience, and your sales team is freed up to focus on larger, more complex events.

Major hotel brands are already moving in this direction. The technology is there and customer expectations are already aligned. Instant confirmation isn’t just convenient. It directly translates to more bookings.

If nearly all hoteliers believe instant booking would boost revenue, the next step is turning that belief into action on your direct website channel.

Automation Will Dominate M&E

The era of slow group sales is ending. 71 % of hoteliers said automated offers and instant booking will dominate M&E sales within five years.

We’re not talking about a distant future. The tools for automation are already here.

Smart RFP automation can turn an inbound lead into a tailored proposal in minutes. A prospective client looking for 20 rooms and a ballroom can receive an offer with rates and dates right away, without waiting on a sales manager.

This isn’t about removing the human touch. It’s about reserving that personal touch for where it really matters. Let technology handle the repeatable tasks. Let your team focus on relationships and closing.

Hotels that hesitate to automate will find themselves stuck with empty ballrooms while the hotel down the street is buzzing with events.

OTAs and New Players Are Eyeing Your Business

Perhaps the loudest warning from the poll results: 74% of respondents fear that OTAs and global tech platforms are coming for the group and M&E space.

They’re right to be concerned.

We’ve seen it before. Hotels were once skeptical that OTAs could sell rooms effectively. Now they dominate transient bookings. The group and event segment is next.

If hotels don’t modernize the booking experience, someone else will. Already, new platforms are emerging that let planners book event spaces in real time. These players will get between hotels and their clients. And they’ll take a cut.

The solution? Build a group and meeting marketplace that gives hotels the speed, visibility and flexibility that customers expect.

From Leaks to Wins: How Hotels Can Fix Group Sales

The group booking process as it stands is too slow, too manual and too opaque. But it doesn’t have to stay that way.

Here’s a simple roadmap:

• Use a smart RFP tool to streamline your lead response and avoid email clutter.

• Add a real-time booking engine for small meetings directly to your website.

• Connect everything to your existing tech stack, including your PMS, S&C and CRM.

This isn’t theory. It’s already happening. Hoteliers using these tools are reporting faster booking times, higher conversions and fewer lost leads.

Modernize Now or Miss Out

The future of group and event bookings is real-time and automated. The tools are here. The demand is clear. Hoteliers know the old way is broken. Planners know it too. The only question is who will fix it first.

Don’t hand your M&E revenue to a third party. Create a system that lets guests’ book on their terms. Empower your team to sell smarter, not harder.

Want to see how it works? Start by exploring MeetingPackage booking engine that can help your group business grow with the speed and simplicity your guests expect.