Intro to Online Booking Systems
Every hostel should have its own website
Every hostel should have its own website and the ability for potential guests to make 'direct bookings' through that website, through what is commonly known as a 'booking engine.' Now, there are many ways to achieve this; however, you have the most control and could pay the least in commissions using an online booking system. Both property management systems (PMSs) and channel managers have online booking tools that are simple to set up and offer more options. Also, many of the online travel agents (OTAs) have widgets that will suffice if you need something simple. We will visit them later.
Now that the OTAs are on your mind, keep them there. When you think of your online booking system, you should want it to work the way that the OTAs do, or even better. Simply put, the OTAs spend hundreds of millions on research, development, and testing of new features to create one amazing bed/room selling machine. Many online booking systems strive to do exactly this, replicating a similar user experience based on research and reports to verify that those OTAs are doing an excellent job. The OTAs are very analytically driven. They focus on conversion more than anything—taking a visitor looking at your inventories and converting them into a customer. Your website should do more than that; however, once a visitor to your website starts the booking journey, they should be converted just as easily.
Here is a list of what the OTAs do, which is exactly what you should look for in an online booking system:
They use pictures: Pictures are worth 1,000 words and truly sell the experience. Not only pictures of the facilities, but pictures of the room types make a major difference. This is more applicable today than ever before, where new devices are very hungry for large, beautiful pictures.
They show all the inventories: Some guests looking for two beds in a dorm might also consider a twin room if the price and experience are right. Perhaps they want to stay five days, but only three in their preferred room type are available. Well, they most definitely should know that they can stay in another room, or perhaps just move rooms. If this isn't communicated well, they would go off and book somewhere else. The OTAs do this with rate mixing, but you can do it all the same.
They reach a larger audience: The OTAs have multi-language functionality built into their systems. Booking.com, for instance, can easily change the site functionality to work in 40 different languages with the click of a button, and they use your visitor stats to determine which languages to offer content in as well. If more than one language is important to you, make sure your tool offers this functionality.
They have special promotions: The OTAs can leverage the competition to get you to agree to flash sales, last-minute deals, and lower your rates for guests who meet certain requirements. You should be able to do all that too with your direct bookings. Even so, you should be able to offer coupon codes and sell extras such as tours, activities, breakfast rates, and more. You can create entire packages that can really motivate potential guests to make a booking, so look for this here.
They show what is left: If a potential customer sees that there are only a few beds or rooms left that they want, then they are more likely to make the booking right then and there, rather than shop around some more. This act of immediacy is a true selling point.
As few steps as possible: Everyone hates the process of filling in all your info to make a purchase online. The OTAs know that. The online booking tools know that too. Some offer integrations with PayPal Express, Google Wallet, and Stripe to make the process as fast and painless as possible, increasing the probability of conversion. This is worth considering as well.
Now that that is all covered, you need to find out if you really need the trouble of setting up an online booking page on your site. You can do so by first asking yourself some questions. Does your site get much traffic? Check your host analytics or Google Analytics if you have that set up. If it is not a huge amount, perhaps you should consider one of the easier options by using tools provided for free by an OTA. Here they are, and what they cost:
Hostelworld: Hostelworld has a widget form that will take users to another domain where they can book your inventories while still feeling associated with your device. It works as if you are an affiliate, where they pay you based on the commissions from bookings your own page has generated. Sunset Backpackers Floripa uses this. Read More...
Booking.com: Booking.com also has a widget you can put on your website, and they take 0% commissions from bookings made there. What's the catch? Well, when your property isn't available, even partially available, that widget will then take your website visitors to book other properties. Also, Booking.com has more than just direct bookings. Their Booking Suite product builds websites, manages SEM campaigns, and takes direct bookings, all at just 10%. We have an article about that in the pipeline. If you are interested, ask your account manager to help you.
OpenTravelExchange: OTE and their HostelHops brand offer commission-free bookings via a link. They have no widget, but a novice web programmer can still make one and send data to their site. Also, like Booking.com, when you have no availability, it takes your visitor to its main page for your destination. Bambu Hostels in Brazil/Argentina uses OTE.
Ok, so now you can see you already have some options, with no upfront cost to you. If you are unsure of what you need, you should use one of those for a month or a year to see how many bookings they can send you (it is up to you to keep track). Now, if autonomy is important to you, you should consider jumping ahead to one of these options:
Book Now: This Myallocator tool is as simple as it gets. You can customize an iframe widget, allowing people to book your beds and sending the reservation to the Myallocator channel manager. It comes free as part of the channel manager package. This tool lacks the bells and whistles, which could impact conversion, but at Myallocator's super low prices, it could still be worth it. A good example of its execution can be seen at Bikini Hostel Miami.
MyBookings: Cloudbeds, powered by Myallocator, also gives you an option to enhance your web bookings. This beautiful page is well worth the extra money.
TheBookingButton: This tool from Siteminder has all the bells and whistles. It can be used alone or at a discounted price if you use Siteminder's channel management service. Discovery Hostel Melbourne utilizes it well.
MaxBookings: This tool has all the bells and whistles too, although the design could use an overhaul to match today's sites. Sir Toby's Hostel in Prague executes MaxBookings well.
These are only a few, and there are plenty out there. Just like how many PMS systems have channel managers, they also have online booking tools. We have heard people using Sirvoy for the booking tool alone, enjoying the email features usually associated with the PMS as a bonus. You would have to visit our page on PMS and check to see which ones offer only the online booking system. There you go. This should be enough information to help you determine what you want. If you know of any not mentioned here and what PMS and channel managers they work with, please mention them in the comments below. We wish that everyone has many direct bookings in our future.