Increase Hotel Direct Booking with Location Targeting

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Increase Hotel Direct Booking with Location Targeting

Posted on | Posted in Hotel Trends & Advice, Marketing, Technology

Hotel booking systems run by OTA”s are managed by different sellers who are trying to sell their rooms online. The only problem is that your hotel is one among thousands of accommodations putting rooms up and these other accommodations can lower their prices to grab more customers.

Target customers using IP address

Hotel booking systems run by OTA”s are managed by different sellers who are trying to sell their rooms online. The only problem is that your hotel is one among thousands of accommodations putting rooms up and these other accommodations can lower their prices to grab more customers. The OTAs focus mainly on prices that are the lowest and this could make your hotel lose out on a ton of customers.

Direct hotel bookings have become more and more popular over time. People are now preferring to make their reservations directly with the hotel on the internet. All your customer needs are to be sitting on their computer or using their mobile and everything will be done from there. One of the top reasons that make customers prefer to book directly with your hotel is because it’s easier than dealing with a middle man if they have to negotiate. 

The booking journey is very complicated since travelers can jump from site to site, which can cause the hotel to lose customers. The hotel should use the golden opportunity once guests are on the site. One of the best features if the hotel has available in their booking system is “IP address-based sale” known as location targeting. 

What is location targeting?

It’s known as IP address-based market sourcing, IP geolocation or IP address-based targeting. Location Targeting allows you to display relevant booking rates to users in a particular country, city, state, or even down to the zip code.

How does it work?

The process involves mapping an IP address to a geographical location. The process is done by means of reverse DNS lookup. Once this has been done, you would have access to information about the customer’s street and city name which would allow you to determine if they are in the area that you are targeting for your business expansion or marketing campaigns. This will make it easier for you to tailor your marketing strategies so that they are more effective in reaching people who are likely to become your customers sooner than later.

How does this help?

In a Nutshell: 

  • Allows you to display different rates to different people depending on their geographics. You can effectively display rates depending on which country they are from, some countries have better economies and can yield higher rates.
  • Ability to create specials and promotions depending on geography.
  • Can gather new data on clients and their behaviours depending on where they are.

This all means that you can maximize your revenue per room and reach more customers.

Learn from OTAs

The OTAs use location targeting to find markets where they can display your hotel. They have made use of this feature for many years with or without you knowing about it. It comes as no surprise if no one made a direct booking on your own website, because your price has been undercut in different locations. Of course, there’s a given promise to keep your prices consistent from OTAs.

What if you can take advantage of this feature with your own booking engine, marketing your offer to different geographics? Not to mention that it is an untapped stream of revenue for hotels to easily take advantage of? 

This is an added advantage that many hotels are starting to realize and tap into. Join this movement by getting your own professional booking system.

To summarize

Hotel booking systems are a vital part of hospitality. For business or pleasure, millions of people travel each year. Hotels are a natural choice for those who are looking to book a room and enjoy some downtime. In today’s highly competitive marketplace, hotels want to offer a quality product and stay on top of their game. This is where hotel booking systems come into play. Having your own booking system can help to divert some of the discrepancies we discussed above. 

Our booking system comes with added benefits like; The ability to set up different rates for different customers or groups of customers. You can create different rates and special offers as per your requirement. This will help you to attract more customers and generate more revenue from the same number of rooms in your hotel.

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