Product & Services Overview

Transcription

1 Product & Services Overview

2 Product Your hotel s website plays a key role in helping you connect with customers. These days, it s not enough to have a simple online presence. Hotels need efficient, interactive websites that perform over a variety of devices. At BookingSuite, we provide everything you ll ever need to take your website from ordinary to extraordinary, whether you need unlimited photo galleries, a fully integrated mobile site or effective, branded design combinations. It all comes standard with your subscription. 2 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

3 Why It Matters According to a study conducted by Google and Ipsos MediaCT, 83 percent of leisure travelers and 76 percent of business travelers go online to plan their trips. Of these travelers, 95 percent use search engines such as Google to find accommodations. This compelling data clearly demonstrates why hotels need to invest in their online booking systems. This same study also points to the importance of having an effective mobile presence. After polling 5000 respondents, researchers found that 40 percent of leisure travelers and 36 percent of business travelers use smartphones to book overnight accommodations. Currently, the vast majority bypass travel apps in favor of mobile search engines; and, according to Google, this number is expected to increase by 68 percent over one year and a whopping 180 percent for tablets over the same period. Judging by these numbers, it s clear that hotels miss out on substantial revenues when they fail to optimize their websites for the web and mobile devices. Fortunately, it s easy to turn this problem on its head, thanks to BookingSuite s intuitive, all-in-one software that gives you the power to easily control virtually every single aspect of your website and hotel marketing strategy. 3 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

4 How It Works BackOffice is an efficient, intuitive content management system that allows you and your staff to easily design an effective website and hotel marketing strategy. Using a simple, easy-to-learn dashboard management system, you can assign individual roles to staffers, giving your marketing, operations and general management teams control over appropriate content. You maintain control of your site, while we assist with the initial deployment, and other optional services, search engine marketing, SEO support and more. With BackOffice, you can develop and implement a unique, tailored hotel marketing plan by: Designing a look and feel for your individual brand Defining your room inventory Uploading photos Creating exclusive, custom articles that are unique to your hotel (promotions, things to do while you re in town, upcoming local events) Uploading photos and points of interest to create interactive maps Using the localization tool to provide website translations for international customers Tracking Google AdWords and other marketing campaigns Creating and managing an effective booking experience that allows you to create quick room descriptions and comparisons, assign and manage rates, and sync with your existing CRS or channel manager Integrating with TripAdvisor TripConnect Integrating with SiteMinder s Room Distribution Exchange Best of all, you don t have to be an IT guru to hit the ground running. Simply open the in-browser hotel web application, log in, and set up promotions, update room descriptions, and add new photos. BackOffice makes it easy to control your website and set up a unique marketing strategy, using four simple control modules: 4

5 The Settings Module Here, you ll fill in your hotel s information, defining room types and capacities. You ll also view who has access to your website and assign limited or unlimited access privileges. Finally, you ll complete your policies and access the unique color and branding scheme for your hotel s digital marketing presence. The Marketing Module Within this control module, you ll define the core marketing details for your hotel and then specify how it should be used in social, mobile and web channels. As you work, you ll have the power to easily preview the material in a sandbox or testing environment, where you can assess and improve any changes before they go live. Once your materials do go live, you can use this same module to monitor performance, so you can clearly see which hotel marketing strategies are performing well and which might need revisions. 5

6 The Pricing Module This module allows you to efficiently define your hotel s rates. You can also price special promotions, define channel and qualifying rates, and track reservations to help you plan ahead. What s more, all of the pricing information you enter here automatically syncs with your online booking engine, which you can access using your Facebook page, website or favorite mobile device. Front Desk Module This is the main control portal for the BackOffice hotel digital marketing platform. Here, you can manage your hotel s day-to-day activities by setting room availability, closing rooms, blocking out entire days or opening rooms for overbooking. You can also view incoming reservations placed on your online hotel booking engine and tap detailed guest information, which can play a big role in helping you develop and tweak your overall marketing strategy. Designed to deliver powerful capabilities within a clean, uncomplicated platform, BackOffice is ideal for those who want the benefits of hotel marketing automation, without having to surrender total control to an outside provider. It s simple, efficient, powerful and proven. 6 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

8 Creating Modern Marketing Solutions At BookingSuite, we re proud to be at the forefront of a shifting landscape that s opening the door to new challenges and new marketing opportunities. Thanks to cloud computing, hotels are able to easily create cost-effective marketing plans that run seamlessly across multiple platforms and multiple devices. With BookingSuite s cloud-based solutions for hotels, you can tap a wealth of simple yet powerful marketing tools, while side-stepping a host of frustrating complications at the same time. Over the past decade, evolving technologies have produced an array of challenges that make in-house software and hardware less practical. Increased worker mobility and the rise of BYOD (bring your own device) have made it difficult for hotels to create seamless networks, since windows-centric management doesn t extend to Macs, tablets and smartphones. In addition to limitations, in-house software and hardware come with big ongoing demands, including maintenance, complex configurations, upgrades and troubleshooting. Conversely, BookingSuite s cloud-based solutions offer fully-compatible, seamless integration across virtually any platform or device. You don t need to buy any new hardware or download new software. Simply create your account and log in using your web browser. It s simple, intuitive and it works on any computer or mobile device, whether you re working in your hotel s main office, at home or at a coffee shop down the road. 8 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

9 Let s face it: Facebook and Google alter their platforms hundreds of times each year; and, smartphone manufacturers develop more than 10 brands across 8 operating systems worldwide. Keeping up with these changes shouldn t be your job. BookingSuite s expert programmers and designers develop information architecture which ensures that your website works on the platforms, devices, search engines and social mediums of today, tomorrow, and beyond. We also ensure that you can make updates and changes anytime, anywhere, using your web browser. Everything you create is saved and backed up in the cloud. What s more, thanks to BookingSuite s advanced security protocols, any and all information you place in BackOffice remains safe and hidden from public eyes. You maintain absolute control, deciding what you want the public to see, and publishing that information only when it s absolutely ready. 9 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

10 Connecting With Customers To connect with customers, your website needs to get noticed. These days, travelers rely heavily on search engines to find accommodations. To improve their rankings, many hotels invest in search engine optimization campaigns aimed at improving their visibility in search engine results pages (SERPs). Unfortunately, this can have some major unintended consequences. Modern SEO is fraught with danger. Thanks to Google s recent algorithm updates, websites can easily find themselves penalized for so-called black hat optimization tactics even if they occur by accident. While so-called SEO experts continue to promise stellar results, the fact is it s impossible to guarantee first spot results on Google, because the search giant has refined its algorithms to the point where they can no longer be gamed. Freshness Update BookingSuite update BookingSuite update BookingSuite buuteeq update update BookingSuite update Phantom Update BookingSuite update BookingSuite update BookingSuite update BookingSuite update Venice Update 7-Result SERPs 10 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

11 Fortunately, these same updates have leveled the playing field, allowing just about any hotel website to rank well if it does a few basic - but critical - things. While no honest person can promise first-place search results, you can do quite well if your site is built according to Google s published best practices and recommendations. Instead of charging for basic optimization, we provide a strong SEO baseline that sets you up for success. Your BookingSuite website is built using industrial strength technology, which produces information architecture that meets or exceeds every one of Google s best recommendations for organic search rankings. BookingSuite s hotel marketing software provides beautiful hotel website templates that are developed to automatically conform to Google s strict standards. We don t offer any snake-oil or pie-in-the-sky promises. We do it right the first time, so you can enjoy all the benefits without any extra expenses or fuss. At BookingSuite, we believe a quality website should have premier SEO already built in. Imagine if you had to pay your shipbuilder for extra buoyancy? A ship should already float; otherwise, what s the point? From our perspective, Google is the ocean your website floats upon. You should expect your designer to create your website with the built-in ability to float and keep floating far into the future. 11 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

12 Search Engine Marketing Not to be confused with SEO, Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is yet another way for businesses to increase their visibility on search engine results pages (SERPs). In short, SEM helps promote your website as advertisements on SERPs and beyond. Great SEM ensures that these ads appear to targeted, relevant audiences. The more visibility you have, the more people will click on your website. But as mama always said, there s no such thing as a free click. Each time a user clicks on your web advertisement, you are charged money. Search engines charge variable rates depending on a combination of factors, such as how relevant your website is to a particular keyword and how much you bid to pay per click. As a result, you don t want just anyone to click on your ad. You shell out money for that click, after all. This is where quality SEM makes all the difference. Through extensive research on platforms like Google Adwords and TripAdvisor TripConnect, we make sure that your hotel appears in places where it otherwise would not and to people who would otherwise never see it. It s also important to know that in the world of SEM, quality trumps quantity. We don t aim to show your ads to everyone. Instead, BookingSuite s SEM services help your site grab the attention of the people who want to book your hotel for their next trip whether or not they know it yet. 12 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

14 Stable Results That Endure Google is always tweaking its algorithms to provide a better, more accurate search experience to users. That said, every so often, it makes major news by unveiling a large-scale update that throws countless SEO experts for a loop. Recently, many hotel executives awoke to find that their websites had plummeted in Google s search engine result pages, thanks to penalties related to over optimization. Sadly, these problems were generally owed to clumsy, short-sighted optimization tactics used by outside SEO firms. Having paid good money to these companies, these hotels were left with disastrous problems, while the so-called SEO experts walked away without a scratch. Dubbed the Penguin and Panda updates, these Google changes rocked the SEO world. They also provided a very clear warning that websites should follow Google s guidelines or suffer the consequences. At BookingSuite, we provide safe, stable SEO that will stand the test of time. Because we develop your website according to Google s best practices and recommendations, you will never have to worry about incurring penalties every time the search giant performs an update. Your site will keep floating, based on the quality of its content. As you continue to publish original, quality articles, you ll attract valuable backlinks that will inevitably send your website higher in the rankings, where it will remain no matter how many tweaks or adjustments Google decides to make. 14 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

15 Multi-Language Support BackOffice features a localization tool which connects your page with Google Translate. When this tool is activated, your website will display a button that users can select in order to translate the site into their choice from hundreds of languages. BookingSuite can also connect you with one of our recommended partners to provide additional language translation services if necessary. Our multi-language support is just another way that BookingSuite helps you communicate the right message to your audience. And since Google favors websites that are localized, this feature can help also improve your page rank. 15 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

16 In-Depth Analytics Hotel analytics enable you to track your visitors behavior and utilize that information to optimize your hotel marketing plan. BookingSuite makes this easy by providing detailed website analytics and reports of each guest s browsing activity. When you select the Performance page in BackOffice, you ll find all sorts of invaluable data you can use to develop smarter, more effective promotional strategies. Among other analytics, you ll find: Hotel Website Stats Our convenient table provides a brief overview of your website, showing each unique visitor and exactly what he or she did on your site across different devices and channels. You can organize this data based on time periods and other important variables, which are likely to have a big impact on your hotel SEO strategy and marketing plan. Detailed Hotel Charts & Graphs To formulate an effective SEO plan, you need to know the keywords guests are using to find your hotel. Our analytics platform provides detailed lists of incoming keywords, so you can understand exactly where your visitors are coming from and what they re looking for. Among other things, this can help you determine exactly what guests find most attractive, so you can create content that targets these specific keyword phrases. 16 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

17 Hotel Search Engine Keywords To formulate an effective SEO plan, you need to know the keywords guests are using to find your hotel. Our analytics platform provides detailed lists of incoming keywords, so you can understand exactly where your visitors are coming from and what they re looking for. Among other things, this can help you determine exactly what guests find most attractive, so you can create content that targets these specific keyword phrases. 17 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

18 Tracking Traffic with Hotel Website Analytics With BookingSuite s detailed analytics, you can effectively optimize your website and marketing collateral. For instance, if you notice your photos page receives substantial traffic even though it s relatively short on photos, you can upload more to enhance the browsing experience. Likewise, if your site is receiving very few hits from a particular keyword phrase, you might choose to remove those words from your meta data and replace it with another. 18 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

19 Simple, Intuitive, Compatible, & Effective Your hotel s website is critical to attracting guests. That said, it shouldn t take up too much of your valuable time. With so many responsibilities, you can t afford to play the role of default IT manager. With BookingSuite s hotel marketing solutions, you ll wield the power to control your website and your booking engine through an easy-to-use browser-based interface that will get you in and out, so you can focus your time on other important tasks. There are no hardware headaches, no maintenance or upgrades, no trouble-shooting and no complex configuration. Everything works right out of the box and right when you need it. It s the ultimate solution for hotels that want to establish and maintain a unique, marketing presence, without giving up too much control. At BookingSuite, we re your one-stop source for hotel marketing. Request a demo of our hotel marketing software, so you can get a first-hand look at how we can help your property develop a better, more effective online presence. 19 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.

20 About BookingSuite BookingSuite is a new unit of Booking.com that helps accommodation providers grow their businesses and brands through smart software solutions and services. Our cloud-based solutions include responsively designed websites, true ROI analytics, and easy-to-use content-management tools which empower partners like never before. The software is built to integrate with numerous reservation systems, channel managers, social media channels, and property management systems. Our innovative technologies are engineered and backed by the breadth of the Booking.com organization including support teams in 200 offices worldwide. 20 Copyright 2014 Booking.com All rights reserved.