08-20-2015, 04:01 AM
Hi White,
Okay, to clarify I should say that we are small: 9-10 rooms, and we only sell online via WuBook's Booking Engine on our own web site and through Booking.com. I do not use other OTAs and don't need to at this point.
Why limit? ($$ Incentive-->>) Well, because I pay more to Booking.com for their commission than I do via WuBook (we are also contracted with WuBook differently through a third party and we do not pay commissions per booking but rather an annual fee). So that is my first reason---pay a commission or pay none. Booking outcompetes our direct sales about 9 to 1. So the savings is significant if availability is wider on our site and people are forced to book through us...
My second reason would be that we have some rooms that are very particular and in the Booking.com standardized format I cannot describe these special rooms as well as on our site and I find that I often have a mismatch of guest expectations with the result being an occasional fairly dissatisfied customer. I would prefer to avoid that. The problem is that if I do not put even these unusual/particular rooms online, as of yet, I cannot manage to sell them completely because we are not quite getting enough direct traffic.
I realize that I can put on restrictions, but that comes with it's own issues (I had some and finally removed them; alternatively I can use PROMO codes to encourage direct bookings, but that relies on guests landing on my website and seeing the promotion to get the discount, which right now they aren't really doing. At this point those seem like indirect fixes but not the direct one. Why not allow hoteliers to pick and choose?
Controlling through availability, as a date draws near I could finally release more rooms perhaps to a certain OTA, as needed. If I put them up in the beginning I possibly lose out on direct bookings...
This is just what I am seeing in a 2.5 month period. Perhaps I need to more actively manage restrictions, but I feel like my brain can more easily deal with juggling availability...
Okay, to clarify I should say that we are small: 9-10 rooms, and we only sell online via WuBook's Booking Engine on our own web site and through Booking.com. I do not use other OTAs and don't need to at this point.
Why limit? ($$ Incentive-->>) Well, because I pay more to Booking.com for their commission than I do via WuBook (we are also contracted with WuBook differently through a third party and we do not pay commissions per booking but rather an annual fee). So that is my first reason---pay a commission or pay none. Booking outcompetes our direct sales about 9 to 1. So the savings is significant if availability is wider on our site and people are forced to book through us...
My second reason would be that we have some rooms that are very particular and in the Booking.com standardized format I cannot describe these special rooms as well as on our site and I find that I often have a mismatch of guest expectations with the result being an occasional fairly dissatisfied customer. I would prefer to avoid that. The problem is that if I do not put even these unusual/particular rooms online, as of yet, I cannot manage to sell them completely because we are not quite getting enough direct traffic.
I realize that I can put on restrictions, but that comes with it's own issues (I had some and finally removed them; alternatively I can use PROMO codes to encourage direct bookings, but that relies on guests landing on my website and seeing the promotion to get the discount, which right now they aren't really doing. At this point those seem like indirect fixes but not the direct one. Why not allow hoteliers to pick and choose?
Controlling through availability, as a date draws near I could finally release more rooms perhaps to a certain OTA, as needed. If I put them up in the beginning I possibly lose out on direct bookings...
This is just what I am seeing in a 2.5 month period. Perhaps I need to more actively manage restrictions, but I feel like my brain can more easily deal with juggling availability...