Tag Archives: Travelocity

Use a Lack of Confidence in OTA Sites to Your Advantage

OTA

A recent report from the Association of British Travel Agents (ABTA) revealed an increase in complaints about false OTA websites created by fraudulent travel companies.  Many customers have lost money to these sites, while others are calling hotels directly to ensure that they are indeed making a reservation at the hotel as intended.

This apparent trend of dwindling consumer confidence matches the booming growth of the online travel sector. While customers now have unparalleled choice and freedom to compare a range of deals, they’re also faced with uncertainty when dealing with unknown companies.

Common questions: Is this deal too good to be true? Is my payment secure? Who exactly am I dealing with here? With answers to these questions unclear at times, customers are increasingly cautious.

For a legitimate OTA, this clearly presents a challenge. How can an online business give people a sense that it can truly be trusted?  Having a quality website that has well-written copy, that features up-to-date content, and has a unique tone of voice can all help give off a sense of added professionalism and authenticity.

But the ABTA report shines a light on arguably the most important way people seek assurances: they pick up the phone.   In the end, nothing replaces the human voice. As a travel company, making sure customers can talk to you day or night offers your clients an instant way to check your credentials.

No doubt, investing in a quality website can convey an extra level of trustworthiness. But many customers will always want a more immediate and reliable way of making sure your company is legitimate.

So, at a time when online shoppers are becoming less trusting and more savvy about who they deal with, having a phone number clearly listed on your website and a system to ensure every call gets answered can safeguard potential bookings from cautious customers.

For more: http://bit.ly/1PhGonk

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Filed under Hotel Industry, Management And Ownership, Technology

Hospitality Industry Management Update: “How Much Guest Data Do You Have a Right to Use?”

Pillsbury does his best to makes sure the question of data ownership is ambiguous in his contracts, Bosworth says.big data “It’s left as a, ‘Let’s leave it so that the contract is unclear on this point.’” That’s not a bad way to go. “There’s a strong motivation for the parties to play nice together,” Bennett says. “Because if a big fight breaks out over who owns the data, the answer is going to come down to, ‘None of you own this data. This is the data of the individual.’”

Using big data to gain insights about hotel guests is a relatively new development in the lodging industry. When done right, it can provide actionable intel to hoteliers that can boost room rates and drive more business to loyalty programs and marketing campaigns. And there are plenty of tech outfits stepping up to lend their expertise to hotels. “We have 18 companies now that we’ve invested in through Thayer Ventures, our venture capital arm, all in the hospitality travel technology space,” says Lee Pillsbury, co-chairman and chief executive officer of Thayer Lodging Group. “One is able to analyze the number of airline passengers overnighting in New York City in any date in the future.” If there’s a huge snowstorm coming to New York, Pillsbury says, the company will take into account the weather forecast and the 600 flights that will be canceled and determine the number of people who will now be staying overnight in Las Vegas as a result.

For more: http://bit.ly/1rX5JUQ

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Filed under Hotel Industry, Management And Ownership, Social Media, Technology

Hospitality Industry Technology Update: “Why the Hotel Industry Needs Google, Amazon or Priceline to Clean Up the Mess It Has Created”

 It is time to understand that spectacular innovation will disrupt our industry, and embracing this will help to make this transition go smooth.google-76522_640 Creating a level playing field will cause players in this industry to seize their business. Travelocity seems to be closing down in the next year, and my prediction is that we will see a rise of new players in technology, that can finally interact with us, and cause traditional PMSs, to go under, and with that all kinds of legacy companies that made their business out of the mess we created.

Have you ever wondered why you automatically get the newest version of Facebook on your phone, have made Google a synonym for search, Booking.com has just signed up its 500.000th accommodation and hotels are stuck with legacy systems for decades already, and new initiatives seem to never really take off or struggle to get traction at least? Surely these new systems seem to provide a modern solution to topics we are struggling with (online travel agencies, technology, demand management and pricing)? I started to work in the hospitality technology industry in 1999, to start up SynXis in Europe. We had a revolutionary product, ‘cloud based’, that would connect the PMS to the land of distribution, be a central reservation system for a hotel call-center and would make your scanned brochure (website) come alive with a booking engine that connected directly to the system. In 1999 Google was just starting up, hotels still received the majority of their reservations through their callcenter/reservations department and Booking.com was still Bookings.nl and just signed up their first hotel in Amsterdam.

For more: http://bit.ly/1uJF5ii

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Filed under Hotel Industry, Management And Ownership, Social Media, Technology

Hospitality Industry Technology Update: “The Hotel Booking App That Will Change Everything!”

“Also, unlike most apps, Roomlia has no ties to a user’s credit card information. It passes the credit card data on to the hotel securely,Roomlia which means that the user can handle booking changes directly with his or her hotel of choice, making it much easier on the traveler and the hotel.”

I am an avid hotel-booking-app user. I regularly toggle between Hotel Tonight, Expedia, Travelocity, and Orbitz to hunt for rooms and deals when I travel. Sometimes I use them even when I don’t have travel plans as a way to decide where I want to go. I’m cheap!

I like to search Gogobot to browse by destination. I think Hipmunk offers a stellar user experience. I am not altogether unhappy with the app landscape right now, so I’m not necessarily in the market for a new hotel booking app, but I am always willing to try something new.

For more: http://yhoo.it/1qKUGuJ

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Filed under Hotel Industry, Management And Ownership, Technology