Yet, a lot of hotels don’t pay enough attention to it. 

Caution: These hotels would suffer just as those people who don’t give enough importance to sanitizers. 

Wondering, why am I saying this?

Wait till I explain all the whys, whats and hows. 

In this blog, I’ll talk about:

Let’s dig in right away.

What is a hotel cancellation policy?

In simple terms, a cancellation policy is a statement given by a service supplier that explains the terms and conditions for cancelled services. It involves all the clauses as well as conditions of the penalties, actions, and refunds. 

Moving on, let us see,

What are the different types of cancellation policies?

The cancellation policy depends on a wide range of factors, such as booking lead time, type of booking, and length of stay. 

Majorly, there are two major types of cancellation policies that hotels prefer:

1. The “cancel by certain date” policy

This type of cancellation policy gives your guests the option to cancel hotel reservations free of charge up until a certain date. Once this date passes, you can either charge:

• A standard cancellation fee
• Full payment for the reservation

2. The “one-night penalty” policy

This type of hotel booking requires the full payment of the reservation at the time of booking and is non-refundable. In this case, the hotel charges a cancellation fee equivalent to one night’s stay at the hotel. 

A majority of hotels adopt either of these cancellation policies. Other than this, most of the online travel agents (OTAs) have their own set of cancellation policies. Have a look at Airbnb’s different cancellation policies. 

If a booking is received from an OTA, then the cancellation policy of that particular channel is applicable. 

Similarly, if a booking is received from your own website or is a walk-in, then your hotel’s cancellation policy is applicable. 

Since every hotel or accommodation provider has a cancellation policy, does this thought ever come across your mind – Why is it even important to have a cancellation policy?

Well, let me tell you:

What is the importance of the cancellation policy?

Cancellations are inevitable in our industry. Ours is a very competitive industry, and it’s the cancellation policy that will help your business to survive. 

Here are the reasons why your property NEEDs a cancellation policy. 

1. Provides Accountability 

It is an assured way to protect yourself from lost business and revenue. 

As discussed earlier, a standard cancellation policy should have a fee or penalty and enough time built into the cancellation notice so you can re-book the spot.

It will hold your customers accountable if they do need to cancel their reservation. 

When a policy is shared with the customer, then they are well aware of what can happen in case they decide to cancel.

2. Guarantees Commitment 

When your guests agree to a cancellation policy, then it shows a commitment to the booking on the part of the customer. 

If your guest books his stay and knows that there is a cancellation fee, then he may not cancel the reservation. 

3. Shows Professionalism

Many hotels have this mindset, that having a cancellation policy will get off their guests. 

However, that’s not the case. It’s actually OPPOSITE!

Your guests feel that having clear policies and details about booking depicts professionalism as a business.

Owing to these reasons, cancellation policy is a must!

Now that you know its importance, let me guide you on,

How to create an effective cancellation policy?

You need to have the right cancellation policy in place. Planning the best cancellation policy takes a lot of groundwork. 

I’ve have broken down that into these simple steps:

Step 1: Understand your customer’s booking pattern

First thing first, you have to gather and analyze your data. 

Unless you know who your major targeted audience is and how they prefer to book: you won’t be able to estimate the reason behind their cancellation.

So first, you have to segment data by the bookings sources and type of guests. 

Once that is done, you can begin to identify consumer trends for each segment.

For example, customers from the OTAs tend to have a higher cancellation rate than those who perform their booking directly with the hotel.

Reason being, OTAs offer a practical platform to compare options and shop around.

When your guests find a hotel they like within their price range, they tend to book it right away and cancel later if they find a better (or sometimes cheaper) option.

On the flip side, there are fewer chances that your direct customers will cancel their reservation later. 

Besides, not all of your guests will dedicate that much time and effort towards their search, but some definitely do.

Step 2: Derive the occurrence and time

From your hotel’s data, find out the particular day or season when you have received maximum cancellations. 

For instance, generally on Tuesdays, you must be receiving the highest cancellation because of any reason. 

If you can pinpoint which day of the week, then you can increase your overbooking limits accordingly and make the most of the increased demand for that specific day.

Similarly, if you can identify that a certain OTA has higher cancellation rates than others, you can rethink on your OTA connections. 

When you know that X percentage of those reservations will cancel at the last minute, you can increase overbooking or raise your rates based on the booking window.

Step 3: Consider group bookings

When a 25-room group calls to cancel their reservations, you have three options:

1. Either you panic 
2. Or expect a miracle to happen
3. Or have a specific cancellation policy for the group bookings. 

Obviously, the last option sounds sensible to me.

To save yourself from such a scenario, you can have a solid legal contract with all the required policies and clauses. 

Whether your customer is looking to book only ten rooms (typical industry minimum for a group) or book your entire inventory, the basic principle SHOULD remain the same.

It has to be profitable even when replacement is involved and you have to be protected against cancellations.

In case of group bookings, the group members either check-in together as a group or they might arrive individually. 

For those individual-arrival groups, you can specify in the contract the minimum room-night number they have to guarantee. 

You should also consider your group contract should protect you against overbooking by the group. 

If they originally wanted ten rooms and you offered them a special discounted rate based on a ten-room piece of business, they shouldn’t end up booking twenty rooms at that special rate.

IMPORTANT: Ensure that such discounted or special rates are not publicly available on the internet. 

Step 4:  Accounting for special days and events

Each and every city has special events happening throughout the year that create a peak in regular demand cycles. 

Be it religious and national holidays, conferences, festivals, entertainment and arts events, enormous sports events such as the Super Bowl or Jonas Brothers’ Music concert. 

If such an event is approaching, then I recommend you to have less flexibility with cancellations and overbooking. 

During events, festivals and long weekends, some hotels get away with no-cancellation policies 

However, you have to be careful not to overprotect your rooms with super strict cancellation policies. 

One good example of such a special event is the 4th of July (American Independence Day- National holiday). 

If 4th July falls on a Wednesday, then there are fewer chances of any hike in bookings. 

On the contrary, if it falls on Friday or Thursday, it will definitely increase demand for hotels. 

So, these are different factors that you have to consider while creating cancellation policies for your hotel.

Once you have created the right set of hotel cancellation policy, 75% of your work is done. 

Now you have to make your guests aware of your policy, and for that, you have to,

Where to highlight your cancellation policies?

Just similar to how your guests check the reviews first and then book a hotel with you similarly they are likely to check the cancellation policies before booking the stay with your hotel.

So, it is your duty to highlight your cancellation policies on different channels from where you are getting bookings.

And believe me, it is very simple: 

1. Share it on the social media handles
2. Highlight it on your website clearly
3. Mention them on OTAs and basically everywhere your hotel is listed

How to manage your cancellation policies? 

No other industry is as dynamic as ours. 

Every now and then, there can be several things, incidents, and trends; which hotels have to keep a tab into. 

For instance: The ongoing pandemic – COVID 19. 

It has hugely affected the travel and hospitality sector. In such a scenario, you cannot be harsh and stay adamant to your policies. 

In this case, you have to be kind and generous. 

You should entertain all the cancellation/amendments requests. In case, your guests have paid any advance, try to refund the amount or give them credit in return. 

Basically, you have to UPDATE your cancellation policies. 

So, the point is creating cancellation policy is not a one-time job. You have to revamp them constantly based on such unprecedented situations, during the time of festival, events or long weekends, and in general as well.

Not to mention, when we talk about all reservation, cancellation, and everything between, a comprehensive hotel software is a must. And if you want to get perfect solution for your hotel, here’s a guide for you.

Conclusion

So, this was all about cancellation policies. 

By far, you have realized that cancellation policy is quintessential. 

I hope that this blog helps you create and manage your cancellation policy in the best way. 

In case you want to have more information on cancellation policies, do let us know in the comment section.

The post How to Set Up Effective Hotel Cancellation Policy? appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Cost cutting in hotels, just like in any other business; helps maintain optimum expenses and of course, control your spending on unnecessary activities.

Now, HOW TO CUT COSTS IN HOTEL?

I am sure, you must have thought about it and taken a few steps. After all, who wouldn’t want a higher ROI?

But to be honest, finding ways to cut off hotel costs is a true challenge, especially in locations where the cost of living is high. You may have to dig deeper, think outside the box and get your rational wheels churning.

In this blog, I have shared some basic and advanced cost control techniques in hotels, which can help you start with this step.

However, before we go ahead with that, you should be aware of some sureshot benefits and reasons to implement cost control measures at your property.

Why should hotels cut costs?

Well, you’ll find many practical yet obvious benefits of reducing your hotel expenses. But it all comes down to reasons which provide value. Those are:

• To keep expenses under control: It is a human tendency to spend more given a free hand. Introducing cost-cutting measures in hotels will help you keep a check on the explosion of expenses.
• To increase profit: Since cost-cutting lets, you reduce your unwanted expenses, you can focus on desired revenue goals and increase your profit margin.

On top of that, having a transparent picture of your hotel expenses will give you some ideas on where you can cut back on costs.

Now, let’s dig into some guaranteed and most effective techniques to save costs in your hotel business.

These are some general cost-cutting ideas for hotel properties. All may not apply, or more than these might also apply for your property.

Let’s go through them one by one.

1. Analyse your expenses in detail

This is the first step towards cutting costs at your hotel property.
To begin with, take some time to sit down and know where your expenses are going.

Hotel management systems are a great help in generating expense and revenue reports. 

The busy schedule of entertaining guests and handling other operations can leave you surprised at the expenses incurred.

There might be an unusual spike in bandwidth usage or non-required expenses on cosmetics and linen. Observe your spendings on inventory that could have been a lot cheaper if had taken prompt action.

Make it a habit to analyze your expense reports regularly. Get a breakdown of your operating cost and try to spot some patterns. Small details matter a lot when it comes to reducing hotel expenses and running your business more efficiently.

Taking account of small things is an ideal first step.

2. Cross-train staff for optimum resource utilization

You know as well as I do that hiring staff takes up a large segment of your efforts, time, and expenses.

Almost 50% of your hotel cost is towards the labour.

CBRE Hotels

That being said, cross-training your staff for multiple roles is a good cost-saving idea for your hotel. That way, instead of bringing in new faces for new roles, you’ll be able to use the existing resources.

Learning new skills is a win-win situation for you as well as your team members. They can gain extra skills that will help them in the long run. And you’ll be able to save money on new resource hiring.

For example, employees can help the front desk during peak hours/months to manage walk in guests, requests and complaints from in-house guests. Similarly, when there is not much rush, front desk people can help the marketing team in social media marketing and reaching out to probable guests.  

A caution you need to take here is that you do not overburden the staff. This will result in demoralization and will make them ineffective.

3. Use technology to cut costs

The hotel industry is advancing with time and so are the guest’s habits and expectations of the hotels.

However, I’ve seen hotels not investing in technology because they fear insufficient ROI. And a usual misconception revolves around hotel technology being a burden and an additional expense.

BUT, using new technology does not mean an increase in operational costs. Rather, these advancements can help in cost-cutting.

Technology can reduce hotel expenses by automating and optimizing operations. 

All-in-one (integrated) hotel technology which includes hotel software, a booking engine, and a channel manager automates and streamlines all operations. These systems take care of bookings, inventory distribution, check-in & check-out, billing, online reviews, housekeeping, and everything else.

This reduces the need for a dedicated resource behind several operations and even saves time.

In fact, a recent report by Hospitality Technology revealed that:

57% of hotels plan to spend more on technology so that they can provide services through advanced software and tools.

Hospitality Technology

In addition to this, it is said that the Internet of Things (IoT) is also going to help in reducing hotel expenses.

Tip: Consider calculating hotel technology ROI before investing to solve your doubts. 

4. Deploy self-check-in kiosks

The hospitality industry is rapidly evolving and it has moved from self-bookings to self-check-ins. Guests tend not to wait for long amounts of time to check in or avail of any services at hotels. They want to get things done faster and better.

So, installing a self check-in kiosk is a great way to do cost control in front office. 

Though a kiosk cannot completely replace the reception desk, it can cut the labour cost to a great extent; particularly for those on the night shift who is a costly resource.

It can also reduce dependency on manual labour as guests find it easy and convenient to perform self-check-in.

A recent study found that 68% of guests want to speed up the check-in process using their smartphones.

Capterra

That’s because a self-check-in kiosk is hassle-free with simple commands and a clear interface. Above all, a kiosk makes it quick for guests to check in by themselves.

As hotels ultimately want to be more customer-oriented, self-check-in is likely to become an industry standard in the coming years.

You should calculate the ROI of such investments before employing them for hotel cost-saving initiatives.

5. Lower electricity costs by going green

Adopting energy-friendly measures is economically beneficial and also benefits your hotel’s reputation.

The Carbon Trust estimates that you could cut your hotel’s energy bills by as much as 20% just by implementing simple and inexpensive eco measures.

Green Hotelier

Using appliances that consume more electricity and printing unnecessary papers not only increases your operational cost but also hampers your cost-cutting strategies.

Now, one of the most fruitful cost-saving ideas for hotels is reducing electricity costs.

This falls in line with the “Going Green” initiative as well, which is an important step towards saving the environment. Here’s how you can reduce your electricity costs:

• Use LED lights: Using LED bulbs can be more efficient and cost-saving than using normal incandescent bulbs. This saves energy and in turn, reduces the electricity bill.
• Implement smart windows: Windows that automatically adjust their tint all through the day are the smartest thing to embrace. These windows control how much light is passing through them, and adjust cooling or heating in the room as required. This eventually saves the cost of air conditioners cooling the room.
• Use Energy Star appliances: Use certified appliances instead of the old appliances that consume more electricity. Doing so with one appliance won’t make a difference, but slowly replace all types of equipment to see a reduced electricity bill.

Controlling the lighting, using the optimized room and water temperature, and educating staff about saving energy are some of the preliminary steps that can be taken toward going green and cost-cutting.

Incorporating IoT can help with cost control in the hotel industry by adopting some smart techniques. To know about them, read our blog on How Can IoT in Hospitality Industry Grow Your Hotel Business?

6. Optimize your hotel’s marketing cost

Marketing needs research. And getting into a marketing campaign without knowing the facts and figures can trouble your expenses.

Just throwing money without knowing the ROI is an inefficient way to promote your property.

Instead, there can be low-cost ways to spread awareness, such as:

• Great content always sells. Invest in writing good content that speaks for itself.
• Social media is the digital marketing weapon that should be used to reach the maximum audience. Be active there. It will leave a thought in guests’ minds and make them visit your hotel once. (Here are some best social media marketing strategies you can adopt)
• Tie up with local vendors to share/generate bookings
• You can also take brilliant photos of your hotel and show them off to your target audience.

You should analyze the results of your marketing strategies constantly, and decide on the next course of action accordingly. If the results are not what you expect, do not continue with that approach and pick up a new one. That’s how you can optimize your marketing costs.

Tip: Here are some tried and tested hotel digital marketing strategies and promotion ideas to help you grow your hotel business.

7. Practice preventive maintenance for appliances

Maintenance of systems and facilities such as plumbing, electrician, and infrastructure can be quite a costly affair. Preventive maintenance involves inspecting these facilities to prevent unexpected breakdowns.

This works as one of the powerful cost-saving ideas for hotels.

An effective preventive maintenance method takes into account all the infrastructural specifics of your property and plans the annual maintenance schedule in a way that doesn’t interfere with the guests’ experience.

There are many IoT solutions in the hospitality industry that help you follow maintenance schedules with smart devices.

In addition, different applications in the market can automate maintenance schedules for the types of equipment. They also help managers keep a tab of all the schedules to avoid unnecessary repairs.

Timely and well planned maintenance and repair is cost effective. Lack of the same can result in high penalty costs that disturb your operating budgets as well as guest experience.

Some breakdowns need repair immediately and the cost cannot be cut down here. But if you follow a regular maintenance schedule and get the equipment checked from time to time, there will be fewer chances of a sudden failure or breakdown.

Thus, preventive maintenance helps reduce hotel expenses by keeping equipment intact for a longer time.

8. Use your hotel’s less utilized spaces

Look into every nook and corner of your hotel to find spaces that are not used often.

Ideally, cutting operational cost and generating revenue go hand in hand.

Using underutilized spaces for business purposes is a good way to earn a side income. There might not necessarily be a permanent setup for the same. So, this works as a revenue generation strategy as well as a perfectly practical cost-saving idea for hotels.

For example; you could use your garden for weddings, parties, or events. Deliver a great experience to the guests who attend these events and they could turn into your future guests too.

If you have a hall; use it for a yoga class or a dance class. This way, the guests will also spend a little extra money during their stay; thus increasing your revenue.

An upcoming trend is to use your hotel lobby as a workspace, a social hotspot, a coffee shop or any flexible space that can be used for almost everything. 

Setting up such a lobby will add value to your property, not to mention the income earned. There can be other ways to use these spaces and promote your hotel during the off-season. You can find some low-season promotion ideas to use these techniques and generate revenue. 

9. Negotiate with vendors

Negotiating the right deal with your suppliers doesn’t necessarily mean getting what you want at the cheapest possible price. Negotiation is done right only when both parties feel happy and comfortable with the agreement. 

While setting up your hotel, you take the best deals from your suppliers and vendors. After that, as the contracts come close to a renewal date and you know the expenses involved, you might have to crunch it a little.

It will be reasonable to ask for a discount when you are renewing your contracts. You can also get quotes from other vendors to pick up the best one in terms of both quality and cost.

Before closing on a vendor, know the optimum cost of what you are investing in. 

For example; if you are ordering cosmetics or other supplies in bulk, you might want to look for a good vendor who gives you a good discount. Or, if you are investing in complex software, you could negotiate with the dealer for free training as a part of the deal. 

FAQs

The post 9 Smart Cost Saving Ideas for Hotels appeared first on eZee Absolute.

You should understand that a hostel business varies considerably from hotels. While you can say that the hotel business is pretty much straightforward (providing accommodation with maybe a few services), a hostel on the other hand cannot survive by just offering accommodation. 

Of course, the hostel target market is altogether different than a hotel, and hence additional requirements and tactics for hostel marketing as well. 

Here are the 9 best hostel promotion ideas to make your business thrive

Your hostel is a product and a brand in itself. Running a hostel is like running a media agency where your online presence or your brand is equally important as your product, i.e your hostel. 

These tips and techniques will not only increase your hostel’s visibility but will also make you a preferable choice of travelers coming to your city. 

Go through them, implement those, analyze the results and decide whether you want to scale the strategy or kill it. 

1. Register on relevant OTAs

The first thing to do if you have a hostel is to get listed on relevant online travel agents (OTAs). And when I say relevant, I mean those sites from where you can acquire guests you want to welcome. For hostels especially, it is advisable to register on niche OTAs that cater to hostel bookings.

Most of the hostels don’t consider this as a factor in hostel marketing. But believe me, your presence on these booking sites will give you amazing credibility.

Sites like HostelWorld, Dorms.com, Bedbooker, Hostelbookers.com, etc are the most popular ones in the hostel industry. These sites will give your hostel an outreach to millions of unique viewers, and eventually get you more bookings from travelers and backpackers alike. 

Moreover, the more OTA connections you have for your hostel, the better. You’ll have greater visibility to the maximum of your audience which will land you more bookings.

2. Get a professional hostel website with SEO

The quicker you understand the importance of a website in your hostel business, the better your hostel will perform. 

You see, technically, your website is the first and the only marketing tool that you own. 

So it can be used the way you want. All other platforms that you are present on; social media, OTAs, or anything else, are constantly changing. Therefore, your website must be the flagship of all your online marketing efforts. Treat your website accordingly – always! It can be the most effective hostel marketing strategy if executed well. 

Now when you design your hostel website, don’t stick to the old ways of content marketing. Perform good SEO and add appropriate keywords so that your efforts in designing a website provide you with good returns.

SEO will make your website visible and rank on the search engines. Further, local SEO plays an important role in boosting your hostel bookings. We have a blog post for tips on SEO for hotels, which works effectively for hostel websites as well. Here are some of the best ways to do hostel website SEO. 

In the end, don’t miss getting listed as a Google My Business. This will make your hostel visible when people search for hostels in your region. Viewers will be able to find your website with proper contact information about your business.

If you’re a hostel chain, then list each of your locations as a Google My Business, similar to what goStops has done.

3. Run Ads on Google and Facebook

If you have some budget, then running ads on Google and Facebook is said to be one of the most effective ways to promote your hostel. Your website can be the base of these ads because you’d want searchers to land on your website after clicking on the ads. 

However, we recommend integrating your website with a booking engine, which will let your visitors book with you directly from the website. 

Google Ads – Apart from regular search and display ads, Google offers a great way for accommodation providers to increase their direct bookings. That is – Google Hotel Ads. These ads will be a part of your Google Business Listing once you enroll with them, and help the searchers book with you directly. Though, keep in mind that you can enroll for Google Hotel Ads only with Google’s authorized integration partners.  

Facebook Ads – Using Facebook Ads, you can easily promote your Facebook page, posts, and even your hostel website to the relevant audience. 

Apart from all this, you also have the option to run REMARKETING ADS, which is a beneficial technique to promote your hostel. These ads follow your website visitors after they leave your website without performing any action. This way, you will be in their mind frequently, and they’ll come and book with you through the attractive discounts or deals you offer in the ads.

4. Give importance to social media

Social media is the need of the hour. Any hostel marketing plan (or any business marketing for that matter) is incomplete without engaging on social media. With the incredible advantages that it has, it is an indispensable part of hostel promotion. 

Social media is now 95% of the internet! 

For beginners; you can start by creating an account and a page on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest. Gradually, identify and reach your target audience, build your brand there, tell your story, and develop a connection with your audience.

Social media is a great way to interact with guests and give them the personal touch that they look for. The best part here is that there are no third-party fees involved. Social media for this segment of the industry is somewhat similar to that of social media marketing for hotels.

People often take pictures while traveling. Use these as a marketing strategy.

For example, set up a nice picture-taking spot (selfie spot?) in your hostel lobby with your name and the city you are located in. Then, run a contest offering a free night stay to the most creative photo with your hostel tagged! Done! You reach a lot of people this way.

Beyond all this, don’t forget videos. Visuals have received more engagement and interaction since always. Shoot videos of the happenings at your hostel, the events you organize, and everything that may show the experience you’re providing.

Check out how Zostel, India’s largest backpacker hostel chain, and eZee’s happy customers since the beginning is killing it on social media.

We have a blog post on the best hotel Instagram ideas, which work amazingly well for hostels too.

It is like a dream to generate traffic through social media. Know your audience, talk to them in your own way and focus on the channel that works for you!

5. Organize events to develop community and guest interaction

There has been an outburst in travelers going around solo and more importantly meeting like-minded people. This can be a great advantage in promoting your hostel.

Cross promotional tactics

They are a good way to attract local businesses and be of mutual benefit to each other’s business. Hostellers coming to you want to explore the city, eat authentic food, have community-oriented, local, and cultural experiences, buy local stuff, etc. So keeping flyers or visiting cards of people who are willing to cross-promote your hostel to their customers is a good idea to market your hostel.

Showing a local presence and effective community interaction builds a good reputation. People will note this and will recommend your hostel to fellow mates. So, local connections and the word of mouth publicity become an important tool for your marketing.

Organize events

Using such tie-ups, you can organize events like cycling expeditions, tree plantations, food-tasting tours, slum tours, and city tours to attract guests and give them a flavor of the local city.

Hostels like Zostel and The Hosteller regularly host such events as cycling tours, treks, and out-of-city tours to provide a unique experience to their guests. Check it out:

Give details of such events on your social pages. This is very important to let your brand make its name in the minds of travelers. Besides this, you can also keep some things on your premises to let your guests engage with each other. 

For example, keep a canvas for them to paint and offer it as a takeaway at a nominal price. Keep small pots with plants for travelers to take back home. Or keep a guitar in the lobby for music lovers and some pets for pet lovers. Keep a game zone or a recreational room where guests can play a few games. A bookshelf is also a great idea for solo travelers.

6. Associate with industry influencers

For those of you who do not know the power of influencer marketing and blogging, let me tell you that blogging is a revolution in the hospitality industry. As we talk about hostel marketing strategies, blogging should be used in the best possible way.

So how does this work? Simple. Offer these bloggers (influencers) a free stay at your hostel. Trust me, the returns are immense.

They are travelers and writers with a good number of followers or are building up the same; they can promote your hostel after a stay. They’ll give you a review on various platforms like their own website or blog and social platforms so that your hostel reaches to maximum audience.

It is not about quantity, it is about quality. Keep that in mind! Invite bloggers and even accept their requests for free stays. Have a clear guidelines to work with bloggers and influencers so that both parties are mutually benefited.

Zostel recently did a video with Shivya Nath (The Shooting Star), a famous travel blogger from India who has been on the road for almost a decade. They also shot an episode with Savi Sharma, an Indian novelist.

If you don’t have a budget to tie up with influencers, then set up your own blog on your hostel website. I’d say, do it even if you have a budget for influencer marketing. It will help you big time in your website’s SEO and even engage travelers with new information.

Zostel’s blogs are a delight to read, filled with advice and instructions on how to travel and the best places to visit near their locations.

7. Offer extra services

These days, “Hostelling” is not just limited to offering a stay in a dormitory. It is much, much more than that. The leading hostels in India at least have kept extra services as a part of their package. 

Apart from your regular services and offerings, consider offering a secondary service as a part of your hostel marketing. For example, offer a bike rental service, travel services, city tours, or trekking trips.

This will increase your word-of-mouth publicity and keep your hostel flag up even in the offseason. Make customized packages for city tours, local food tours, and such likes, and sell them on your website.

A few hostels like goStops also let travelers book experiences from their websites. 

8. Make the most of reviews

Reviews majorly pose as a decision-maker for your guests. Besides affecting your online reputation, they even affect your bookings. The industry is gradually realizing the importance of online reviews. And the sooner you do so too, the better it will be for your business. 

Focusing on hotel reviews and reputation management should be on your task list henceforth.

Collect as many reviews for your hostel as you can, and respond to them. Once your guests check out, ask them to give you feedback on Facebook, booking sites, and even Google. In turn, you can offer them some discounts the next time they visit. 

Besides, you can collect more reviews on TripAdvisor for free through the TripAdvisor Review Express Program. You can explore more about it here.

9. Expand into a hostel chain

If you’re an independent hostel, one of the most recommended hostel marketing strategies for you is to expand into a hostel chain. 

Once you’re all set in a city with one hostel, plan out properly how you can set up your brand in a different city. Treat yourself as a brand.

Start with finalizing a location for your next hostel. Decide on the basis of the type of experience you provide, the guests you welcome and the travelers a city gets. If you implement this one in the right way, it will work in the best way possible. 

Don’t take this job lightly. Take baby steps. One at a time. Ensure that you maintain the consistency in experiences you provide at all the locations. Perform the same promotion tips for all your hostels. This way, you will gradually emerge as a brand in the industry and among the millennials. 

Implemented well, we are sure these hostel marketing plans and tips will help you bring your hostel to great heights in terms of service and high conversion rates. If you want to see your hostel house full this season, you better get your head on straight to these strategies.

Along with your hostel promotion, we’d also like to give you the right hostel management tips. Our recommendation is to adopt an integrated hostel management system to manage every operation at your hostel. 

eZee’s end-to-end hostel software is already adopted by India’s leading hostels as well as many of hostels worldwide. With the best marketing tips in your hand, the only thing that remains is streamlining your operations.

Let us know in the comment section below what you think about these tips and how did they turn out for you!

The post 9 Effective Hostel Marketing Tips To Get More Bookings appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Here’s a sneak peak of the event:

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During the event, HostelWorld presented some great insights to attendees. Out of which, one data showcased the top 5 hostels in India receiving maximum bookings from the travel site. Those 5 hostels were:

• Zostel
• goStops
• Joey’s Hostel
• The Madpackers Hostels
• The Hostel Crowd

Now let me mention an important finding here.

4 out of these 5 top performing hostels are using eZee’s hostel software.

Wonders never cease! Right? It was definitely a proud moment for us, which lead me to a thought on what made these hostels choose our hostel software.

And one more fact dawned upon me gradually.

With more than 70 hostels onboard, we are the preferred choice of majority of hostels in India.

Why do hostels need technology?

Now if you see, hostels have evolved with the latest trends of travelling and backpacking.

Hostels these days are not limited to just offering dormitories, but rather a unique experience with a wholesome stay to the guests within budget. They’ve embraced versatility by providing shared and private rooms besides dorms with amenities like free WiFi and breakfast. Besides, they even organize activities like city tours, treks, musical nights and more.

More than 70% of hostellers are millenials.

Consequently, with the evolving trend of backpacking, the significance of hostels has increased to a great extent in India as well.

The exponentially increasing number of hostellers has transformed the mission of hostels from providing only accommodation to imparting an unforgettable experience to the guests.

Certainly this would need them to seek for a technology to manage their expanding operations, which could even help them grow in their business, which is where eZee fits in.

What made these top hostels and others choose eZee’s hostel software?

So, after meeting and talking with many of our hostel customers in the conference, I figured two major reasons behind eZee as hostels’ choice of technology.

1. We provide technology which they exactly need

Ever since we determined hostels’ need of technology some years ago, we started constantly researching on their requirements, on how they operate, and their mindsets.

And we developed a technology, a completely integrated hostel management system which would help all the types and sizes of hostels, as well as hostel chains in managing their operations. This technology is periodically updated to ensure optimum performance and efficiency.

Here are some special features of our hostel software which sets us apart from others:

1. Dorms or private rooms: Hostels can set up dorms as well as private and shared rooms in the system and sell them accordingly.
2. Connection with the right OTAs: They can manage their availability on the right channels directly from the system and acquire more guests
3. Booking engine for direct bookings: Hostels are able to get more bookings from their website through our integrated booking engine
4. Dynamic pricing for hostels: Hostels can set up and manage slab-wise pricing depending on the occupancy and seasons.
5. Handling promotions and packages: As I mentioned previously, hostels these days offer a myriad of services along with accommodation. Hostels are able to manage the sale of these activities and packages and even run promotions along with their regular operations
6. Managing Pay@hostel bookings: Hostels can easily accept booking deposits for pay@hostel bookings by sending an online payment link from the system.

In addition, hostels are even able to manage their online reviews and reduce their last minute no-shows and cancellations using our technology.

You can explore our completely integrated hostel software from here.

Here’s what Deep Banka, the Online Sales Manager @ Zostel had to say about our technology at the conference, and why they have chosen eZee:

Headquartered at Gurugram, Zostel is the biggest backpacker hostel chain in India. Started with 5 hostels in India, they now have hostels at 36 locations across India and Nepal; that aim to provide safe, hygienic, relaxed and affordable accommodation to travelers.

2. Unparalleled, round-the-clock customer service

Well, customer service is an important aspect of any business. Even more, when you’re in an industry which revolves around guest experience.

We have always been on our toes to provide not just the best technology, but equally excellent customer services, which include:

1. 24x7x365 live support
2. Dedicated account manager
3. Unlimited free product training
4. 100% product implementation and onboarding

Similar to what it is for all our users, we have been able to offer the hostels an unforgettable customer experience, helping them wherever required and enabling them to look after guest experience by automating day-to-day operations.

This is what Pankaj Parwanda, the Co-founder of goStops shared on why he swears by eZee:

goStops is known as India’s most trusted experiential and social hostel chain. They have hostels at 12 locations across India; in which they offer great amenities, along with carefully curated activities to ignite the passion to travel.

About the 1st Annual Hostel Conference

The Backpacker Hostel Association of India (BHAI) organized the Annual Hostel Conference from 18-21 April for the first time in India. The conference witnessed hostel owners across India getting together with travel giants like HostelWorld, Goibibo and Tripoto, companies like Veepay, RedBus and Arbor Bewing, and other industry professionals along with eZee as the hostel technology providers to discuss on the latest industry trends, challenges and solutions.

Niral Ramani, the Regional Manager of eZee Goa and I represented eZee in the event to showcase our special offerings to the hostel industry. It was a memorable experience for both of us, where we were able to meet our various long-term customers and even converse with several interesting industry professionals.

Our cutting-edge technology is all set to facilitate the evolving hostel industry in all possible ways. Just as these 4 leading hostels, many hostels worldwide are simplifying their hostel operations with our hostel software. And we’re welcoming more such hostels and hostel chains onboard everyday.

But we are not ceasing here! We’ve already fueled our hostel management system with nascent technology such as a booking engine chatbot, digital assistant, data analysis tool; and we promise to continue to augment our technology which transforms the way the hospitality industry conducts business.

The post [Case Study] What made ⅘ leading hostels in India choose eZee’s hostel software appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Indeed, the hospitality industry being one of the most courteous profession, giving a commendable welcome to guests is an indispensable part of an outstanding guest arrival. To match the competition, these days you require matching your hotel services to that of guest’s values and preferences to deliver a memorable hotel guest experience.

And it all starts with bookings and arrivals; on which the guest’s whole stay experience is based. So, here I’ve got a small visualization as to what can be done to enhance your guest experience.

Here are some ideas to improve your guest’s hotel experience through arrivals:

1. Easy booking process with a discount

Your potential guest searches a hotel room online. A list of all the hotels in the preferred location is displayed, he’s searching for. Having one’s hotel website, being listed on OTAs, meta-search engines and GDS will make it easy for your guest to find you. You also need to be available to take bookings or inquiries on the phone.

You must be already working on increasing your direct bookings. For that, you need to offer something which your competitors aren’t. Coming up with attractive deals and packages is one such way to attract lookers and simplify the decision-making process.

2. Know your guests

It is imperative to perceive your guests and understand their purpose of visit; whether they are on a business visit, or on a leisure visit; so as to decide their choice, food preferences and if allergic to anything at the time of booking confirmation.

Based on the purpose of guest visit, you can offer them vouchers to a museum or a casual sightseeing or rent-a-car for a long drive.

3. Offer your hotel amenities to enhance hotel experience and gain some additional revenue

Sending an email notification just a day before the arrival can be a booster for a guest experience and revenue generator for your hotel. You can ask your guest to avail your hotel amenities. Like a spa or steam bath so that your guests feel rejuvenated after a long-hectic journey and a car parking facility.

Providing them with a welcome drink at arrivals is a must these days. You can also ask for morning wake-up call and breakfast that’ll freshen-up your guest for the day.

4. Pre-arrival emails

For a lasting first impression, you ought to send a pre-arrival email to welcome your guest. Your hotel’s location can be added in the email, helping your guest reach your hotel easily. This way a rapport is developed between your hotel’s guest relationship manager and the guest. A good rapport makes a guest to be frank enough to avail services which they require. At this very point, guest may also notify you of a special facility to be provided at your hotel.

5. Managing early check-in

Let’s consider, you receive a call from your guest before his arrival mentioning an early check-in. And on the other end is a guest who informs you from the guest portal of his early arrival by 2 hours.

What will you do in such a case? Would you ask your tired guests to wait in the lobby? Or would you ask them to initiate an early check-in? The first option may create a bad impression of your hotel, while the second one may be less likely to be enacted as they’ve already informed you in advance. Here, providing an early check-in with no extra charges is the best option.

So, your maintenance staff gears up and goes at a hotel room with a checklist whether everything is OK. Bed, AC, lights, intercom are functioning or not. And, once you get a nod from the staff that everything is fine, you’re ready to hand over the room to your guest.

6. Pickup service

Now that you are well aware of your guest’s day and time of arrival, you just need to check and see whether a guest has requested for pick-up services. If not, you can call them and ask if they need one; and work on improving their experience with you.

7. Self check-in facilities

If you’re providing a guest self-service portal or a self-check-in kiosk, it will simplify your guest’s check-in and arrival.

In case of a hotel guest portal, you can approve the check-in, have the guest registration card ready using the pre-filled information in their guest profile and guide them towards their room.

This way guest check-in process which took 10-15 minutes earlier is now done in few seconds.

Besides, your guest can request a change in his reservation, build his profile, get route-map of your property, give reviews, manage group reservations, be updated with hotel bill and even ask to consume your hotel’s recreational and transport services using the hotel guest portal.

So, this was all about how you can nail your guest experience at arrivals. Well, we’ve also listed 17 easy-to-apply ways to enhance your guest experience before arrival, on arrival, during the stay, on-departure, and post-departure. You can explore those strategies from here and can deliver an overall amazing experience to your guests.

Conclusion

Having gone through the above strategies, you can decide which of the following hotel services are eligible at your property, as per the type of guests you cater to any type of property you own. Most important is that if you succeed to provide an ultimate hotel experience to your guest, you will see an upward curve [hike in guest influx] in your hotel revenue graph.

The post Best Hotel Guest Experience: How to enhance your guest experience at arrivals appeared first on eZee Absolute.

In this blog, we will learn about hotel RevPAR, how to calculate it and strategies to optimise it.

RevPAR stands for revenue per available room and is one of the most significant factors that build your hotel revenue.

When you understand the power of RevPAR, you can plan better room rates and increase your revenue. We have listed 10 proven strategies to increase your property’s RevPAR. Read the blog further to know all of them. 

What is Hotel RevPAR?

Hotel RevPAR stands for Revenue Per Available Room. It is a key metric that you should use to track your business performance.

It is pure room revenue and does not include additional services like food and beverages, spa, laundry, room service, tours or any service that a customer utilises during their stay. This way you can understand the value of every available room in the property.

RevPAR is calculated daily, monthly or yearly. 

Let us walk you through the RevPar formula to make you understand it better:

How to Calculate Hotel RevPAR?

Well, there are two ways by which you can calculate your RevPar: 

RevPAR = Rooms Revenue/ Rooms available

OR

RevPAR = Average Daily Rate (ADR) * Occupancy Rate;

Here’s an example to help you understand the formula better:

Suppose that you are a hotel with 200 rooms. The average daily rate of the hotel is $100. On any particular day, when the occupancy rate is 80% (i.e. out of 200 rooms, 160 are occupied), then total earned room revenue is $16,000. In this case, hotel RevPAR can be calculated as:

So, on that day you generated $80 per room. 

Further, you have to understand the fact that getting 100% occupancy by compromising your average daily room rate (ADR) is not beneficial.

To have a better profit percentage, you need to have a higher RevPAR.

Think about this: Do you want more money by charging a higher room rate with fewer guests? Or you’re willing to compromise your room rate and increase your occupancy? The choice is yours!

Now that you know, how to calculate hotel RevPAR, let me throw some light on,

Importance of RevPAR in the Hotel Industry

RevPAR is not just a KPI in your hotel revenue. It also helps you:

• Plan room rates better: With the formula, you can decide the profit you want to acquire from the rooms. Based on the profit percentage, you can calculate the projected RevPAR and then decide rates accordingly.
• Measure your business performance: As mentioned in the above point, with RevPAR, you can strategize profitable room rates. Similarly, if you have higher occupancy and RevPAR, then it means your hotel is performing great. 

Basically, these are the two key reasons to calculate RevPAR. Now, let’s explore the section that will interest you the most.

Proven strategies to increase your hotel RevPAR

We have seen that RevPAR is important. The question is, how to increase it?  There are multiple factors that affect your property’s RevPAR.

We have analysed all of them and formed these strategies. For better understanding, we have classified the strategies in two parts:

1. Primary strategies: These strategies will have a direct impact on your RevPAR. As soon as you apply them, you would see an immediate effect on your RevPAR. 
2. Secondary strategies: These strategies will have an indirect impact on your RevPAR. Applying these strategies, you won’t see an instant increase in your RevPAR. Instead, you will see the results gradually after over the period of time. 

Let’s first go understand the primary strategies.

1. Apply revenue management

Revenue management means selling the right room to the right customer, at the right time, and at the right price. 

Simply put, revenue management is all about adjusting the prices as per demand and supply. As and when the demand increases you have to increase your room rates. 

But, how would you do that frequently?

These days, integrated channel managers and booking engines can handle this occupancy-wise pricing on their own. All you have to do is define different occupancy slabs and set different rates for each slab. The software will automatically update the pricing as the occupancy level changes. 

When your rooms are being sold at the optimum price as per the occupancy, you‘d definitely get higher RevPAR and revenue.  

2. Implementing different pricing strategies

We have already defined that RevPAR is directly proportional to your ADR. So higher the ADR, higher will be your RevPAR. 

However, it does not imply that you randomly hike your room rates to such an extent, that your property becomes unsellable . 

You need to have a strategic approach to increasing your room prices.

For example:

• Have different pricing strategies for high seasons and low seasons, weekend and weekdays.
• Create different room rates for customer segments viz. business travelers, leisure travelers, and so on.
• You may also want to perform competition analysis and figure out the optimum rate for a room type in the market amongst your competitors to maximize your revenue. 

These are the few different pricing strategies that we recommend. You can explore other strategies from here. 

By considering different factors, you can not increase your RevPAR which will in turn increase overall revenue. 

3. Balancing your occupancy percentage and ADR

RevPAR is dependent on two important metrics- ADR and occupancy. All three of them work in sync. 

Many hoteliers still view high occupancy as the operational target, disregarding all other aspects of revenue management.

You should not only focus on having a constant ADR and 100% occupancy. To increase your hotel RevPAR, you can play around your ADR.

Let us give you an example for a better idea

If you are a hotel with 10 rooms, each costing $100. Now, on selling each room, you are getting $40 profit. Here, there could be two cases:

1.  On a particular day, there’s 100% occupancy. Either you sell all the rooms at constant ADR of $100 and earn a profit of $400. 
2. On another day, when there’s 80% occupancy. On that day, you can initially sell your 5 rooms at $100 and for the rest of the rooms, you can increase your ADR by 50$. In this way, despite having less occupancy than the previous day, your profit would be 620 $. 

So, this is how you can play around your ADR and increase your RevPAR. 

In reality, higher occupancy in many cases leads to lower profits, when the increased number of rental units doesn’t offset the loss in average rate.

4. Focus on direct bookings

Undoubtedly, OTAs play an important role in getting you more bookings. 

You see, there are always two sides of a coin.

On one hand, you are getting bookings, on the other hand, you are losing a significant chunk of your room’s revenue as OTA commissions. 

To compensate for this, you must focus on getting more direct bookings. All you have to do is, get a booking engine integrated with your hotel website, that is capable of converting your website visitors into bookers. 

Other than that, you can increase your efforts in getting more direct bookings. There are many ways through which you can increase your direct bookings via your website. You can explore them from here.

When you are getting enough direct bookings from your website, then you can gradually scale down your dependency on OTAs. 

5. Reducing cancellation rate

A high cancellation rate is a major pain point for hotels. And to be honest, it affects your RevPAR greatly. 

To save your RevPAR, you can have more non-refundable reservations. This won’t bring any changes to your cancellation policy.

Yet, putting up non-refundable reservations will definitely increase your occupancy and reduce the cancellation rate at your hotel. We have some solid strategies to reduce your last-minute cancellations. You can explore them from here.

These are the strategies that you can apply and you will see the increase in revenue straightaway. The results of these strategies will have a direct impact on your hotel’s RevPAR. 

Secondary Strategies

Apart from these strategies, there are certain actions that indirectly affect your RevPAR. Following those strategies will surge your revenue too. Let’s go through them. 

1. Save your side expenses

Let’s understand this by an example.

Say, you have a 20 rooms property. We o0pe and wish that there will be a 100% occupancy for the property for all 30 days of a month. But, that is a far reach. When you have a housekeeping team in-house, you have to pay them salaries regardless of what occupancy you have in a particular month.

To overcome this issue and save the expense you can opt for – uber for housekeeping. Instead of having a dedicated housekeeping staff 24*7, you can go through your arrival list, and then outsource the staff to get the housekeeping done. 

So, when you have more arrivals, you can outsource 3 people, and similarly, when you have fewer arrivals you can outsource fewer people. You can easily optimize your room expenses and thereby increase your RevPAR. Besides, you can also adopt IoT devices to save energy costs. `

2. Plan room rates as per length of stay (ALOS)

Trust me, mandating  ‘Minimum Length of Stay’ is still considered as the most effective way to increase revenue per room.

As RevPAR is directly proportional to the occupancy percentage, with this strategy you can increase your occupancy easily.  

To increase your occupancy rate, you can employ strategies using the length of stay restrictions as below:

Minimum length of stay: Accept long-termed stays instead of bookings with short-termed stays.
Maximum length of stay: Take reservations at discounted rates only for set maximum nights of stay

3. Manage your online reviews

Nearly half of all travelers book a hotel room by just reading online reviews. Therefore, it is important for you to focus on your hotel’s online reputation in order to bring in more guests and build your brand value.

Your hotel’s reputation has a direct impact on your hotel revenue. So you should not miss out on responding to all types of reviews. (Especially negative ones!)

You can try online review management software to streamline your response system. 

When your response to reviews gets punctual, your guests get strong confidence in your hotel brand, and your chances of getting selected by them increase. 

Well, to assist you in your response procedure, we have ready to use FREE review response templates as well)

4. Increase digital marketing efforts

Today, your potential audience searches for you on different digital platforms. Therefore, to attract your guests from these platforms, you need to have a solid online presence. 

Well, with digital marketing strategies you can increase your direct booking. Moreover, it improves the conversion rate of your website. 

You can try the following digital marketing strategies to enhance your online presence and get more bookings:

1. Interact via social media and videos 
2. Advertise on OTAs and metasearch engines
3. Start influencer marketing
4. Run online ads
5. Strengthen email marketing
6. Do regular blogging on your website

You can explore these strategies in detail from here. 

5. Run and promote loyalty programs

Running loyalty programs can be a proven strategy to increase your occupancy rate as well as RevPAR. As it attracts the existing guests to stick to your brand and encourages new guests as well. 

#Protip: If you don't have a loyalty program for your hotel, you should definitely consider having it. As it is one of the most assured marketing and revenue-generating strategies. 

It is important to note that loyalty programs work only if you offer rewards that provide your guests with some real value. You should reward them on the very next visit itself, instead of rewarding them after certain loyalty points are calculated.

This is how your existing guests will come back to you and choose you over other hotel brands. 

Relevant Read: 8 Practical Methods to Increase Repeat Guests at Your Hotel [Easy to Apply]

FAQs

Conclusion

So this was all about how you can increase your RevPAR. I have mentioned different strategies, direct and indirect strategies.  

You can start with a few direct strategies and a few indirect strategies initially for a certain time period. Study the results from these strategies, and then continue with the best-performing ones.

Now, if you want to dig deeper in your hotel RevPAR, then RevPAR has three subdivisions:

1. Total revenue per available room (TrevPAR): 

It is a sum total of net revenues from all the departments, rentals and other income for a particular period divided by the total available rooms during that period.

TrevPAR= Total revenue / Total available rooms

[Here, Total Revenue = Total Room Revenue + Spa + Breakfast + Bar + Mini Bar + Room Service + any other income]

2. Net revenue per available room (NrevPAR):

It is similar to RevPAR, except that it takes into account ONLY the net revenues you earned. It DOES NOT include your expenses such as distribution costs, transaction fees and travel agency commissions.

NrevPAR= (Room revenue-Distribution cost) / Total available rooms

3. Gross operating profit per available room (GOPPAR):

This indicates the actual profit you earned; after deducting your distribution costs, other operational expenses like maintenance, hiring staff, and more.

GOPPAR= (Gross operating revenue- gross operating expenses)/Total available rooms.

These are metrics just for calculating RevPAR, there are several other metrics or key performance indicators (KPIs) that you can read to measure your overall hotel business performance.  You can learn about them from here.

The post What Is Hotel RevPAR? 10 Simple Ways To Increase It appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Well, for some of your fellow hoteliers; this still might not be a reason powerful enough to invest in a tool called channel manager. If you too are looking for a compelling conviction on why to invest in leading-edge distribution automation technology, read on:

Hotelier and Channel Manager: The connection

Room availability and rates; these are prime factors that govern the ROI of your hotel business. You are well aware that managing an optimum level of rates and occupancy is sheer essentiality, and it falls completely under your span of control. Not to forget that this is a continuous process (a full-time job for those who perform it manually) to be followed day in and day out at any accommodation.

Therefore, it is indispensable to evaluate the number of efforts, time, energy and payroll that are dedicated to maintaining them manually. Just imagine, what if you can automate this process and get rid of manual operations? Wouldn’t it be a giant relief? Hence, for you to get a channel manager and ease up, we have accumulated top “7 reasons as to why hotels need a channel manager”.

1. Easily add new booking channels for your hotel. The more the better!

Multi-channel booking strategy is what works best in any season. A hotelier following this does not have to depend on limited booking sources. The more sources that bring you booking, the better and safer it is for your business. Implementing a channel manager at your property gives you access to hundreds of connected channels. A channel manager bridges your property with all those booking platforms, displays your inventory to crowds of bookers looking for accommodation in your city and brings you paid bookings. Moreover, being connected to online platforms has more advantages such as,

• Higher distribution reach,

• Demand generation,

• Higher ROI,

• Variety of booking sources,
• And, get seen by regional as well as global bookers.

2. Single dashboard for strategic inventory and rate management

Tiresome inventory management becomes hassle free once you deploy a channel manager to do that. Moreover,

• You get a single dashboard that gives you an insightful overview of availability and rates distributed on all connected channels.

• Minimized human intervention with system to push and pull data. You can post and manage precise room rates and inventory allocation with minimum efforts.

• You can send out pooled inventory to channels to acquire maximum bookings from any channel, without worrying about overbookings.

• Your room rates and availability are always in sync and latest to the moment across all channels, so that your staff does not need to sit and pass on inventory refill and updates. 

• You can post restrictions and inclusions; while processing new, modified and cancelled reservations centrally.

• Rates on different OTAs, vacation rental portals, metasearch platforms and even your own website; manage it from one-place.
• You can manage multiple properties too.

Everything automated. Just send a command and system does it for you. Instead of manual operations, you can focus and strategize better distribution.

3. Time saving automation with even 365 days calendar update

Without a software, inventory and rate distribution across channels is a do-it-yourself task for you. You might miss something, and it can cause errors, double bookings, wrong or delayed updates and a lot many unpredictable mistakes. Duh! And then comes correction part, consuming more of your time. You might lose track of updates. You might never realize if your sent update was never executed at OTA end. What a sad life, isn’t it?

Now think of a channel manager that can magically take all this of your pain away. Yes, a channel manager would not make humanly(!) mistakes or errors, maintain update logs, keep control on overbookings, keep inventory and rates always latest and synced, and notify you of updates communicated to OTA. Take a sigh of relief, I know you are getting a Channel Manager for your hotel now.
Moreover, you can update calendar even for an entire year if you want on channels that support it, in just a click. Let the system take care of rate updates and while you sit back and enjoy your time conversing with a guest or two.

4. Quick stop sale and auto-updates. Do more with lesser efforts

Imagine a sticky situation when suddenly a group demands bookings and you need to use up inventory that is currently allocated to and live on a given travel site. I know there remains a sense of fear while stopping the sale manually. So many to-and-fro operations might overwhelm you. This is when a system like channel manager comes to your rescue.

If you are sending room rates and occupancy details too frequently; you might as well need to ask a particular channel to stop selling a certain part of your inventory. Later on you might release inventory. All you have to do is click on stop sale button and system will automatically put a halt to online sale of your inventory on a that channel. Not only saving you repeated efforts, it also prevents revenue loss you might suffer due to this errors.

Just a channel manager and there you go….No more mismatching inventory, no more revenue leakage, no more delay, no more overbooking. All you have is swift and simple distribution with real time updates at remarkably reduced manual efforts!

5. Minimize over bookings and under-bookings. Utilize complete inventory!

A channel manager comes up with several built-in mechanisms that help you effectively prevent overbookings and under-bookings. Sometimes, you might end up receiving more bookings than your physical capacity, and bingo! your inventory is oversold.

On the other hand, due to uneven distribution, possibly you might not be using inventory to the fullest capacity, that is, under-bookings! Without a channel manager when you go out to resolve this, it can prove to be the toughest job ever.

Just some human or technical errors might cost your hotel loss of reputation, decreased customer loyalty and much more. At such times, channel manager keeps on trying in back-end multiple times until a request sent to OTA is not successful in order to save you from overselling. And it notifies you as well with execution status. So, you need to have that channel manager because you know you cannot afford to sit and keep a tab on updates communicated to OTAs and their statuses.

6. Effortless rate parity maintenance

It can be tricky when you see your demand increased and your want to make the most of it. Might as well you want to give out rooms on discounted rates to your guests, which becomes easy as a pie with a distribution tool.

Channel manager systems are developed to automatically maintain efficient rates to ensure that any changes you make on system are unanimously updated across all platforms in real-time, leaving no room for errors. Thus, you can avoid rate disparity and enhance your hotel’s online reputation.

7. Yield Management features for skyrocketing efficiency

More than just a number Best Available Rate (BAR) is a way to achieve optimal revenue. It’s a brainstorming task to set up a dynamic rate plans and derive the most suitable room price of the day.

If you have a channel manager, it can help you sell right room at right price at right time; that too, automatically. Owing to high/low occupancy at your property, system will hike up or slash down room rates to sell each and every room for you. Sounds like a smart idea to increase bookings? That’s the most effective yield management.

Done, there you go! Now that you have assimilated the top reason why you should get a channel manager, there is one more thing you should know about. Before you begin evaluating an online distribution tool for your property, do keep in mind these points.

• Channel manager should give you connection with your already existing booking channels.

• Channel manager provider should be able to quickly connect you with channel of your choice so that you can broaden your reach.

• How about foreign currency conversions in system?
• It should integrate with systems that you use at your property. For example, it should integrate with a hotel PMS or booking engine, so that you operate on a live inventory at any given time.

Final takeaway: The good, The better, the best

Without a channel manager,

• Every morning you rush to update all calendars with live rates and the latest occupancy.

• Keep worrying about overbookings or missed bookings.

• Repeat those same time-consuming tasks every day.
• You might lose that potential revenue you could’ve earned otherwise.

With a channel manager, you can

• Enjoy your morning coffee while interacting with your guests.

• Leave the front desk and take a vacation too. You have a channel manager on mobile to check and update rates if and when you wish to.

• Automate recurring operations to save time and money and master productivity.
• Earn higher ROI with no revenue leakage.

Because you have the tech way to manage it.

Decide now, how do you wish to spend the rest of your life as a hotelier? With or without a channel manager?

The post 7 Ultimate Reasons Why You Should Invest in A Hotel Channel Manager appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Seldom you might have come across this question, “Do you accept a card?” Well, it is mostly asked when your guest wants to make a cashless payment at your hotel.

And if your answer to this question is NO; then let me tell you, my friend, you are surely behind the curve in this digital world.

But, if you reply with a pleasing YES; your hotel has a sureshot green tick on your guest’s mind.

Having global acceptance, online transactions are the easiest and fastest growing mode of payment.

They are payments made with a real-time gross settlement; driving people to carry more plastic money (cards) in their wallets than having physical cash.

While, cashless payments in hotels are being preferred significantly, however some still strive to adopt them at their properties. 

On that note, in this blog, I have gathered all information on how you can adopt cashless payments in your hotel and the various ways through which you can accept them.

Let’s begin with,

What are cashless payments?

Remember those days when we recorded our expenses and incomes in files? And, we had huge drawers and lockers to keep the cash secure? 

However, this situation has changed completely now. Bills and cash are rapidly becoming a distant memory, as the world moves into the cashless era.

Right from purchasing a carton of milk to a new car – everything is being paid digitally; with its information stored on your smartphones. 

To be precise, cashless payments have swept everything into a new world of digital transactions. 

So what are they?

Basically, cashless payments are made by transferring electronic money typically through a bank transfer or a card; without the need for physical cash.

They are the simplest, fastest, and safest way to carry money on your fingertips anywhere in and around the world.

Let’s find out,

Why are cashless payments a must in the new normal?

With the COVID19 pandemic attacking the globe; going cashless is no longer an option, but rather a necessity for all types of businesses.

In the hospitality industry, it has enforced the revolution of contactless services and digital payments; further boosting the pay@hotel option gradually. 

Mainly because of the simplified transaction procedure and refund policy that it provides to your guests. 

Let me highlight you a few,

Key benefits of cashless payments in hotels: 

Convenient to guests: Naturally, guests don’t need to carry physical money while traveling to make payments. Either they pay while booking through any medium (OTA, booking engine, etc) or they pay directly at your property. This is convenient for them and even enables quicker transactions. 

Reduces human errors: Electronic payment transactions are easier to record and track, yet safe from thefts. On top of that, managers no longer need to register this influx diligently against the receipts; thereby leaving no space for manual errors.

Enables paperless and contact free payments: The new normal to go contactless is one of the most favored reasons to adopt cashless payments. Besides, it helps hoteliers serve more customers in less time thereby enhancing the hotel’s revenue.

Allows proper collection of customer data: Cashless payments record every transaction that is made, providing you essential data on who buys what and when. This gives you an opportunity to understand your customers better and offer them services based on their preferences. 

Eliminates the risks of keeping cash: Handling cash has a lot of risks involved. It can get stolen, damaged during disasters, accidentally hand over extra change, and suchlike. With a cashless system, managing your money becomes quite simple.

Loyal customers and bookings: Receiving prepaid reservations ensures you that the booking is valid and has lower chances of no show or cancellation. This helps you maintain optimum occupancy at your property and thereby boost your business revenue.

To sum up, going cashless can surely be a boon to your hospitality business owing to negligible risks involved, ease of use, and higher guest satisfaction.

Since you are well versed with the benefits, let me shower some insights on, 

Why are cash payments not recommended now?

Technology is changing every single day. If we look back, cash payments were the most and quite frankly, the only source of money people relied upon.

To state the truth, online payments did take some time to claw their way inside the ecosystem. But now that they’re in, they’re going to stay here for good. 

Those who never made online transactions are now keen on making cashless payments (even my Dad, who used to be skeptical with such methods now prefers Paytm and Google Pay over cash exchange). 

To mention, cash payments are not preferred because: 

• Transactions are often lengthy
• Deliver slower services 
• Possibility of fake notes or dirty money
• Constant need to maintain change

Not to mention, currently, the hand-to-hand exchange of cash is considered risky. So, hotels need to prioritize their guests’ needs now and adopt a no-cash policy.

To start with this, let me guide you on the various ways to accept cashless payments at your hotel.

How can you offer cashless payments at your hotel? 

There are numerous ways to go cashless. In fact, with every new guest entering your premises; you’ll find a unique payment method they prefer. 

Though, here I am covering some of the best and most preferred payment methods to help your hotel business pilot it’s way into a cash-free world.

1. Debit and Credit Cards

Banking cards offer your guests more security, convenience, and control than any other payment method.

I’m sure the amount of debit and credit card holders across the world is almost equal or even more to our overall population. 

In the Q1 of 2020, there were around 1141 million VISA credit cards issued across the world. 

Source 

Whereas, in Q4 of 2020, there were around 2.33 billion VISA debit cards issued globally. 

Source

These cards allow your guests to transact money directly from their bank account and pay for your services within a fraction of seconds; saving equal time and effort behind collecting such payments for you and your guests.

Some examples of card payment systems are: RuPay, Visa, and MasterCard.

Note: You might need a credit card server integration or a POS system to swipe cards for payments. 

2. Net banking

Net (internet) banking is an alternative to a debit or credit card. Here your guests need to login to their net banking account to approve a payment. 

Net banking gives your guests the flexibility of transacting even if they have misplaced their debit card or credit card, or for those who don’t prefer to carry cards everywhere. 

Through internet banking, they can make utility payments, purchase goods and services online, or send and receive money.

It is an electronic payment system that enables your customers to conduct a range of financial transactions.

These are services that enable real-time transactions for your guests to make any cashless payments at your property.

Some examples of internet banking are: IMPS, NEFT, and RTGS.

3. UPI 

UPI stands for Unified Payment Interface. It is an immediate and 24×7 functioning payment system that helps you transfer funds between any two bank accounts through a mobile platform.

The only thing that you require is, to have an account with a bank that provides a UPI App for Android, Windows, and iOS mobile platform(s).

Once done, make sure to register your mobile number with the respective bank and link it to the UPI account. 

With this, you can receive cashless payments at your property on-the-go in just a matter of a click.

Working in real-time, this mobile payment method has recently been most prevalent in India to facilitate inter-bank transactions without having to deal with any transaction fee. 

Some examples of UPI are: BHIM, PhonePe, and Google Pay.

4. e-Wallets 

An e-Wallet is a digital wallet that users can carry anywhere. It poses as an online service or a program that allows users to process electronic transactions while paying for goods and services through digital currency. 

These platforms usually have a QR based option that allows users to simply scan, pay, and avail any of your services. 

So instead of asking them to make payment with a credit or debit card, you can simply place a QR code scanner at your hotel premises to accept digital payments.

For this, all you and your guests need to do is link your bank account to the available digital wallet app. 

In like manner, banks have now introduced these features in their mobile banking app itself; making it even easier for you to accept payments. 

Some examples of mobile wallets are: Mobikwik, Apple Pay, and Citrus Pay. 

5. Payment gateway

A payment gateway is the simplest way for hoteliers (and businesses alike) to collect digital or online payments from their website.

It acts as an interface between you and your guest’s bank to transfer money securely and perform any online payments.

In other words, a payment gateway is a software that authorizes you to conduct an online transaction through different payment modes.

These can be net banking, credit card, debit card, UPI, or any online wallets that are available these days. 

Basically, it is a master of all the above mentioned cashless payment methods and an essential integration that your hotel software must have.

Some examples of payment gateways are: RazorPay, Paytm, Amazon Pay, and PayPal. 

In a nutshell, the past few years have been a rollercoaster of innovation for hoteliers. Starting from paperless, contactless, and now cashless; we are surely on a new ride to success.

And I believe if the industry adopts these practices then customer experience and stay can definitely reach a new high.

But before that, let me give you a quick glance on

What should hoteliers keep in mind while moving to cashless payments?

Turning your hotel into a cashless property cannot be done overnight. It does involve a lot of thinking, planning, and implementation.

Here are a few mandatory factors you should keep in mind for that:

1. First and foremost, identify the areas and points where cash-exchange happens on your premises (spa, restaurants, gift shops, etc). 
2. Analyze and decide which mode of cashless payment would suit the best. For example, if it is a play zone area, then mobile wallets can be the most convenient way to enforce. 
3. Do not restrict yourself to any one payment method. Always have an alternative payment method for those guests who aren’t active or don’t prefer your chosen approach. 
4. Adopting the right payment system and ensuring the ultimate security of your guests’ data is the most crucial element that you need to take care of.

Failing to protect your customer’s data will definitely have huge aftermath on your reputation and brand image.

Understanding this, such services are often PCI DSS certified. Thus, ensure that your property and the hotel technology you use is committed to PCI compliance.

FAQs

I am sure, a lot of questions must have popped into your head. And it’s only fair. I personally would not recommend you to go ahead with any method unless you’re clear with all its aspects. 

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