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What are the Best Practices for Creating a Google Hotel Ads Campaign?

Google Hotel Ads has emerged as an important channel for hoteliers to improve online exposure of their properties. In this blog, we list out some of the best practices that are involved with the creation of a Google hotel ads campaign.

What are the Best Practices for Creating a Google Hotel Ads Campaign

About 4.5 billion searches are made on Google every day, making it essential for every business to have presence on the platform. Over the last few years, Google Hotel Ads has emerged as the most popular platform in the metasearch space.  Which for years have been dominated by the OTAs. GHA which aggregates your hotel rates from participating OTAs and brand website and displays your hotel rates and availability on Google, across desktops, tablets, and mobile devices? Find out about some of the best practices for the creation of a Google hotel ads campaign.

Familiarize yourself with the interface

In order to be successful with Google hotel ads, it is essential to be familiar with the interface and know what goes into it. The sign-up process is quite similar to Google PPC campaign. Hotels need to create a Google Hotel Center account to send and manage hotel rates and availability across Google. The interface is user-friendly, effective and efficient. Once you have listed your property, connect your prices and availability to your ads by linking your Hotel Center account to a Google Ads account and start advertising.

Use data to your benefit

Data that is recorded by Google systems lets you pinpoint those things that are/are not working. Reports every week are offered in detail, and how your campaign is proceeding in each device. Make use of opportunity reports every week to detect missed opportunities. Know about the areas that you might have improved on, and prepare better for bid optimization in the following round.

With conversion tracking, you can exactly find out what happens when anyone visits your site. You can get information on cost per acquisition, how long a person stays in the accommodation and whether or not they booked a room. The use of this information and other performance metrics for the adjustment of Google hotel ads booking campaign strategies can help you to derive the best from your experience of Google Hotel Ads.

Group hotels and manage bids better

In case you are operating bids for more than one hotel property, group the properties together. This can let you manage the same in a more efficient way and optimize returns on investment. The principles happen to be the same for each hotel property that is part of the group. When you structure bids, you have to remember that.

Optimize your ads

For optimizing your ad spends, Google recommends hotels to provide entire inventory to Hotel Ads along with room and package Meta data. The details comprise of data about occupancy levels and rooms, and all the updated prices and active bids can ensure accuracy of prices. The ads which notch up the best numbers are generally those that offer the most information. Optimized ad can help hotels to have much better business and increase the bottom line.

Google Hotel Ads campaigns can provide future travelers with the chance to reserve a hotel room at many important hotels all through their research. Wherever a user makes decisions related to travel, hotel ads are surfaced by Google to assist them in the assessment of booking options and pricing available to them.

Find Hotel channel manager and Online Distribution.

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Is your PMS enough for distribution?

Channel Managers and Hotel Property Management Systems have been around for quite a few years now. Whether you are a real estate agency, a hotel, a B&B manager or the owner of some family properties, there are chances that you are looking for the type of software that can help you out the best. Here are some differences between Channel Management systems and Property Management Systems, which can let you understand such platforms better and take an informed decision.

Is your PMS enough for distribution

Purpose

Property Management Systems are a type of software system that is created to make daily operations management easier for real estate companies, hotels or rental agencies. The aim is to assign, schedule and organize tasks and these are especially helpful for reporting, accounting and staff management. Channel Managers, on the other hand, specialize in distributing short-term rentals to listing websites, whether it comes to wholesalers, GDS, Metasearch, Vacation Rental sites or OTAs.

Capability

PMS systems are created originally in the form of front desk hotel software, and are made to follow trends in the market and can redirect them to vacation rentals or some other expanding sector. With the use of this type of system, you can spend less time in dealing with business and get more time to concentrate on guest experience and guests.

A PMS channel manager can let you deal with time-consuming operations of managing a vacation rental business. A PMS channel manager updates information automatically across every booking channel and can automate payments and online reservations. Dedicated channel managers, however, are online distribution specialists and can frequently offer much more connections across many channels.

Sophistication

When you choose a property management system integrated with a channel manager, it can help you in online property management and can ensure listing distribution for you across many websites. A PMS or company has several advantages. Property management systems offer automated guest communication services, business performance analytics, in-built accounting services and many more.

PMS coming with an in-built channel manager can be very useful for your own business. A dedicated channel manager is useful in all those cases where there is a drop in the functionality of a property management system. There are more sophisticated capabilities of dedicated channel managers, which can let you create a very complex type of pricing model as per your wish. While PMSes and channel managers tend to vary in nature, the former lacks the sophisticated features that are part of dedicated channel managers – such as pushing right property specs and dealing with a complicated pricing model.

Support

A few property management firms have a team comprising of local employees that care for on-site upkeep and maintenance. But you can expect a built-in expert team with dedicated channel managers, which come with the support of a team comprising of expert distribution professionals. The team of experts of the developer company has a direct communication line with booking websites as well as other channels, due to the fact that a high volume of properties is offered by dedicated channel managers to listing websites.

 

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6 Great Types of Content for Hotel Website for Increase in Bookings

6 Great Types of Content for Hotel Website for Increase in Bookings

A good hotel website that is rich in content can help you to attract potential customers and influence them enough to book a room in your hotel. Good content can also improve your hotel website’s search engine ranking. Here are 6 types of great content for your hotel website that can increase bookings.

  1. New menu

If you have just released a new menu, you have to announce the same. Use your hotel website to allow guests to find out you are preparing new mouthwatering dishes in your in-hotel restaurant. This can provide them with a good reason to check out your online menu. It can fill them up with enough anticipation to make a reservation. It can even attract local guests who are loyal to your business and who might like to often dine at your restaurant.

  1. Top local attractions

Write down about the places of interest in your area, and all that the region has on offer for travelers. Sharing such information can show travelers that you are knowledgeable and assistive, and the content can also attract random people looking for those topics on Google and other search engines. You may also write about the best restaurants, walking routes, shops etc in your area.

  1. Upcoming events

If there are upcoming events in your region, you may cover them as well, similar to the local attractions. You can write down various details regarding the event, such as the number of people who are anticipated to attend it, how far the venue is from your hotel etc. Write down whether a special discount is being offered with the tickets.

  1. Holiday content

You can create content that is related to holiday events. Mention whether your hotel would be offering complementary wine on Valentine’s Day upon arrival or free dinner to moms on Mother’s Day. You may write a post about a treasure hunt that you might be hosting on Easter at your hotel or the top 5 foods to have in your in-hotel restaurant for Christmas dinner. When you create content timely around particular holidays, you can attract customers enough to turn them into your hotel guests.

  1. Video tour

You may also make a video tour of your own hotel property. It can transport guests straight to your hotel property via their PC / mobile screen. You can hire a professional to shoot high-quality videos that can portray your hotel with all the vivid details, lending a personal touch to the same. You may walk guests straight through the outdoor spaces, restaurants, common areas such as lounge, rooms, suites and more. All these can help customers get a bigger and better view of your hotel property.

  1. New feature

You may also use your hotel website to announce any new feature that you have added at your hotel, such as a redecorated restaurant, Jacuzzi baths, king-size beds in all rooms, spa facility, gym, swimming pool etc. Basically, if you have bettered your hotel in any way, let potential guests know about the same.

Content plays a huge role for traffic pulled and bookings are done on your hotel website. Get Hotel channel manager & Online Distribution.

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How to Increase Bookings from Hotel Booking Website?

These days, it is important for hospitality businesses to have a website of their own. Whether you have a small hotel in a quiet town in the country or running an independent hotel or managing hotel chains in some of the best destinations across the world, you have to know how to develop and design a hotel website that grabs the attention of your targeted market and makes travelers interested enough to drive bookings. When you are building a website for your hotel property, here are some important factors that you have to take into account.

How to Increase Bookings from Hotel Booking Website

Brand

You would like your website visitors to keep your hotel brand in consideration. For this reason, you have to consistently showcase your brand through your whole website. A lively color scheme and logo will let you establish a wonderful identity and let you associate with your target audience and establish a personal relationship.

Target market

Your site’s features have to be appealing to the wants and needs of your target market. In case your hotel is targeted at luxury vacationers, you have to post lovely images of the fantastic amenities in your hotel property. Post content that can be attractive to your audience. If you like to draw travelers who are from the millennial generation, your photos have to feature active, young adults who enjoy your property completely.

Booking form

Guests have to make the booking experience on your site a simple experience. This is the reason you have to spend on a hotel reservation engine that can be used easily and which also lets you boost conversions. It is also essential that you integrate a major call-to-action message such as “Book Now” to grab the attention of users.

SEO plans

There is no point to spend on a new site in case it cannot be found on the Google SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). Make sure that your website content is properly optimized to rank for keywords that are relevant and is a vital factor in drawing traffic. Your SEO (Search Engine Optimization) plans are necessary to consider.

Site speed

Your website has to load fully and quickly in just a few seconds. Otherwise, your hotel can be at risk of losing potential guests to competitors. Make sure that your hotel site is designed to be fast loading. Keep in mind that even a delay of 2 – 3 seconds can make users impatient enough to go to the website of your competitors and opt for whatever they have on offer, even if it means opting for a more expensive deal.

Mobile capabilities

You require a website design that is responsive, and your hotel site builder has to assist you in achieving the same. A responsively designed hotel site can let your users navigate easily to your site – whether they use a mobile device or a desktop. The booking engine for your hotel should also accept mobile reservations, given that more and more travelers are making bookings with mobile devices. It can enhance the experience of users, and aid your SEO efforts.

Get Hotel Room Distribution Management and Channel manager software.

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7 Ways to Ease the Work of Distribution of Hotels for Better Business Growth

Online Hotel Distribution System

The hotel industry is gaining more popularity and the distribution is becoming easy and technically advanced. The customers who want to book the hotels are also changing and easy distribution becomes a way to gain momentum in the industry.  As the distribution becomes more scientific and smooth, the trends of the hotels and its customers are evolving for building a stronger structure.

  1. Distribution methods and channels are increasing – the multiple online booking methods are becoming the talk of the travellers. They keep using these platforms as and when they find it beneficial. The hotels are also expanding their network and finding channels like the travel agents who work online and the other areas through which they can ensure further bookings of their services. The main thing is to choose the most important channels that will give the hotels maximum benefits in booking.
  2. Metasearch engines and their extensive uses – This is a new way for marketing for the hotels. The sites can provide a lot of information that these search engines use for providing the viewer’s their choice of information. The use of these search engines has helped the travellers and the hotels too. They can compare the rates and accommodation choices and then choose the hotel that is best for them. The hotels are listing themselves in the metasearch so that they get a boost for their business.
  3. Cost reduction also helps – the travel agents are there to take care of their commissions but these online distribution channels often save the commission payments for the hotels. The booking generated through their own website often makes it easier for the travellers. The social media and the metasearch engines are there to drive direct bookings and eliminate the commission based agents who often can charge exorbitant from the travellers.
  4. Varied stay options beyond regular – There are different ways of booking accommodations. The travellers try these ways for staying at different times in the hotels. Vacation rentals are such options that the hotels use to list the properties and the other information regarding the availability and the charges of the rooms. The traveller now has got more choices and easy way to opt for such choices.
  5. Blockchain also helps in eliminating commission payments – This is another technology that the hotels use to build up records for proper room occupancy, inventory and rates of the rooms. The information helps customers and help eliminating OTA and other third-party platforms that survives on commission. As this is a new technology – the hotels have not used its full potential to eliminate extra cost.
  6. Tools and technologies from OTAs – The modern technology has also evolved for the OTAs and they are trying to bring about changes in the way they work. They are taking to advanced technology and preparing tools through which they can offer their service for the hoteliers. This also helps the hotel owners and the travellers at the same time.
  7. Expert channel managers and their efficiency – The channel managers are taking care of the hotel administration and are getting better results for the industry. The hotels are hiring the channel managers who are experienced and have given good results. The expertise and knowledge of these professionals are changing the way the hotels and the travellers are working for each other.

These are some of the new trends and easy ways to bring about work distribution in the hotel industry. These will either improve or they may give in to better and more advanced ways to take care of the services and rates.

To know more about Online Hotel Distribution System, visit https://www.erevmax.com/

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Travel and Holidays – What Does the Future Hold in Store?

Every day, new marketing techniques and tools are launched almost every week – which increases the complexity of the marketing sector. Experts have different ideas and opinions about how holidays will be like two or three decades from now. The possibilities are limitless.

Virtual travel will be ‘in’:

Travel is likely to become virtual In the future. By the year 2050, holidays for most people will be about enjoying the popular as well as not so popular attractions of the world from the comfort of home. Time travel will be in, and it will be possible for travellers to visit New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina ravaged it or seeing the Pyramids right after their completion – all through virtual reality. They will be able to customize their surroundings and the weather, and also get a digital tour guide. They can also make situational or hypothetical travel – such as visiting the Taj Mahal without the tourists. This will help them remove the stress of travel without needing to visit the locations actually.

Travel and Holidays

More personalized travel experience:

Travel brands, in order to get brand recognition and loyalty, need to make use of customer data in such a way that shoppers can get value. The travel marketing techniques are likely to be made more personalized to help customers find the most relevant travel products and ideas for their choices – whether it comes to room, hotel, airline, airport or occupancy duration type.

Smarter Retargeting:

While retargeting has existed for quite a few years, it is expected to see more innovation. Travel companies will use live user session user profiling in real-time, which would allow a smarter retargeting that offers more relevant recommendations and information to users. For travel brands, it can increase the ROI significantly on every interaction.

Use of Chatbot technology:

Travel brands are making increasing use of the chatbot technology from companies such as Amazon, Expedia and Skyscanner, in an attempt to pre-empt the purchase requirements of customers. The use of Cortana or Alexa can be expected sooner rather than later.

Use of PWAs (progressive web apps):

These come with all the good things about mobile websites and mobile-based applications. These are delivered online and act just like native apps. PWAs help sell holidays quickly and form an important part of the overall user experience. The programs also operate in areas with inferior connectivity or in those spots where connectivity drops and comes – as in cars or trains. These will help travellers on the move.

Get Hotel booking channel manager software at https://www.erevmax.com/ratetiger/ratetiger.html.

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How to Know When Your Hotel Property Management System Needs a Change?

Property Management System (PMS) is important for hotel properties, and here are a few signs to indicate when it needs a change.

With changes in time, the needs of your hotel tend to change and the goals and requirements of your hotel property, staffs and guests change as well. The Property Management System (PMS) of your hotel has a short longevity. Here are a few signs that will indicate when your PMS needs a change.

hospitality property management software

Less control / idea about hotel operations

The main purpose of a Property Management System is to smoothly manage the operations of your hotel. The long-term success of your hotel depends on a PMS that satisfies the reporting requirements of your hotel. In case the existing system makes it impossible or tough for you to generate the numbers required for your business’ growth or evaluation, you should look for a new PMS that makes the job easy. With a good PMS, you can create customized reports and filter, export and sort the data that you need.

Your existing PMS frustrates employees

The actual worth of a PMS is defined basically by those who use it every day. If your staffs complain that the existing system in your organization is buggy, slow and comes with poor support, it is better that you get in touch with a new PMS that is known to offer a better user experience and uptime. A strong Property Management System makes even complicated tasks simpler, and ensures that everything is automated and each process is streamlined.

Your PMS requires 3rd party app integration

With PMS, it is often complained that these do not integrate or important communication tools and features cannot be implemented fully. If the existing PMS in your workplace is showing its age, and seems to be outdated enough as far as features and integration go, it is important to go for a new one. It is important for your PMS to be cloud-based and ensure that its data can be accessed in real-time in all departments.

You are paying higher maintenance and vendor support costs

If the support and service for your PMS is costing you in terms of money and time, and your business productivity has taken a hit as well, you need a change in the system. With on-site systems, continuous upgrades are involved and these can become costly.

Need for better ROI

With a cloud PMS, you can save on the initial expenses involved with costly software and hardware, thus reducing your overall ownership expenses. These are designed to offer more security, reliability, data backups and high performance.

Whether a guest books a room online or with a tour operator, your PMS stays updated through RateTiger. Contact us today – marketing@erevmax.com

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Booking.com fires away strict rate parity: What it means for hoteliers – Part II

In the first part of my article (see here) I’ve focused on Booking.com’s new rate parity agreement and how hotels now have regained control over their pricing. Here is the next part of the article.

Loosening rate parity with a caveat
The commitment comes with a caveat: the hotels had to maintain same rates and booking conditions on Booking.com as they do through their own direct website. Term this as a narrow ‘Most Favored Nation’ agreement, the OTAs require a minimum allocation, or some availability, from hotels. Predictably, hotels are not happy.


They fear that the big OTAs, with their marketing budget would be able to manipulate the search results, which they claim would continue to affect their business adversely. In a strongly worded statement, the British Bed and Breakfast Association calls Booking.com a “bully” and says, “that this new settlement, thrashed out behind closed doors in Europe, is wrong and anti competitive, and against the interests of consumers.” The powerful British Hospitality Association has shown similar disappointment, and terms the commitment as falling short of progress and not benefit customers or hospitality businesses in a meaningful way.

Paris based Accor, Europe’s biggest hotel chain has taken a cautious approach and expressed satisfaction. However, InterContinental Hotel is not impressed. In a market, where close to 70% reservations come through OTA with Booking.com alone contributing over 43%, no one can afford to kill the goose that lays the golden egg.
For now, they have the option of promoting discounted rates to their closed groups for more direct bookings. But then again, Booking.com with its excellent loyalty program, which accounts for close to 50% of their overall reservation will give then a tough run. In fact, industry watchers believe that the next war will be fought over loyalty programs between the OTAs and major hotel brands. Elimination of rate parity might trigger ‘price cannibalism’ between OTAs and brand sites that could (at least potentially) lead to a worse-case scenario for the industry as a whole.
Make the most of the opportunity
As travellers spend more time on research, hotels need to be present at every touch point to their target audience. This is why, hotels need to evaluate each channels for the opportunities they present, and create tailor-made pricing strategies – all while staying within rate parity constraints – for optimizing rate and revenue.
To start with, hotels need to look at analyzing margins from each channel and allocate rate and inventories with margin as base-line. Select channels that bring key value to their properties – ones that support not just when the circus is in town but on a rainy day. With access to reservation reports to identify the customer demographics, hotel can develop intuitive packages to help customers actually find what they are looking for. The basic of every pricing strategy is to know the value of the product and the elasticity up to which consumers would be ready to pay.


Which leads to the importance of evaluating different distribution platforms. Without a foundation of platform based pricing it will be extremely difficult to manage pricing to the players sitting on the various levels of distribution, such as  traditional OTAs, Same-day booking sites, GDS, Tour Operators, Own Website, social media, mobile applications, fenced groups, loyalty programs, specific credit cards, and so on. By introducing a platform based pricing methodology, hotels can optimize their rate matrix while staying within their contractual obligations.

Mature distribution markets are moving from daily rate changes to real-time changes from a revenue management perspective which has a positive impact on profit optimization.  Remember, price is only one of the four P´s of marketing. Give equal importance to other 3, namely product, place and promotion. Parity is not so evil after all, only misunderstood.



Cristina Blaj is Sales Director at eRevMax.  She can be reached at cristinab@erevmax.com
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Hoffmeister Hotel & Spa selects RateTiger for effective rate and inventory distribution

One of the finest luxury boutique hotels in Czech Republic, Hoffmeister Hotel & Spa has partnered with eRevMax to expand business exposure and optimize online revenue. The five-star luxury property has been using RateTiger ChannelManagement Solution for managing availability, rate and inventories (ARI) across their online distribution mix.

“RateTiger is a must have hoteliers tool in 21st century allowing you to effectively balance all the material variables in the hoteliers profit/occupancy/rates/distribution costs/channel parity equation,”  said Petr Novotný, Sales Manager, Hotel Hoffmeister & Spa.
Hotel Hoffmeister is built in Mediaeval Roman architectural style of the 15th century, sales 45 spacious apartments across various channels. The hotel offers its guests a worry-free time in a Roman bath style jacuzzi, soothe their body and mind while trying signature massages – relaxing, detoxifying and chocolate one or pamper themselves in a Beauty Parlour.

Read full story here