Eileen Higginbotham, CHME - President

Eileen Higginbotham is the president and founder of Hotel Marketing Resources, Inc.  HMR provides sales and marketing solutions for the hospitality industry.  Its focus is on results, on services and solutions tailored to the needs of clients, and on practical, cost-effective, and measurable objectives. HMR’s main activities include consulting, training and targeted problem solving, all at both the individual property and the corporate, multi-brand, multi-unit levels.  Eileen is a member of the HSMAI University faculty.  She has developed and taught the four part HSMAI webinar series "The Selling Plan" and a three part "GuvBiz" workshop. 

Responding to changing times Eileen has expanded her experience still further into working with major franchise brands, management companies, national organizations and independent business owners.  Eileen has developed strong relationships with other companies that specialize in internet marketing, sales office automation and media development.  These alliances offer HMR customers a one-stop-shop service provision for all of their marketing needs.  Her vision of HMR has continued to grow and provides her clients with the best and most experienced services in all aspects of sales and marketing.

As president of HMR Eileen prefers to concentrate her consulting on the corporate level, at finding a fix to fit the culture, resources and market situation of the corporation.  HMR training targets both the new hires and especially Directors of Sales, General Managers and Corporate executives already familiar with the ABCs of sales and marketing.  HMR selects topics that most immediately meet the actual business situation of today’s competitive hospitality market.  HMR does both on-site and Web-based training.  Hotel Marketing Resources has a diverse clientele located throughout the country.

Professionally, Eileen has been C.H.M.E. certified for over fifteen years.  She is one of the few certificate recipients to have her thesis published in the HSMAI Marketing Review Magazine.  She is also a regular guest speaker at the national Society of Government Travel Professionals Conference held in Washington, D.C.  Her latest topics "Building Alliances to Increase Sales" and "The SGTP Business School" are still hot based on the continuing interest among those who heard her speak. She has been a mentor to new members and served on the Long Range Planning Committee. Eileen is a member and a past President of a Chicago land chapter of Rotary International and serves on several committees.

Before founding HMR, Eileen served over twelve years as the Vice President of Marketing and Sales for a Midwestern-based hotel management firm.  Her duties included responsibility for the sales and marketing plans at both the corporate and property levels, for taking full advantage of franchise and alliance opportunities, for staffing, and sales training—including the training of general managers to take a leadership role in the sales efforts at the property level.  Before that she was the Director of Marketing and Sales for a 700 plus room Chicago area hotel, and Vice President of Sales for a travel and meeting planning Company.  She also worked at the operations level of a major airline reservation center.

HMR has a simple educational philosophy.  To be effective training sessions must be participative, interactive, hands-on, customized to the real needs of the participants, carefully planned, wrapped in good and timely feedback, and give the participants something valuable to take with them to do a better job with the sales effort.