But here’s the good news, it doesn’t have to be this way. With the right booking engine, you can turn those potential commission losses into direct revenue gains. A well-crafted booking engine not only simplifies the reservation process for the guests but also gives you control over your bookings, rates, and guest experience. 

In this blog, we’ll uncover the must-have features of a booking engine that can help you ditch those pesky commissions and start capturing more direct bookings. 

Booking Engine for Direct Bookings

Think of your booking engine as your hotel’s charming concierge, available 24/7 to welcome guests. It’s your virtual storefront where potential guests can check out room availability, rates, and those enticing special offers—all without the middleman fees from third-party booking sites. Direct bookings through your website are not only cost-effective but also give you control over pricing and branding. 

A well-integrated booking engine enhances the user experience by offering seamless navigation and a secure booking process. This not only improves conversion rates but also fosters trust and satisfaction among guests. 

Additionally, your booking engine acts as a direct communication channel, enabling personalized upselling, cross-selling, and the opportunity to highlight unique selling propositions (USPs) such as loyalty programs or exclusive discounts. 

Features That Get More Direct Bookings for Hotels 

1. Responsive Design 

In a mobile-first world, a responsive design is a must. Your booking engine should look stunning and function perfectly, irrespective of the device your guests are using. A responsive design ensures a seamless experience, making it easy for them to book anywhere, anytime. 

2. User-friendly Interface

A user-friendly interface is crucial for encouraging guests to complete their bookings. Your booking engine should be intuitive, with clear navigation and minimal steps to finalize a reservation. Guests should be able to find what they need quickly and without confusion. Streamlined processes and clear calls-to-action (CTAs) make the booking experience pleasant and efficient, reducing the likelihood of abandoned bookings. 

3. Compelling Imagery and Descriptions 

High-quality images and detailed descriptions can make all the difference. Showcasing your rooms, amenities, and unique features with compelling visuals and engaging text can captivate potential guests. 

Highlight what makes your hotel special, from luxurious suites to scenic views and exceptional services. Descriptive content that resonates with guests’ desires can create an emotional connection, making them more likely to book directly. 

4. Real-Time Room Availability 

Guests want to know what’s available instantly. Providing real-time room availability through your booking engine ensures that potential guests see up-to-date information. This transparency builds trust and encourages bookings by eliminating uncertainty. 

Plus, integration with your property management system (PMS) keeps your inventory accurate and prevents double bookings, ensuring a smooth reservation process. 

5. Secure Payment Processing 

Security is paramount when it comes to online bookings. A secure payment gateway integrated into your booking engine protects guests’ sensitive information and ensures safe transactions. 

Offering multiple payment options and ensuring compliance with industry standards builds confidence in your booking process. Guests need to feel assured that their financial data is safe, which can significantly reduce booking abandonment. 

6. Promotions and Special Offers

Everyone loves a good deal. Prominently displaying promotions, special offers, and exclusive discounts on your booking engine can entice guests to book directly. 

Highlighting seasonal deals, package offers, and loyalty rewards provides added value that third-party sites might not offer. Making these promotions easy to find and apply during the booking process can significantly increase direct bookings. 

7. Live Chat Support

Sometimes, guests have questions or need assistance before making a reservation. Offering live chat support on your booking engine provides instant help and can resolve any doubts or issues on the spot. This real-time interaction can turn a hesitant visitor into a confirmed guest. 

Additionally, with today’s advanced chatbots, you can offer 24/7 personalized assistance, providing recommendations and handling common inquiries- just like a virtual concierge. These AI-driven chatbots ensure a seamless and engaging guest experience from booking through their stay.

Check out how: Hotel Chatbot Acts Like A Digital Concierge For Your Guests 

The All-In-One Booking Engine for Modern Hoteliers 

Regardless of the size or type of your property, having a versatile and powerful booking engine is crucial. One such advanced solution is eZee Reservations, a robust and easy-to-use online booking engine designed to cater to all hotel types, from boutique hotels and large resorts to bed and breakfasts. 

One of the standout features of eZee Reservations is upselling, which allows hotels to offer guests additional services or room upgrades during the booking process. Imagine a guest booking a standard room but being tempted by a special offer for a suite with a view; it’s an easy sell when presented seamlessly at the right moment. This feature can significantly boost revenue by encouraging guests to enhance their stay with just a few clicks.

The engine integrates with your hotel’s Facebook page, enabling direct bookings through social media—capturing guests wherever they are most active. 

Additionally, it comes with a chatbot that assists with inquiries, recommendations, and bookings around the clock, freeing up your staff for other tasks. 

The user-friendly interface and robust reporting and analytics further streamline operations and help optimize occupancy and revenue. 

Explore More: Booking System Features to Boost Direct Bookings

In a nutshell, eZee Reservations offers a comprehensive solution that enhances the booking process, improves guest satisfaction, and drives direct bookings, making it an essential tool for hotels of all sizes in today’s competitive market. 

The post Direct Bookings Made Easy: Must-Have Features in Your Hotel’s Booking Engine appeared first on eZee Absolute.

As per Google, in the past 5 years searches for ‘stay today and tonight’ have grown by 519%!

Condor Ferries

That’s why hoteliers these days are promoting last-minute bookings among their guests. If you want to know more about them, you are in the right place.

In this blog, I will guide you on…

What are last-minute bookings?

Room reservations made at the last hour or prior to the hotels’ day end process are coined as last-minute bookings.

Achieving 100% occupancy is essential yet a crucial process for hoteliers, and last-minute bookings are what save them from such unbearable losses.

Business professionals or leisure travelers have spontaneous travel plans. Hence, they book hotels at the last hour.

As per an article published by Peek,

44% of leisure travelers and 56% of business travelers chose to opt for last-minute bookings. 

Last-minute bookings are beneficial for both guests as well as hotels. It’s an opportunity for your guests to book rooms at a lower price, and for the hoteliers to maximise their occupancy.

How can hotels increase last-minute bookings?

Last-minute bookings are fruitful for hotels. Here are some strategies to increase last-minute bookings.

1. Market last-minute offers on OTAs and other platforms

OTAs and websites are one of the best online platforms to source bookings at your property. Here are some intriguing statistics shared by Condor Ferries,

An average of 148.3 million hotel bookings were made every year (Before the pandemic). Out of these, 82% of bookings were made online on OTA apps and hotels websites.

Going by these figures, you can realise the importance of having an online presence. So, I would recommend running some last-minute offers and promoting them across online booking platforms.

For OTAs, you can connect with your property’s account manager or business development officer, and ask them to activate last-minute offers. Most of these platforms have various deals on payment methods like credit cards, debit cards, and net banking.

On clubbing last-minute offers with those deals, guests get a captivating discount that makes them book a room at your hotel.

 You need to implement these offers on your website also. There are various ways to do this, such as coupon codes, flat discounts on tariffs, or cashback on specific modes of payment.

But, don’t forget to update the offer’s end date on OTAs, as well as your hotel’s website.

2. Promote offers to the target audience

One of the important rules while deploying any last-minute marketing strategy is determining your target audience and pitching them the right deals. 

You can use data analytics to understand your guests’ booking patterns and filter out the ones who have made maximum last-minute bookings.

Most of the target audiences are millennials and GenZ. Apart from them, check for your corporate guests; they have client meetings on the spur of the moment.

3. Create mobile-booking offers

Smartphones have indeed made our lives easier. With multiple hotel booking applications available for android and iOS devices, one can easily reserve a room at a property within minutes.

As per the infographics share by Condor Ferries,

72% of last-minute bookings are made on mobile within 48 hours of Google search.

That’s definitely a big percentage. You can facilitate bookings by creating app-only offers. However, this is only applicable to OTAs and your brand’s mobile application. 

Alternatively, you can run this offer on your website. But ensure your website is mobile-optimised and gives a smooth user experience while making a reservation.

4. Dynamic pricing is the solution

Another way to increase last-minute bookings is through dynamic pricing. You might be aware of how the flight prices keep on increasing during the last hour. That’s an example of dynamic pricing.

For hotels, it would work in the opposite way. If you need to achieve 100% occupancy but have a couple of saleable rooms left, you can slash down the tariff for that day.

However, avoid a prolonged use of this last-minute marketing strategy, or else it would result in a catastrophic situation.

5. Introduce short-stay rates

Travelers visiting the town for a day or having early morning flights look for a hotel to freshen up and relax. 

They do have some options such as airport lounges, transit hotels, or low-budget lodges. Hotels can be an alternative choice, but a majority of them need to be booked for a day. 

This is where you can introduce short-stay rates. You can go with a day-use tariff for such guests.

Alternatively, you can also introduce special tariffs for guests having late check-ins.

6. Do not miss long weekends

Working professionals, families, students or a group of friends often plan for a weekend getaway.

As a hotelier, this is a great opportunity for you to increase last-minute bookings at your property. You can simply reduce your cut-off period and create some weekend combo offers on several room types.

Once you create the deals, start promoting them at least 2 weeks in advance. You can market these offers as exclusive deals for loyalty program members.

7. Get registered on last-minute booking websites

There are various websites that specialise in last-minute bookings. Similar to OTAs, they deal in every hospitality business. Some of the known ones are:

• Lastminute.com
• Hotwire.com
• Hoteltonight.com
• Lastminutes.deals
• Laterooms.com

If your property is not listed on these websites, register NOW.

8. Don’t forget travel agents

Travel agents often have enquiries for spontaneous group bookings or an event where there is a sudden rush of guests. In case you have saleable rooms on any day, try connecting with travel agents.

If they have a quick booking available for that particular day, you can share your best offer and seize the opportunity. 

9. Invest in revenue management services

If you are struggling with what kind of deals to rollout, you can hire a revenue management service provider.

They would make a thorough analysis of your property’s traits, guests’ booking patterns, and other such factors. On the basis of an audit report, they will guide you on the best offers to create without risking your revenue generation. 

Once you create last-minute deals, market them using various strategies like emails, social media, and WhatsApp.

What are the implications of last-minute booking?

Last-minute bookings are profitable for hotels. Yet, they have certain backdrops. One of the negative impacts is that many of your guests wait for such discounts. 

This creates an unnecessary surge in last-minute bookings, which in the long run can result in a loss of revenue. Apart from this, the hospitality industry saw a major drop in advanced bookings, which raised concern among hoteliers.

In fact, many guests cancel their existing reservations to create a new booking at subsequently lower rates. This is yet another backdrop of last-minute bookings. 

The post 9/10 Hotels Ask How to Increase Last-Minute Bookings appeared first on eZee Absolute.

The online travel agents (OTAs) have witnessed a spike as well as loss in OTA market share. And today, there are a huge number of hotels that have stopped putting much weight on OTAs and started promoting direct bookings.

This old “OTA vs hotel direct bookings” battle has put accommodation providers in a dilemma. They are finding it hard to balance between both.

In this blog, we are going to compare the pros and cons of both OTAs and direct bookings to understand which is better.

What is an OTA Booking?

An online travel agency (OTA) also known as a hotel booking site is a marketplace that provides consumers with multiple hotels to book with. Simply put, OTAs are the middleman that connect travellers with hotels and take a small commission in the process.

In recent times, OTAs have gained tremendous traction. Millions of travellers around the world use them to plan their travel and stay.

Furthermore, OTAs are not just driving bookings to hotels, but also delivering a lot of other benefits.

• Giving hotels more visibility on the web
• Providing rich tools, analytics, and insights to target the right travellers
• Managing guest reviews and more…

What is Direct Booking?

Direct bookings are nothing but guests who book directly through a hotel’s website, phone call, email, social media, etc.

How do they get to know about the hotel? 

There are multiple factors that contribute to this. They must have:

• seen your advertisement
• read your blogs
• gone to some OTA but decided to book through your website
• seen your hotel in person and considered making a booking

Also, direct booking has its own set of benefits. Here are some of them:

• A great way to nurture a good relationship with guests
• Gives you the power to personalize the guest experience
• Can gather more data for your future marketing campaigns
• And of course, you can do away with commissions

The OTA vs Direct Booking Conflict

The opportunities OTAs present in terms of revenue are significant and it is crucial for hotels not to deprive themselves of such avenues. But hotels are still sceptical about relying on it. 

Let’s understand why it has become such a huge battle.

The rise of OTA bookings

Early on, hotel reservations were either made directly through a phone call, walk-in, or via a travel agent. But over the years, things have changed. Today, there are several ways to book a hotel room and one of them is through an OTA.

The concept of OTAs dates back to the days when Microsoft launched Expedia Travel Services in 1996 in the USA. Which was then just a tool to book a room quickly evolved and gained a lot of popularity due to the good work and a lot of branding.

But there’s another reason that ushered the popularity of OTAs — lack of transparency in the traditional system.  

When brick and mortar travel agents and tour operators were still in the game, there was a serious lack of transparency. But OTAs stepped in and quickly formed a symbiotic relationship with hotels and travellers. They let everyone have a clear picture of everything.

Since then, OTAs became a go-to medium for travellers to book a stay, resulting in more and more hotel listings.

Also, why not!

Hotels were charged a modest commission, they were getting good advertisements, and they didn’t have to spend much on their online fronts.

According to a report, travel sales generated by OTAs were about 45% of entire European travel sales revenue in 2013.

The rise of direct bookings

However, today, despite all the benefits of OTAs, hotels are getting second thoughts and considering direct bookings.

But why do hotels prefer direct bookings these days?

OTAs have lately increased their commissions, cutting into hotels’ profits. That’s not all. Hotels are becoming more concerned about their relationship with their guests. OTAs are at the front and this might not help hotels build a strong guest relationship.

Considering all of this, hotels are now struggling; they cannot let go of the OTAs as they contribute to their revenue, and also, they cannot solely rely on it too.

This is where direct bookings come into the picture. 

An increase in online bookings is inevitable and hotels are now spending significant resources and efforts in enhancing their direct bookings. Securing a share has become more important than ever now.

Let’s Address the Elephant in the Room: Which is Better?

Saying upfront that OTA is better than direct booking or vice versa wouldn’t be valid. Because, both have their own set of advantages. 

So, let us look at the similarities and the differences between both and see who wins this OTA vs direct booking battle.

Here are the similarities:

Act as an online brochure

Both OTA and your hotel website act as your hotel’s online brochure. They allow your guests to check your property’s photos, description, amenities details, etc. And then decide, whether they would want to book with you.

Contribute to revenue

For many hotels, the number of direct bookings secured might be lower compared to OTAs, but there are no commissions involved.

And when it comes to OTAs, there’s a commission involved, but the booking frequency is higher.  

Both are really critical for the hotel to keep the cash flowing.

Contribute to a hotel’s brand reputation

Both OTA and your website are critical for your hotel business. 

The experience guests get while making a reservation through your hotel website impacts your brand reputation. A seamless booking experience is a brownie point for hotels and OTAs and website booking engines deliver just that.

Allow hotels to accept bookings round the clock

Your OTA listings and your website always provide your existing/potential guests with the ability to book anytime, anywhere. They just need a smart device with an internet connection to book a stay with you.

The Internet has made reservations really simple and both OTA and direct booking win the game here over traditional reservations.

Here are the differences:

OTA delivers more visibility and reach

OTAs provide a lot of advantages to hotels, and the ‘Billboard Effect’ is one of them. People are more likely to search for your hotel and visit your website when they see you on an OTA.

Also, OTAs want to gain higher revenue. So, they provide extensive marketing to hotels, helping them reach a broader audience, and generate more bookings.

Direct bookings help with better guest relationships

I have already mentioned this above. But let me give you a clear picture here.

Every time a guest books through an OTA, his/her data gets captured and that particular OTA can use the data to communicate with them.

But OTAs are not able to build the level of close relationships a hotel builds with its guests. 

This is where direct bookings are an advantage. 

It allows hotels to gather guests’ data to cultivate meaningful relationships. Also, hotels can deliver a personalized guest experience for every individual and in return, cultivates loyalty.

Direct booking saves the revenue shares

OTAs are the most preferred booking channel. However, according to a report, hotels usually pay 15 – 30% of the value of the booked stay which is definitely a huge percentage.

Now just think, if you get most of your reservations from your website or your Facebook page and not from any OTA, how much would you actually save?

Increasing sustainable revenue is the ultimate goal for hotels apart from building a brand. And hotels that focus on driving direct reservations achieves the same. (https://spoonerberries.com)

In this scenario of OTA vs direct booking, direct booking takes the cake.

OTAs deliver an efficient experience

One of the major reasons people turn to OTAs is because they get to see and compare a lot of hotels. Also, the process of booking is really fast and seamless.

And as more people are turning to OTAs, hotels are also flocking there.

Now that we know the similarities and differences between OTA and direct bookings, can we say which one is better?

Well, I don’t think we can!

Both the approaches to drive reservation have their own set of pros and cons, but that doesn’t mean hotels can rely only on one approach.

People might argue that hotels were doing well even before the OTA boom. But that doesn’t justify the current scenario of OTA vs direct booking.

The world has become internet-savvy and everything is happening online. It’s not the hotels who have brought in the OTA trend, it’s the travellers who found it really alluring.

So, the bottom line is both OTA and direct bookings are equally important for hotels. It’s just that they need to strategize their approaches. And this brings me to my next point.

How to Strike the Right Balance Between OTA and Direct Bookings?

Even though there’s an OTA vs direct booking conflict, you can still nurture and grow your hotel business if you rethink your distribution strategy. And the best way to go about it is by leveraging prices, special offers, policies, providing guests with an incentive etc.

Here are some of the tips you can consider:

Offer loyalty program

In OTAs, travellers cannot access loyalty programs and rewards. And this is what hotels can use to their advantage and secure direct bookings.

For example: You can roll out a campaign where guests would get access to the pool and gym, free breakfast, and other amenities if they book directly with you.

Furthermore, you can also take your loyalty program and reward approach to the next level by targeting former guests. You already know their preferences and behaviour, and based on that, you can curate personalized packages.

Here’s another example: Your hotel is near the airport and there are chances that most of your guests would be the ones on layovers or someone on a business trip. You can always create packages for these groups of travellers. Provide them with exclusive amenities to relax if they book directly with you.

Implement smart pricing strategies

The price you charge for your hotel rooms is crucial for your business. And while you want to strike a balance between your OTA bookings and direct booking, concrete pricing strategies are a must.

Right price, right time, and the right avenue is the key to boost occupancy and profitability.

You can read our blog on "Powerful Hotel Pricing Strategies” to know more.

Further, you can also invest in revenue and marketing management services. Revenue managers will help you make informed, data-driven choices, rather than relying on instincts or guesswork.

Here’s another blog that will help hire the right revenue management service provider for your hotel business.

Have an effective cancellation & refund policy

A flexible and seamless cancellation policy is another great way to secure more and more direct bookings. When someone cancels a booking on an OTA, they mostly end up waiting for the refund. The process of cancellation and refund on most OTAs doesn’t entice a lot of people.

So, why not use this to your advantage again? Offer a quick refund and flexible cancellation policy on direct bookings.

Optimize your website and OTA

An optimized hotel website that is easy to use and navigate, has a proper booking engine in place, has rewards and offers, is more likely to drive direct bookings.

Similarly, it is also important for hotels to optimize their OTA listing. The OTA profile must have all the relevant updated information in place — description, high-quality picture, a proper cancellation policy and so on. 

Be it on a website or an OTA, engaging content is a hook. Period.

Also, hotels must maintain rate parity; not only to avoid cutting into your hotel’s profits but also to avoid confusing customers.

Convert OTA booking to direct bookings

Whenever a guest books a stay at your hotel through an OTA, try convincing them to book with you directly on their next visit.

Offer them discounts or something complimentary on their next stay. This is one of the overlooked strategies; but if done right, it can be really effective.

FAQs

The post Who’s Really Winning The Battle Between OTA and Direct Booking? appeared first on eZee Absolute.

And if he has a hotel website; chances are, he’s already taking steps to acquire bookings from there.

However, most of the hotels strive to rank above the OTAs in the search engines. Such that, visitors hardly reach the hotel website; let alone make a booking from there.

So, in this blog; I’m going to talk about some great ways to increase direct hotel bookings on your website; including steps to make your website visible OVER the OTAs in search results.

Let’s start from the scratch.

What are direct bookings in hotel industry?

The bookings made at your property without involvement of any third-party website or person, are termed as direct bookings. 

Since these are commission-free (and of course more profitable) bookings, naturally any hotelier would wish to acquire more of them. 

And if we look at the facts,

Nearly two-thirds of guests prefer to book direct with hotels.

Triptease

Having said that, if you’ve not started focusing on this aspect of hotel management, you should START doing this right away.

In this blog, I am giving you 14 assured strategies to increase direct hotel bookings:

There are two mediums through which you can increase direct bookings:

1. Your website
2. Other platforms

Let’s first see, 

How to increase direct hotel bookings from your website?

Your website is the face of your hotel brand, therefore it has to be excellently developed. Here’s how you can drive maximum bookings from your website:

1. Have a mobile-friendly hotel website

First things first, have a mobile-friendly hotel website or turn it into one. Besides, it should be accessible on all devices; be it a laptop or PC, or even tablets. The more accessible or reachable you are, the higher opportunity there is to acquire direct hotel bookings.

Moreover, keep in mind that whenever any visitor comes to your website, the very first page he visits is your homepage. For a better conversion, give as much information as you can on your website homepage.

You can also highlight your unique selling services, or your scenic surroundings (if there are any) to attract the visitors to book with you.

2. Integrate a booking engine to your website

You made your website responsive. Great! People are visiting your website, browsing it, and now want to book with you.

But, there’s a DEAD END there!

Why? Because you don’t have a booking engine integrated with your website!

Here, having a hotel’s brand website is just not enough. You need to integrate the best (READ: attractive and effective) booking engine, which will let your visitors book directly with you from the website itself.

A booking engine that just fetches the direct bookings is not enough. It SHOULD impel your website’s visitors and convert them to bookers. 

3. Optimize website to rank on Google

Your visitor lands on your website. What next? Lead him to your booking engine to book with you.

Nowadays, your guests would always explore your hotel and more options on search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing, to book their stay. 

And you SHOULD be there; where your guests are looking for you.

And to be there, you need to perform search engine optimization (SEO) of your hotel website. 

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is the process used to rank your hotel website on these search engines for more quality and quantity traffic. 

SEO service includes; building links from relevant sites, optimizing page content with keywords, and more. (Read all about hotel SEO – here)

Apart from this, maintain your website’s loading speed. Nobody likes a website that keeps loading for even 10 seconds.

According to Tnooz, 

32% of bookings on mobile devices are abandoned due to slow loading time.

Phocuswire

A slight delay can let bookers leave and switch to your competitor’s site, which will ultimately break your conversion rates.

Having said that, improvise your hotel website’s loading speed to give a flawless user-experience to your visitors while booking with you. 

4. Keep attractive CTAs on your website

Your visitor lands on your website. What next? Lead him to your booking engine to book with you.

You see, your visitor has landed on your website, he has explored your services, rooms, gallery and other pages, but he hasn’t booked with you yet.

What do you think you missed?

Well, let me tell you – it is the attractive call-to-action (CTA).

In simple words, I’m talking about the BOOK NOW button or booking box.

Your CTAs play an important role to get you more bookings, that’s why do not forget to keep appealing CTAs (Call To Actions) on your website. The CTAs should be that attractive that your visitor can’t help and click on it.

5. Highlight social proofs for your website visitors

These days, none of your guests will book their stay without checking your hotel ratings and rankings, client testimonials, social media followers and case studies. 

So, consider highlighting your reviews on your website or any of the above said parameters. 

These factors work as a proof for your visitors. By displaying these, you are giving them an assurance that your hotel is well known and trusted.

Believe me, this would definitely encourage your visitors to book their stay with you.

6. Use widgets on your website

Engaging with your visitors at every stage increases the possibilities to convert them into a booker.

But you may ask, how can you engage with each and every visitor? 

To start with, offer “direct booking discounts” to the visitors for booking directly through the website. 

Around 45% of travelers consider offers and perks important while booking.

Skift

Additionally, get a booking engine which has ready plug and play widgets; such as exit pop ups, quick notifications, welcome box, and many more. This will engage with your visitors effectively and direct them to book with you.

When your guests come across such notifications and highlights, they get more curious and they might book with you instantly. 

7. Let your visitors compare rates

Before booking a hotel room, your guests tend to go through several websites and other multiple OTAs to compare the prices. 

Now, what if you can provide them the comparison on your website itself? 

Try giving your website visitors the best possible comparison, so they can make the decision there and then. 

By doing this, your chance of getting direct bookings increases and on the other hand, it minimizes your dependence on OTAs.

Note: eZee Reservation has this price widget, through which you can give the comparison of the hotel rates with the OTA’s rates on the website itself.

8. Implement a live chatbot to attend guest inquiries

When visitors land on the hotel website and browse through your website, they may have several queries. And you have to answer them instantly, because if they don’t get any reply within a few minutes, they may leave. 

And you know what, this may lead to a bad hotel brand reputation. 

In such a case, if you’ve got a chatbot, it becomes easy for you to provide instant replies to your website visitors. 

If your guests have any questions, they would instantly ask the chatbot. And within a few seconds the chatbot will answer their queries. 

When they will get their answer in a fraction of seconds, they will be able to make a decision instantly. 

So these were some ways to generate direct hotel bookings from your website. Now you may think, what could be other mediums to get bookings from?

Let us explore them in detail:

How to increase direct hotel bookings apart from your website?

Well, there are lots of other ways to get more direct bookings. This is why many hoteliers still skip the thought of not owning a brand website. As, it’s not just your website that counts; but your reviews, your social media presence, and a plethora of other factors that affect your hotel’s direct sales.

Here’s how you can make the most of them.

9. Make the most of metasearch engines

According to Trivago,

Roundabout 50% of all online bookers make use of metasearch to discover their perfect hotel.

It is a search engine that collects different hotel rates and availability from other websites and shows the combined results, all in one place.

Listing your hotel on metasearch engines makes you more visible in the online market. It not only helps you get more online bookings but also increases your brand value globally.

Further, you can also run ad campaigns on the metasearch engines like TripAdvisor, Trivago, and Google to drive bookings. 

Not to mention, search giant Google has rolled a program called Free Hotel Booking Links for hotels worldwide to showcase their real-time direct booking rates for free. 

#PointToNote: Hotels can enroll for this program only through Google’s authorized integration partners. You can read more about it here. 

So make sure you are listed on all the possible metasearch engines.

10. Manage your online reviews

Reviews pose as a key factor in your guests’ purchase decision. 

Almost 80% of bookers consider reviews to be essential before making the final reservation. Good reviews can affect a traveler’s booking choice to a great extent. Therefore, it is important to strategically promote positive guest reviews on your website.

You can also share your positive reviews on your social platforms to build a strong brand reputation. 

And make sure that just collecting reviews is not enough, you have to respond to them timely. 

And to do that, you can use our ready-made review response templates to quickly respond to the website reviews.

11. Let guests book directly from social media

With the rapid and unstoppable march of social media, hotel marketing has grown by leaps and bounds. Hence, marketing through social media-based channels is an excellent tool for dominating search results and to drive social media traffic to your hotel website.

Moreover, set up your profile on social media, post amazing content and lure your followers to visit your hotel once. 

Even best; you can integrate your booking engine with your Facebook page and let your fans book with you from the Facebook page itself. 

Now, amid the hustle and bustle of hotel operations, you may not  be able to post the content regularly on your social media handles. 

To help you with that here, our social media posts templates. Simply download the templates, choose your favourite one and start posting. 

12. Implement targeted marketing

When you have an advanced hotel software, it can give you detailed guest data from your hotel PMS. From that, you can know your customer segments, build targeted reports, and marketing elements that you can further personalize to each guest. 

Also, you can work upon enhancing your guest experience by sending them pre-arrival, post-stay, or some precisely targeted emails, thereby increasing the number of repeat guests. 

Besides, when happy customers leave your hotel, don’t consider that as the end of the service. Keep in touch by sending special offers to happy customers on important occasions like festivals, long weekends, their birthdays and anniversaries.

Offer them special discounts to book online. Ask them to subscribe to your newsletter and send them compelling newsletters from time to time, and make them think about returning to your hotel.

13. Run ads to make visitors book directly

Your marketing strategy should be different for every sort of audience. For example, it should be different to attract new bookers, to visitors who landed on your website once, or bookers that frequently visit OTAs to book a hotel room.

And do you know which marketing strategy lets you cater to all these audiences distinctly?

Online ADS.  

You can run different online ads on Google, Facebook or any other platforms

You can design target-specific ads campaigns or strategies for increasing hotel room sales and website direct bookings.

For better ad conversions; you can also make use of our Google ad templates as well as Facebook ad templates.

14. Run loyalty programs

Your repeat guests always want to feel more special, and loyalty programs have always been a great way to do so.

By giving exclusive deals and discounts to repeat customers, you can create a powerful way to boost repeat visits that are booked directly through your website.

Loyalty programs is one of the best strategies to attract your guests to choose you over your competitors.

The post 14 Great Ways to Increase Direct Bookings on Your Hotel Website appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Hotels that reflect and feature on the websites of ‘Online Travel Agents (OTA)’ clinch an additional benefit of getting more reservations over and above direct sales. This advantage, in the hospitality industry, is often referred to as ‘Billboard Effect ’ through which hotels observe an upswing in the number of direct reservations through various connected distribution channels and hotel’s website. This effect not only quantifies the number of direct bookings but also enriches hotel’s online search. Numerous hoteliers over the globe have adopted this marketing technique to wangle an astonishingly great number of reservations through the middlemen.

Let’s see step by step what magic can the billboard effect do for your hotel business

Be as visible online as any other bigger brand

Modern travelers tend to surf dominant OTA websites before finalizing their travel plan for the sake of comparison between different hotels, locations, visitor reviews as well as best deals.Ultimately, this increases the chances of traveler visiting the hotel’s own website to seek more information once he finds it acceptable on the travel site. Essentially, Billboard effect is all about being present everywhere, as these travel giants splurge a huge amount of money in marketing and advertisements which eventually help you building your brand stature vis-à-vis the bigger established brands.

Save yourself from extravagant marketing costs

Prominent OTAs spend a herculean amount on online advertising; this has significantly affected the increase in sales trend of the hotels. The precipitous rise of hotel OTAs is also because of the fact that these travel sites offer a wide range of hotels to bookers in a single place to select from instead of conducting a long and exhausting individual hotel search. Even though the booker found your reference on the OTA, many of them will still visit your website before finalizing the booking. You can easily take advantage of this opportunity to attract the guests directly while saving a lot on marketing expenditures.

Access reliance on the Billboard Effect can get a little sour

We all are aware that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Thus, use of the Billboard effect is a little bitter-sweet as trying to be present and managing a huge number of distribution sites can go little awry as well. Quite often, things go out of control when hotels receive a massive number of booking but are unable to update their inventory on all the associated site. It can lead to over-bookings which…. let’s face it, is a sticky and very unpleasant situation. Additionally, with an upsurge in the bookings through the OTA, the commission the hotel has to pay increases as well.

What should a hotelier to do? How can you take advantage of the billboard effect without facing the negative impact of the approach?

What you need to do is a complete analysis of the current situation and apply a few well-tested approaches that attracts more direct bookings compared to the OTA.

Offer the most competitive rate

When the bookers visit your website, make sure they are aware that they will get the best price while booking directly with you instead with third-party agents.

Take advantage of guest reviews

Make sure to have a lot of positive reviews on OTA portals as well as your hotel website, this will definitely impact your sales positively and attract new guests to experience your hospitality.

Responsive website and content marketing

One of most obvious methods of converting lookers into bookers is offering a smooth and user-friendly booking experience with your website. At the same time, don’t forget the importance of content marketing either through promotions, a fresh and new travel blog series or newsletter.

To conclude

Thus, it is beyond doubts that the ‘Billboard Effect’ can work in your favor enchantingly well to enhance your brand reach and online visibility. Part of the magic formula is to be unswervingly represented across all influential OTAs, succouring to strengthen your brand reputation while not losing control of the situation to maintain a win-win situation.

The post Billboard Effect And The Magic It Can Do For Your Hotel Business! appeared first on eZee Absolute.