VFM Leonardo, Inc. has just released the results of its first Hotel E-Business Survey which was conducted from March 1, 2010 through April 30, 2010. The key goals of the survey were to identify and analyze what hotel e-business professionals are currently doing and what they plan to do in the next year to enhance the online presence of their hotel(s), the travel shopper experience and drive online booking conversions. The results were compiled based on responses from 590 companies across the world representing hotel interests and e-business responsibilities.

The survey unveiled some fascinating trends. Interestingly, the features that many e-business professionals are currently using do not align with those that they believe to be most effective. For example, 64% of respondents believe that “hotel tours (combinations of guided spin, zoom imagery, videos or animation)” are very effective yet only 41% have deployed this tactic.

Highlights from the survey include the most popular planned and deployed features and their effectiveness across two categories: rich media/merchandising and social media.

At a glance, the top five most effective rich media merchandising and social media tactics include:

  • User ratings and rankings: 67%
  • Hotel tours (combinations guided spin, zoom imagery, videos or animation): 66%
  • User comments and reviews: 64%
  • Videos for merchandising, advertising and demonstration: 60%
  • 360 degree spins/panoramas: 49%

This analysis of e-business professionals’ merchandising tactics offers valuable insights for online hotel merchandising and validates current online trends. Importantly, the results, across the board indicate that e-business professionals with rich media in their online merchandising strategies are finding great success. Download the full report for more details.

About VFM Leonardo | VFM Leonardo is a technology leader in online visual content management and syndication for the hotel industry. VFM Leonardo's VScape® and VBrochure™ products leverage the syndication capabilities of the VNetwork™, the most universally accepted and largest online visual content syndication network for the global travel industry. VFM Leonardo offers the most effective digital asset management and online merchandising systems available today with over 1,000,000 visual images (photos, virtual tours and videos) for 90,000 hotels worldwide currently in distribution across the VNetwork. All four global distribution systems (GDSs) - Amadeus, Galileo, Sabre, Worldspan - as well as Pegasus source hotel visual content through VScape. Tens of thousands of travel-related channels including online travel agencies, travel research and supplier web sites, search portals; Travelocity, Orbitz, Priceline, TripAdvisor, Yahoo! Travel, Kayak, Google and more also source visual content through VScape. For more information about VFM Leonardo, visit www.vfmleonardo.com. Follow us on Twitter at @VFMLeonardo.