Adapted from a recent episode of The CEO Project podcast, this article captures the essential insights from a discussion between host Jim Schleckser and Geoffrey Toffetti, CEO of Frontline Performance Group, on growing and optimizing a modern business.
Schleckser asked: Hotels already know how to extract money from guests - so why do they need FPG?
Toffetti explained the difference between charging more and creating real value: "What we're teaching and what we're helping with, is to connect with their guests so that they understand the guests needs and wants and then offer them things that will meet those needs and wants, never offer something they don't need or want."
He emphasized that when the right enhancements are offered, they can improve both guest satisfaction and revenue: "If you're in the right room, you have the right views. Your spouse is happy, your kids are happy. Or if you're a business traveler, you have a desk in your room, you have access to the lounge after your meetings, these things really do improve your experience."
Toffetti also noted that the concept is universal across industries: " If you connect with your guest or customer, you offer them what you know will enhance their experience. They're going to be happier and they'll spend more money."
He described two major trends driving hospitality revenue growth:
Personalization at scale (without being creepy). Toffetti noted personalization has been discussed for years, but technology is now making it more realistic.
Hotel tech stack modernization. Large brands are investing heavily in their core systems: "A lot of the bigger brands now are also modernizing their tech stack, which is a massive undertaking, that's a multi-year distraction, but certainly enhancement to profitability over the long run."
Schleckser asked what personalization looks like beyond a good bed and a view. Toffetti listed practical examples: "It could be, what's in the mini bar. It could be what kind of coffee you drink. It could be your your view preferences. It could be your bed sheets."
He also mentioned growing demand for allergen-friendly options: "There's rooms now that are like homeopathic or anti allergen... There's a thing called PURE rooms, it adds an extra filter to the to the room."
Toffetti stressed that personalization must connect to commercial outcomes: "In order to monetize it, you've got to be matching it up with people who will pay for it."
Related reading: Master Top Down Selling at the Front Desk
One of the most important points Toffetti made about hospitality revenue growth is that hotels often underestimate what guests will pay for, especially in group travel.
"There was a for a long time, there was a concept that you could not enhance rooms for people traveling to group events, because no one would pay for it."
FPG tested the idea and saw a different result: "We turned it on it's head and we said, look, for a lot of people that go to these conventions, it's the only business trip they're going to go on, they'll spend $30 or $40 to have a suite."
He said this is a common issue in any customer-driven business: "You sort of make assumptions and you don't test things, you don't try things, and then you limit yourself for no reason."
FPG has been focused on front desk performance for more than a decade, but recently expanded into restaurant and bar operations with CheckMax.
Toffetti says: "We spent a year developing the tech, then we went to our closest clients and we said, look, this is what we're doing. Do you want to pilot some properties with us?"
The solution is now commercial: "We recently launched a press release, so we're taking it to market."
Schleckser asked: How AI is affecting the business?
Toffetti said: "We are deeply embracing it on three fronts."
On the product side, FPG deployed AI: "We've actually deployed an AI layer into our platform."
The most powerful use case is giving frontline leaders better access to performance insights: "Interrogating complex data and providing natural language insights to our customers in a way that they've never seen. So of course, if you're if you're in the C suite, you've had access to that kind of insight for quite a while now a few years. But if you're a restaurant manager or a front desk manager, we are now able to provide them insights into each member of their team and exactly what the opportunities are to develop that team member."
This allows managers to coach quickly and specifically: "We are now able to provide them insights into each member of their team and exactly what the opportunities are to develop that team member."
For example: "Jim doesn't sell as many appetizers as everybody else. You might want to coach them on selling appetizers."
Toffetti described how this impacts performance and income: "If you're helping an individual solve their weaknesses and they make more money, it becomes a virtuous cycle."
Toffetti warned that broad AI initiatives often fail: "They're taking too broad a brush to the to the challenge. Instead of asking the AI to do one very narrow thing and do it very well, they're trying to get it to do too much at once."
And when AI isn't tightly managed: "Then it starts hallucinating and they lose confidence in it.
FPG's approach is iterative. For example, with the insights report, we're on version 86. That's how quickly we're iterating. It's getting really interesting, it's starting to surface observations we didn't explicitly tell it to make. The reason it's working is that we've given it very tight constraints: a clearly defined role, a clear ontology and boundaries around what it is and isn't allowed to do. And again, we're not in charge of missile defense, so a little misguidance isn't going to hurt anyone. But we're finding that it's now about 90% as accurate as a human coach would be when making observations, which is incredibly promising."
From Service Business to SaaS: Scaling Hospitality Revenue Growth Through Technology
Schleckser asked: Explain FPG's transition from services to SaaS?
Toffetti explained that when he joined, the company had no platform: "When I came to FPG, there was no technology. We were all just services, just services Word and Excel and PowerPoint."
FPG built technology as an internal tool first: "We started to build the technology as an internal platform for our consultants to use, to become more efficient."
Then the model evolved: "It became apparent to me that we could leave this technology behind after our consulting engagements and create a subscription business."
COVID accelerated the shift: "Our services revenue went almost to zero."
FPG's first SaaS agreements came in 2022: "We got our first SaaS agreements in the fall of 2022."
Now, SaaS dominates: "All of our new business is SaaS."
Toffetti said the hardest part wasn't technical, it was identity: "The hardest thing, I think, for me, was the identity that our internal employees had of themselves and of our business."
FPG retained institutional expertise intentionally: "We kept way more people than we needed to, because we wanted to keep the institutional expertise in house."
The mission stayed the same: "Our end goal didn't heckchange. Our end goal has always been to help the customer make more money and have a better relationship with their customer."
Operating globally and virtually requires deliberate leadership.
Toffetti said: "We have a lot of meetings, probably more than we should, but it's important to get up face-to-face with people."
He credited homegrown leadership: "Every single leader in our company was homegrown."
FPG hires primarily for culture: "We hire for the culture. We don't hire for the skills."
And he shared his leadership philosophy: "My personal motto is that leaders give trust first..."
He explained what happens when leaders don't: "If you say to someone, you got to earn my trust, what you're actually saying is, I don't trust you."
Finally, he tied leadership behavior directly to customer experience: "You can expect your customers to be treated exactly the way you treat those you lead."
Across personalization, AI, and operational efficiency, the conversation kept returning to one theme: hospitality revenue growth depends on people.
Toffetti summed up the culture behind FPG's approach: "We want cultural personalities and we spend a lot of time just focused on being there for each other and being completely transparent with everyone."
Further reading:
Pre-Arrival vs On-Arrival: Which Upsell Wins
Case Study: How New World Hoiana Beach Resort Achieved a 60% Upsell Revenue Increase
Hotel Front Desk Training: How Role Play Boosts Confidence and Sales