Comments on: How can we create “the thrill of the chase”? http://www.hotelmarketingstrategies.com/the-thrill-of-the-chase/ Internet Marketing Ideas for Your Hotel Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:48:14 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.4 By: Costa Rica Hotels http://www.hotelmarketingstrategies.com/the-thrill-of-the-chase/comment-page-1/#comment-748 Costa Rica Hotels Tue, 22 Sep 2009 18:59:03 +0000 http://www.hotelmarketingstrategies.com/?p=2274#comment-748 Interesting approach, loved the post, have been reading this site for a while and I think it has offered me a great deal of knowledge in many areas thanks to informative posts like this one, you are doing a great job, thanks for helping ! Interesting approach, loved the post, have been reading this site for a while and I think it has offered me a great deal of knowledge in many areas thanks to informative posts like this one, you are doing a great job, thanks for helping !

]]> By: Mark Forrester http://www.hotelmarketingstrategies.com/the-thrill-of-the-chase/comment-page-1/#comment-747 Mark Forrester Mon, 21 Sep 2009 16:52:57 +0000 http://www.hotelmarketingstrategies.com/?p=2274#comment-747 Josiah, Thanks for your updates on Eye for Travel. The relationship between hotels and OTA's is an interesting one. You can’t live with them and you can’t live without them. One area where OTA's hurt their image with independent hotels and indeed the chains is brand hijacking. The PPC strategy for many OTA's is to bid on the hotel name with often unsubstantiated offers - "70 off rack rate etc". This creates a lack of trust between the hotelier and the OTA's. If OTA's focussed more on generating sales through experiences and innovation, other than rate & brand then everyone would benefit. Opaque channels are a good example where innovation has been a win win. As for the chase, the chase should end when the users finds the same rate on the hotel website. This is often not the case of course. One innovation I think could work is room bidding, the user would be able to bid for a room on a certain night, with the highest price winning. It would certainly spice up the current booking engines which are quite boring to use. Mark Josiah,
Thanks for your updates on Eye for Travel. The relationship between hotels and OTA’s is an interesting one. You can’t live with them and you can’t live without them. One area where OTA’s hurt their image with independent hotels and indeed the chains is brand hijacking. The PPC strategy for many OTA’s is to bid on the hotel name with often unsubstantiated offers – “70 off rack rate etc”. This creates a lack of trust between the hotelier and the OTA’s.

If OTA’s focussed more on generating sales through experiences and innovation, other than rate & brand then everyone would benefit. Opaque channels are a good example where innovation has been a win win.

As for the chase, the chase should end when the users finds the same rate on the hotel website. This is often not the case of course. One innovation I think could work is room bidding, the user would be able to bid for a room on a certain night, with the highest price winning. It would certainly spice up the current booking engines which are quite boring to use.

Mark

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