Three opportunities to get the most out of Peak Season
As we all know it is peak season and most of the hoteliers are working at full speed. Booking.com organized a webinar about this subject and we were there to gather the juicy details for you.
Booking.com marks the peak season from June up to August, a period where they notice an increase in booker activity. Their solution: grab those (peak season) opportunities and make them work for you! Of course, they looked at opportunities that reduce the day-to-day workload, that improves guest experiences and that gives you more control over revenue. The three opportunities that were highlighted are as follows:
1. Improve property page content
''Turn lookers into bookers!'' was one of the first things Booking.com said in this webinar. Travellers book more quickly when they see a relevant, clear and high-resolution photo. Throw those photos of fruit baskets and croissants out of the window, and start showing more relevant visuals of your hotel. By the way, travellers read less than 18% of the property description. So our advice is to keep the descriptions short and clean!
Fun fact: Properties with a 100% property page score get up to 18% more bookings.
2. Enable messaging with guests
Guests expect quick answers to their questions. Booking.com researched what kind of communication is most appreciated by guest, and you know what? It turns out that 50% of the guests don't really care if their questions are answered by a real person or a computer. But, even more interesting: most of the travellers prefer self-service to get the information they need.
Booking.com has a booking assistant were you can quickly respond to guests' most commonly asked questions. Before being able to use this application you will need to set up messaging templates and automatic replies, but in the end, it saves you time and the guests get faster replies.
You can find more information about this tool right here.
3. Offer special deals: Genius
Genius is a travel rewards program connecting our top-performing partners with high-value bookers. Properties in the Genius programme have priority visibility in Genius bookers' search results. Setting those special offers results in an average of +15% additional bookings, higher visibility on search results.
Well, enough talking: let's get most out of Peak Season with these opportunities!
About SmartHOTEL
SmartHOTEL delivers Smart and Simple channel management software with service as a hospitality. Our experienced team of hospitality professionals and smart developers are going all the way in solving the distribution challenges of over 2000+ hotel partners already. For any questions regarding our solutions, feel free to contact us on +31 (0)182 75 11 18, or mail to [email protected].
Chantal Mieremet
Consultancy
