I alternate years between HH Amex and SPG Amex, maintaining Gold status in both programs. Next year I'll nudge that up to Diamond in HH...I can't do $40k in 5 months.

For me, my main objective with hotels is diversification. The three big programs have very different strong points. My business travel took me to places that had good Marriotts, so that's where I did most of my real stays. (I'm in the process of reevaluating this a bit.) I do most CC use through SPG Amex. I know I can get HH points through AA easily. So no matter where I go, I always have a pool of points in all three programs.

For actual hotel stays, Marriott and HH yield the best return without promotions. But SPG frequently has the better promotions. (Marriott's "Megabonuses" are getting kind of tired.)

For credit cards, SPG and HH both yield excellent return - better than Marriott.

I personally find that Marriott's conversions out to air miles are very valuable - moreso than Starwood's. I keep Starwood 100% focused on actual hotel stays. But I've run a few of those 120k chunks through AA from Marriott: without Marriott I wouldn't be Lifetime Gold. One year, when I knew I needed a bunch of West Coast U.S. trips, I moved Marriott points into WN - paired up with ten Hertz car rentals, I had 100 credits which is a little more than 12 free tickets thanks to the Companion Pass. OK, I'm not otherwise a big WN flier, but for a fat stack of free nonstop trips to various West Coast cities I thought that was a pretty sweet deal.