Booking Engine
What is a Booking Engine?
This is a software application that enables guests secure reservations directly from your website or social media pages.
With the surge of online bookings as the preferred channel for guests to secure reservations, a Booking Engine has become a necessity even for small organizations dealing in travel and accommodation.
Booking engines offer the most profitable channels for bookings to an organization as they are commission free and can easily be customizable to their preference.
Simply works as a plug in into your website or social media pages and then helps process reservations done via those channels and data is then fed to a property management system (PMS) or retained in the Booking Engine application.
Why do you need a Booking engine?
Times have changed, travelers have become more self-reliant when making bookings, travel searches now begin online, most travel decisions are made last minute, all solutions can easily be found online etc. this are just some of the reasons why an organization no matter the size in this modern times requires a website and most importantly a Booking Engine.
Guests of today;
- Are self-reliant – they prefer to check which rooms are available, prices and when they can reserve without talking to the organization. They prefer to manage their travel itinerary.
- Want instant response – most bookings are made last minute and guests want to know that they have their travel plans are secured so having to wait for feedback from the organization to confirm is not encouraging to them
- Expect to perform tasks online – most guests will be surprised that they are not able to book or perform an action on an organizations site. Lacking a booking engine gives a negative impression and you end up losing bookings to your competitors or other channels.
A booking engine allows you to communicate directly with your guests, own that data, improve booking conversation and revenues and save on costs as its commission free.
Your website needs a booking engine as it provides the below benefits;
- Increase your bookings – allows guests to book directly on your website. Most guests prefer booking directly as they have confidence in the booking.
- Pay less commissions – allowing guests to book direct on your website leads to less commissions as bookings via your direct channels are commission free
- Reduce dependency on OTA’s or 3rd party sites – lack of a booking engine leads guests to book via available 3rd party channels, this channels charge commissions for their bookings and this leads to high acquisition costs and loss of revenues.
- Control guest data and experience – when guests book direct you receive their data and this allows you to personalize your services to them. Booking via 3rd party sites come with encrypted data hence you are not able to sell direct services the guests.
- Flexibility on rates, packages and offers – with a booking engine on your website you are able to customize your direct offers and rates directly to your guests. This leads to high conversions and guest loyalty.
What to look for when selecting a booking engine
- Simple booking process
- Mobile friendly
- Emails and notification capability
- Payment gateway integration or options
- Integration to you PMS or other systems you work with
- Multi-Currency and multi-language
- User interface – easy to maneuver by guests
- Upselling capabilities
- Easily customized to your brand
RevSol has ensured that we provide personalized solutions according to you and we have different products to ensure all your needs and budgets are met.
Reach out and let us take you through the technology space and help you select the right system for you.