The first question I ask before working with a hotel...

// And it's not about budget.

When I speak with a hotel for the first time, there's a moment I've come to recognise very well. People expect me to ask about their budget. Or their RevPAR. Or their social media performance.

I don't.

The very first question I ask is much simpler - and often more uncomfortable:

"Who are you really trying to serve?"

Not "business and leisure." Not "everyone." Not "anyone who can afford the rate." The specific guest whose experience this hotel is meant to be built around.

It sounds like an easy question. It rarely is.

Because before you launch campaigns, hire a content creator, redesign a lobby, or rewrite your website - you need clarity on one thing: who your hotel actually exists for. Without that, every decision becomes reactive. With it, decisions start to make sense.

What I see often - especially in independent and aspiring luxury hotels — is a rush to copy what looks successful elsewhere. A design trend. A brand tone. A certain "luxury look." But very few stop to ask the more fundamental questions:

What problem am I really solving for my guest? What makes my hotel different in their eyes - not ours? How does staying here feel, from the first hello to checkout?

These are not marketing questions. They are strategic ones.

When they are answered early, everything else becomes lighter. Decisions — from staffing and service style to design choices and communication - start to feel intentional instead of forced. Things align not because of rules, but because there is a shared understanding of who the guest is and what matters to them.

If you are reading this as part of a hotel team, here is a short exercise I often suggest. Ask three people from different departments to answer one question individually - without aligning answers beforehand, without correcting each other:

"Who do you think our hotel is really for?"

Then compare the responses.

If the answers are very different, that is not a failure. It is a signal. It usually means the hotel isn't lacking effort, creativity, or ambition — it's lacking shared clarity. And that is often where the real work begins.

When you start with the right questions, strategy becomes lighter. The hotel begins to feel coherent — not just beautiful.

That's the space I like working in.