Tips
I want to be clear up front that Cendyn does some things really, really well. They’re a great company with a great team that has helped many hotels with their CRM efforts. But this is a question that comes up now and again of whether Inntopia Marketing Cloud is a good Cendyn alternative and I just wanted to outline a few reasons why, when choosing a hotel CRM, hotels and resorts have either either moved from Cendyn to Inntopia Marketing Cloud or chosen Inntopia Marketing Cloud instead of another tool.
I don’t have some secret knowledge about Cendyn’s platform, but we’ve had enough people move over and heard enough feedback from them that I can pretty confidently give a high level overview of our two platforms.
First, let’s talk about what they do well. Similar to Inntopia, Cendyn has been around for a long time and is well known. Also similar to Inntopia, they have a handful of different products on offer which can often be a nice perk when looking to bundle services under one contract or ensure that the roadmaps of various products you rely on are aligned. Now, Cendyn has a lot of different products and services they offer, but we’re going to focus just on the CRM pieces in this article.
In terms of their CRM itself, Cendyn’s platform is typically really well matched for standalone hotels where data is simpler, automation needs aren’t as complex, and the guest profile is a little bit more straightforward. Their tools makes it easy for a standalone hotel to spin up a simple set of features fairly quickly In other words, if you’re a standalone hotel or a property with simpler needs, Inntopia may not be a good alternative to Cendyn.
With that as a starting point, it’s important to understand that Inntopia Marketing Cloud was built for hotels with more complex guests and marketing needs. That’s where we started out. Most hospitality CRM’s like Cendyn started with hotels and slowly added complexity. We, on the other hand, started in complexity (massive destination resorts) and worked backward toward hotels. In other words, Inntopia is built for hotels that have multiple systems to sell multiple types of products. If you’re a hotel that just sells rooms? Cendyn might be a good choice. If you’re a hotel that sells rooms, spa, and other upgrades? Inntopia Marketing Cloud will likely do a much better job of centralizing all of that guest data and insight.
Because we’re so good with complexity and layers of data, Inntopia Marketing Cloud is one of the best for standalone hotels that are part of a larger group of brands or destinations and need to look across guest behavior from multiple properties in their portfolio. Sometimes hotels with more complex data needs will work with Inntopia Marketing Cloud to be able to create custom guest traits and types to better organize their data. If you’re a standalone hotel, again, Cendyn could be a good choice. If you’re a hotel that’s part of a larger portfolio that does any sort of analysis, loyalty, or marketing between the group? Inntopia will likely be a much better choice.
With that as a quick foundation, let me share seven things to consider when assessing Inntopia Marketing Cloud as an Cendyn alternative.
Inntopia Marketing Cloud is incredible good at dealing with complex guest data from multiple systems. Many hotels have moved to our platform and been blown away by our ability to combined guest records into accurate households with complete timelines of their transaction history. It’s not that Cendyn can’t handle some complexity, but that’s not what the system was designed for so it’s harder to account for the level of complexity a system like ours can that was built for these sorts of use cases.
Our ability to send custom confirmations, automations, and marketing emails from a single system is another perk we hear mentioned often. It’s easier for billing, managing templates, and measuring results. This is one of the most common things we hear from hotels moving to Inntopia from platforms like Cendyn. Other CRM platforms can send some types of emails, but only Inntopia can send all types of emails from one place and help you quick resend emails as needed.
The biggest difference many hotels notice is the type of support they receive. Instead of a support line, Inntopia Marketing Cloud clients work with a dedicated account manager from a team where the average hospitality CRM experiences is well over 10 years. If you worry you won’t have time or skill to do it all yourself, this is important to consider. I will say that Cendyn’s support is much better than some other hotel CRM platforms, but they don’t have the level of experience and hands-on approach that Inntopia does.
Because we’ve solved the problems around data complexity, Inntopia Marketing Cloud can bring in a more more broad set of data. Which mean’s we’ve also built integrations for many more PMS, POS, marketing, survey, demographic, and other systems to create incredibly deep, insightful guest profiles. I don’t know exactly how many integrations Cendyn has so I won’t try to guess, but I will say that Inntopia has over 100 integrations with a dozen more slated for this year alone.
Very little within the Marketing Cloud platform can’t be tweaked which allows us to really evolve with the specific needs of your brand whether that’s custom email templates or guest traits that are totally unique to your operation. We’ve also learned how to do this in ways that keep workflows fast and nimble, so we’re not sacrificing speed or quality.
This ability to truly match the brand visual on the website to what guests see in every email is another things hotels point to when they move to Inntopia from systems like Cendyn or other hotel CRMs.
We’ve led the hospitality CRM industry in marketing automation and dynamic content for years, so much so we’ve written a book about more than 25 of the automations we help our clients with. We can reach any guest at any phase of the guest journey with a message neatly targeted to them based on the data you have in their profile. This level of hands-free marketing is unparalleled and a big reason hotels and resorts choose Inntopia over Cendyn. Cendyn can absolutely do some automation, what we hear from users is simply that it’s not as sophisticated as Inntopia and can’t use as many data points as triggers.
Finally, we’ve worked really hard over the last 5+ years on building in layers of data storage, access, and reporting so multi-property brands can track guest behavior across their locations and understand those trends on both the individual location and corporate level. This means that your call center, front desk, marketing, sales, and leadership teams each get access to all the data they need and, if you want to restrict it, none of the data they don’t need. It’s a big reason so many larger portfolios and brands that are part of portfolios have worked with Inntopia over the years.
In other words, Inntopia Marketing Cloud is usually a better choice when you’ve got a complex guest, lots of data, and want to really customize your setup to perfectly match your needs and brand. But if you have simpler needs and want a more plug-and-play solution, Cendyn would probably be a great choice. And we totally get that. Cendyn may not be for everyone, but we aren’t either. We’re at our best with resorts and hotels who have multiple systems and more unique guests that aren’t just looking for a hotel room.
Long story short, Cendyn and Inntopia may seem similar, but as you may have noticed we’re built for fairly different use cases. Yes, there is overlap, but not as much as many people think.
Learn more about Inntopia Marketing Cloud at the link below:
https://corp.inntopia.com/marketing/
Start selling more of everything your resort has to offer.
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