In recent years there has been a major acceleration in the automation of many hotel processes, including those involving a shift of tasks that used to be performed by hotel and chain teams to the traveller, such as online check-in. Other automation procedures reduce internal hotel processes and save administrative and operational costs (PMS, channel manager, booking engine).
There is another large block which can be automated, and that is the one that concerns and deals with the travel journey in terms of the direct booking of a hotel room. In this highly important block, the client is the focus and the real protagonist, and the objective is none other than to save on commissions to third parties. This technological stack is essentially composed of the gears that drive the interplay between Web-Booking Engine-Metasearch Engines-Marketing Campaigns-BI. Each of the tools should be chosen carefully if, on the one hand, your goal is to grow year after year, and on the other hand, you want to be protected in times of crises (which always arrive, sooner or later), thus avoiding being dependent on OTAs.
The key is that in this stack all the cracks through which the client may abandon the purchase are patched and the user is brought back into the sales flow. To do this, you need the technologies involved to talk to each other and come into play at the right time.
Objectives of an All in One stack in direct sales
- To update and transmit information between tools in order to avoid contradictions and chaos in the information.
- To generate a cross-cutting brand sentiment at whichever purchase stage the traveller is.
- To activate sales rescue actions between the tech solutions and the marketing campaigns, which in turn increase their reciprocal performance.
Here are some examples of how tools should talk to each other:
- YOUR WEBSITE, YOUR BRAND
And how the booking engine participates in the management of information and the browsing experience.
– Rooms are your hotel’s greatest asset. The information on your booking engine and your website must be accurate and seamless. It would be great if you can update this information from your booking engine and dynamically update the information on your website at the same time in one single action: photos, descriptions, virtual tours in the engine, but also in the Rooms section, etc.
– The offer information on your booking engine should also dynamically lead to your own website, and even generate specific URLs, so that each offer becomes a possible landing page for your marketing campaigns. Dynamise, automate and optimise your team’s time.
– 3D immersive experience that starts on your website and ends in the booking process: show off the location of your hotel from the air, invite the traveller to walk around your facilities and enjoy the views from your best rooms, reveal your spaces and suggest that they check out the different types of rooms and book them on a map. To dream is to travel.
- PROMOTIONAL CODES
Manage promotional codes and agencies/companies for your entire chain
If the campaign is contingent on the insertion of a code, link your email campaign in such a way that the code is automatically inserted when the campaign is clicked on. If you prefer the client to insert it manually, make sure that the space for the code is clearly visible, without having to open parallel menus.
Any marketing action should be traceable in your BI. Assessing the profitability and impact of your campaigns is key to your decision making.
- UNMET DEMAND
And how your booking engine can come to the rescue from potential booking abandonments
Your hotel has launched paid search campaigns on Google and Bing to protect your brand, or launched a campaign on Pmax or Meta for Business… Unfortunately, your hotel is full on the requested date or your client is not ready to book at the moment. Offer a second chance to the generated click by activating a battery of automated “operation rescue” functionalities in your booking engine, such as:
- Automatically offer alternative dates close to the travel date where the hotel still has room availability.
- If the hotel is part of a chain and there are other hotels with availability in the same destination, provide the possibility to book at those other properties at the same price for the same date.
- Impact with a pop up “waiting list”, where the user can sign up with their email to this option and be impacted with a communication of availability in the event that the hotel receives a cancellation. The last rooms are very prone to be snatched up by OTAs, but with this option, your client will be the first to know about them.
- Activate automatic cart recovery and retargeting strategies to reactivate unfinished booking processes. You will also leave a digital footprint in their email inbox.
- If the client has not completed the purchase but continues to browse your website, you still have the option of providing them with a chatbot to answer their questions, or even restart the purchasing process because it is seamlessly integrated with your booking engine.
4. LOYALTY CLUB
The easier it is to join your club, the more likely it is clients will engage
- Prevent your clients from having to go to a registration page and abandon the purchase process to benefit from your Loyalty Club membership. The “book and join” option generates a 95% success rate in converting your customers into “loyal” customers compared to the 30-35% of those who have been diverted from the purchase flow and have to restart the booking process.
Fewer members = fewer users to impact with your email marketing campaigns = less control over your own demand creation = more reliance on OTAs.
- The club prices should also move around the metasearch engines. Your client should identify the existence of your club as early as possible in the buying process.
- If your club also offers tiered membership (with discounts and additional benefits) for reaching a certain number of roomnights or bookings over a certain period of time, your email marketing communications will be more colourful and will be an excuse to contact your customers and encourage them to keep repeating their stay.
- The Loyalty Club is an extension of your brand image, so it’s always a good idea to integrate it into your website and even update and manage the discount and benefit information from your own booking engine. Dynamic and updated information at all times.
5. UPSELLING AND CROSS-SELLING ACTIONS
The booking in your hotel has been completed, but your engine can optimise the sale even more…
Upgrading the booking from a standard room to a superior category or selling a tour or a show ticket to your future guest will not only increase your Average Booking Value, but will also convert your campaigns and investments in paid search, social media and metasearch into lower commission actions. Optimise the value of click marketing beyond room bookings. If during the purchase, the user has not booked the best room or has not included extras, mobilise upselling and cross-selling actions such as:
- Banners in the booking confirmation itself that, on click, take your customer to a second level of purchase, be it a restaurant reservation, a tour or a spa ticket.
- If you have a rich menu of additional services and experiences, remember that inserting an online shop can be an excellent way to increase the average booking value per customer. At busy times you may not have any rooms left to sell and increase your sales, but the good news is that you have a large list of customers at your fingertips to sell them whatever you want.
- Send your guest an email a few days prior to their arrival offering a superior room, and they will be one click away from leaving their booking upgrade fully arranged. An automated action with no management costs for the hotel, the benefit of which goes directly to your bottom line.
- Monitor the scope of these actions in our BI:
6. BI
We cannot improve what we cannot measure. Marketing campaigns, metasearch engines and the booking engine (with all its functionalities) in data
Are you able to measure the success of your offers by market? What impression share did trivago get in January in the UK? And compared to the previous year? Does any specific market require an additional discount through the loyalty club? How many times did you make an impact with your upselling email and have it turn into a room upgrade?
The undisputed power of information.
Conclusion
The technologies involved in the direct sales process must be aligned with the hotel’s objective. Like everything else, this is a team effort, and when they cannot perform on their own, they should complement each other. What is essential is that the technology travels with the user throughout the process to trigger the necessary mechanisms at each step and achieve the desired sale.
If you need further information on any of these aspects, please contact our team by emailing partnerships@mirai.com
