E-Marketing

This lesson will provide an overview of:

• The difference between manual and online booking systems
• The benefits of online systems

At the end of this lesson you should be able to:

• Discuss the functions of a reservation system
• Understand the difference between manual and online booking systems
• Identify the type of reservation system used by your tourism business and assess the viability of an online system

Types of reservation systems

1. Reservations management on paper

The most basic type of booking system is when businesses manage their reservations manually on paper, keeping notes of guests reservations, check-ins, payment, etc.

2. Reservations management in Excel spreadsheets

Using computers, some businesses manage their reservations in Excel or other spreadsheet programs.

In both of these types of reservation management, businesses have to manually handle the bookings and reservations. They have to manually update their occupancy, rates, available rooms, booked rooms and so on.



An online hotel reservation system is a software tool that allows a guest to plan their own trip at their convenience.

• It displays your live rates and inventory in real time, across all of your channels
• It allows guests to select the dates for their trip and finalise their reservation
• It sends an automated reservation email immediately on booking
• It offers a payment portal so that guests can complete their transaction
• It automatically updates your property management system or central reservations system when your rooms are booked.

The benefits of an online reservation system:

It directly improves the guest experience at your property

A cloud-based hotel reservation system allows your guests to book their preferred room type on their computers, from their tablets or on their phones. With short forms and secure payment portals, your hotel reservation system makes the process of online booking a room simple, easy and enjoyable. Remember, this is their first impression of your hotel and it will have a lasting impact on their perception of your brand. It should be user-friendly if your guests will complete the process and book online.

It simplifies the administrative process for you and your staff

Rather than requiring you to respond to email inquiries and accept reservations over the phone, an online booking system does the work for you.

It reduces the risk of overbooking your rooms

When a hotel reservation system is not in place, one person has to manually update the reservations coming in from all the connected distribution channels; this can be an extremely difficult task.

With a hotel reservation system in place, all live rates and availability are automatically updated by the software. The risk of overbooking rooms is massively reduced, which significantly improves the smoothness of your hotel operations.

Source: Siteminder

Summary

• When using paper or spreadsheet reservations, businesses have to manually handle the bookings and update their occupancy, rates, available rooms, booked rooms, etc
• Online reservation systems allow guests to plan, book and pay for their trip online at their convenience without needing to interact directly with the business.
• The benefits of online reservation systems are:
  • Improved guest experience
  • Simplified administrative process
  • Reduced risk of overbooking