Upselling has long been one of the most visible levers in hotel revenue management: room upgrades, early check-in, late check-out, and ancillary services promise incremental revenue with minimal marginal cost. Yet for many hotels, the practice remains frustratingly inconsistent and operationally fragile.
The issue is not that guests are unwilling to pay for enhancements. It is that the operational model behind upselling was never designed to scale across properties, guest types, and busy operational realities. In too many hotels, upselling remains anchored to check-in, dependent on staff timing, intuition, and individual initiative, factors that inevitably create uneven results.
The Operational Reality Behind “Just Offer the Upgrade”
Why front desk–led upselling breaks down at scale, even in well-run hotels.
Front desk teams are expected to be the frontline of upselling, but the reality of hotel operations makes this expectation nearly impossible to execute consistently. Agents are managing arrivals, room readiness, loyalty benefits, special requests, and operational disruptions — often simultaneously and under time pressure.
Upselling fails not because teams don’t try, but because the operating model was never designed for consistency or scale.
Even well-trained staff default to safe, generic offers during peak periods, or skip upselling entirely. Across a multi-property portfolio, this creates variation not tied to market demand but to staffing, timing, and individual judgment. For executives, the revenue opportunity remains visible but structurally unreliable, creating frustration and, too often, missed potential.
Guests Are Not Opposed to Upsells, They Are Opposed to Irrelevance
Understanding guest behavior is more important than selling harder.
The problem is rarely the price. It is the context in which the offer is presented. Guests arriving late on a one-night business trip evaluate upgrades differently than a couple booking a weekend escape or a family on a longer holiday. Yet many upselling programs rely on static scripts or one-size-fits-all timing, ignoring signals that already exist in booking and PMS data.
The most effective upsells don’t appear at check-in. They appear when the guest is already thinking about their stay.
A well-timed early check-in offered after booking solves a problem. The same offer during a rushed check-in feels like a sales tactic. A suite upgrade suggested to a couple on an anniversary is meaningful; offered to a single business traveler at the desk, it is irrelevant.
Moving Upselling Earlier in the Guest Journey
Timing and context are the real drivers of conversion.
Leading hotels are shifting upselling from an operational tactic to a design decision embedded in the guest journey. Booking behavior, stay length, travel patterns, past stays, and arrival times all provide signals about what a guest is likely to value. Acting on these signals allows upsells to feel natural rather than transactional.
This approach transforms upselling from a reactive conversation to a proactive, guest-centric design problem. Early check-in and late check-out become predictable products rather than exceptions. Ancillary services like parking, spa, or dining are presented when guests are most receptive. The result is revenue growth that feels effortless for both the guest and the staff.
Automation as an Enabler, Not a Replacement
Technology should remove friction, not replace hospitality.
There is understandable skepticism around automation in guest-facing interactions, driven by fears that it depersonalizes service. Yet when contextual data drives the logic, automation enhances personalization.
When upselling becomes part of experience design, revenue becomes a byproduct rather than the objective.
Platforms like LasoExperience are designed to operate at scale while respecting the guest experience. By connecting directly to PMS and booking data, these platforms trigger offers based on guest profile and travel patterns, not generic templates or static timing. For operations, this creates clarity and consistency. For revenue teams, repeatable performance. And for guests, offers feel timely and thoughtful, not intrusive.
A Useful Reframe for Hotel Leaders
It helps to stop thinking about upselling purely as a revenue tactic. In practice, it is a design question: how well does your operation translate guest insight into timely action? Viewed this way, many operational frustrations start to make sense and, importantly, become solvable.
The Strategic Takeaway
Hotels that treat upselling as an operational problem risk inconsistency, frustrated staff, and missed revenue. Hotels that treat it as part of the guest journey (powered by context, timing, and systems that scale) see predictable revenue, happier teams, and guests who feel understood rather than sold to.
For executives, the question is clear: Are we asking our teams to sell more, or are we designing systems that make value easy to discover, easy to accept, and easy to deliver?
Those who get this right will see six-figure incremental revenue in mid-sized properties, higher engagement with upgrade offers, and measurable improvements in guest satisfaction by aligning offers with guest intent and operational reality.
Upselling is evolving. The leaders who embrace that evolution will not only capture more revenue but create guest experiences that scale without compromise.
