In our last article—“What Does Our Hotel Website Need to Work Effectively?”—we discussed the importance of having our own website for our hotel or resort and what features it must include to be effective and generate bookings. Today, we’ll be writing about an important aspect of the website: the online booking system.
As mentioned in our last post, it’s essential to have your own booking system on your website. Here’s why:
- Nowadays, over 70% of all bookings are made through online booking systems. If this option isn’t available, guests are practically being invited to book elsewhere.
- An online booking system increases the percentage of direct sales, reduces the influence of intermediaries, and thus lowers the cost of acquiring new guests.
- These days, no guest has time to wait for an email response. If that response doesn’t show any available rooms at the hotel or offers an unsatisfactory price, the situation becomes even more negative. Therefore, it’s essential to provide a tool that gives potential guests direct information.
- Having our own booking system also allows us to offer customers specific deals that aren’t available anywhere else. We can also display cross-selling offers for other products or services.
At present, developing an online booking system independently—with all its complexities—is feasible for only a very small number of hotels. Therefore, it will be essential to have it developed and implemented by a specialist. There are many options available in this sector, so we should carefully analyze all possibilities, as our success will depend on this platform.
Here are a few things to keep in mind:
- From the moment we launch our own online booking system, we’ll be competing directly with other specialists in this field. To gain a competitive edge, our system should be easier to understand and use than our competitors’.
- It should also be easy for us to manage—for example, to keep it constantly up to date with new reservation figures and bookings, to change prices, and so on. We should be able to carry out these tasks quickly and accurately.
- The booking method and system we’ve chosen should be integrated with our other tools.
- It should be visually appealing to encourage visitors to our website to make a booking. A dull design with sluggish performance won’t be as successful as an attractive platform.
- Some customers prefer to book through travel portals because they believe that cancellations work better that way. This is due to the fact that cancellation information is often missing from hotel websites. Our website should not only highlight this but also provide specific information on cancellation options for payments, etc., to give guests the service they need and a sense of security in case of any issues.
- The system should be designed to be user-friendly.
- More and more customers are using platforms like Facebook for their research. That’s why our system should be linked to Facebook and other social media platforms.
- Ultimately, however, the system should be helpful not only for the end customer but also for us. Therefore, each booking system method must be carefully reviewed for monthly costs, commissions, etc.
So there are many things to consider when choosing the right booking and reservation method. As
suggests, we should analyze each point to find the best option for us and the hotel or resort.
We hope this article has helped you better understand online booking systems. If you enjoyed it, please share it!
