Taking control of e-distribution of your hotel inventory in a more focused manner

Distribution in hospitality is evolving and there is a tectonic shift in the way various channels offline and online are contributing to the productivity. Booking windows are shrinking, online reputation and feedback is gaining ground and noticeably challenging the traditional channels of sales.

Published: 29 Oct 2010

Distribution in hospitality is evolving and there is a tectonic shift in the way various channels offline and online are contributing to the productivity. Booking windows are shrinking, online reputation and feedback is gaining ground and noticeably challenging the traditional channels of sales.

Here are a few pointers that will help you take control of the e-distribution of your hotel inventory in a more focused manner:

1. Work On The Business And Not In The Business

To stay ahead of the curve, it is imperative to take a step back and get a bird’s eye view before the revenue and distribution manager takes the plunge in managing their hotel online. Contrary to the supposed role of a distribution manager, a survey conducted by a leading professor and revenue guru Dr. Sheryl Kimes , the distinguished professor at Cornell Nanyang University published a report almost a year ago which threw back some trends that are alarming. In the new trends that are surfacing, increased role of channel management is a prominent factor for today’s revenue manager to succeed. However most of the deployed resources in today’s times are fairly raw in terms of talent and skill set. Moreover they end up working more ‘in the business’ rather than ‘on the business’ and this is where things get out of control. While the day to day to day activities must be carried out efficiently, there should be time dedicated in analysing the trends, measuring the outcome of strategies and reinforcement of new action plan based on lessons learnt from past ‘winners and losers’ amongst strategies . Other data inputs on overall online visibility of the hotel and competitive pricing info at this point would also help in analysing trends and any competitive tactics being deployed that need to be considered while drawing your own plans

2. Actively Connect With All Your Channels:

A gap on the channel’s side has also been observed. Limited teams of market managers are given the responsibility to manage a growing market with ever increasing portfolio of hotels. This makes it very challenging for them to keep on top of their key producers. This on one side and the pre occupied revenue/distribution manager on the hotel’s side leaves plenty of scope for the business to just take its own course and a dangerous one at that, but in reality it’s a very common phenomenon.

3. Offer Rate Parity Amongst All Your Channels:

Is it really possible? The answer is a resounding ‘Yes’ in the form of a channel management solution and its biggest advantage is the leverage it offers in terms of saving time and minimising input effort while ensuring rate parity and accurate implementation of pricing strategy and inventory management. Channel management through a single platform will let you easily manage as many websites as you like. In essence it means that you only get to manage one website and that in turn reflects a mirror image of your rates and inventory to all the channels you contract with whether they are retail, wholesale or package operators

Not only does it reduce the margin of error, delivers rate parity, maintains rate integrity, but also gives you the chance to treat all OTAs equally. This in itself presents a huge opportunity as the hotel remains neutral to all and its success then depends only on its qualified and well thought out selling strategies.

4. Content Parity Management

Extra time, once one starts using an automated channel management strategy, extra time can be put to beneficial use by ensuring content and image parity on all the channels one is working with at any given point of time. Many a time the performance can get seriously affected due to neglect in the form of poor or uninviting content, old images and poor descriptors resulting in reflecting the hotel poorly to potential bookers.

5. Don’t ignore the power of Long tail

A lot of revenue managers get entangled in the web of only working closely with existing high producing OTAs and not developing the long tail (in hindsight tagged as non performers). The result is a Catch 22. The revenue manager doesn’t target the long tail in a focused manner since they do not perform today and while the reality is that they need attention and nurturing to perform in the long term for the hotel and also to diversify too much dependence on only few top channels of today

6. Excite The Customer With Relevant Offerings

Freed up time by using an automated channel management strategy can afford the opportunity to the revenue manager to launch event and occasion specific promotions across all channels, demand based packages and value add-ons etc. This all is simple to load on the channel manager and just one click publishes your offers across all OTAs. It will not only help you track your top performing OTAs and keep them on high priority but also let you closely work with the mediocre performers to discuss productivity optimisation with the market managers in a one to one session. (Remember you have the time to do it now)

In today’s date TMS (Travel Meta Search) engines dealing with multiple booking options for the same hotel draw the end consumer mainly because of rate disparity and since you are ruling that dangerous part out of your scope of business, not only are you ceasing the opportunity for one OTA to play against the other on your hotel’s turf but also giving them no excuse to explain why they are not working in your best interest. Let’s face it, OTAs are several and they all have their own strengths, some because of the options they offer , some due to regional popularity or some due to mere ease of making bookings and the hotel should get to play it to their strength with each one of them and not one against the other.

Then and only then will the revenue manager be in control of his/her strategies. Try it out! The optimisation of productivity you will enjoy will surely push up the top line for your hotel and the trust you will establish in the market will be a byproduct that will go a long way.

(The article has been contributed by Yogeesh Chandra, AVP Product Management at Rategain IT solutions).

Related Reads

comments powered by Disqus