
It is imperative for every independent hotel website to have, at its heart, calls to action pointing the way for users to book their stays directly onsite. The ultimate goal of any hotel website design should be to drive direct hotel bookings. Anything short of reaching the objective of conversion is missing what should be the point of having a website. So the focus of any independent hotel website needs to be on converting the site visitors into paying hotel guests.
The website booking engine must be present on all pages of the site. Potential guests can be anywhere on the hotel’s website when they complete their decision and decide to book now. Their booking process should always begin from the page they are currently viewing. Therefore a button, and associated calls to action, taking users directly into the buying process is required on every page. The booking engine should give the hotel the flexibility to make changes easily so specific offers and promotions may be presented to users. Availability must be readily apparent as well to customers. This is best displayed in an interactive calendar format. Availability and pricing need to be tied to high quality property images of individual room selections. Specific calls to action can also be added based on availability, for example “only 2 rooms left at this price”.
It is critical for the entire booking process to be simple and straightforward, requiring minimal steps along the way. Nothing should obstruct the pathway for future guests to book their hotel stay directly. The user must have the ability to not only book on the website, but make changes to their itinerary or cancel all together as well. It is also equally vital for an independent hotel to maintain strict rate parity across all online channels, between their website, and on the property. It is acceptable to offer channel specific promotions, but extremely important to identify them as such. If the potential hotel guests find a rate disparity they will book elsewhere or maybe even not at all.
The presence of an Internet booking engine (IBE) on an independent hotel website can be the ultimate deciding factor in its success or failure. As crucial as the IBE is, there are many other features which go into making an effective independent hotel website which will be discussed in the up coming parts of this series.
Posted via OnFast - http://www.OnFast.com
No comments:
Post a Comment