Monday, October 31, 2011

How Strong is Our Signal?

How much business will be lost in rural areas that do not have 3G or even ANY mobile signal?

The question above was raised a few weeks back by Alan Rankin the Chief Executive at Cairngorms Business Partnership. He went on to discuss the issues facing hospitality businesses in Scotland when it comes to digital access - broadband, WiFi and plain old mobile.

The point was reinforced by those in the discussion group that mobile access was increasingly important yet as a country our coverage was appalling compared to some of our competitors and that with the growth in use of mobile devices for information, travel directions and live reservations we needed to improve the situtaito quite dramtatically.

On my own various trips across Scotland it is quite possible to lose mobile signal equally easily in parts of Edinburgh as it is in the western Highlands.

We thought theerefore that a quick and easy to complete survey of what's going on across Scotland's tourism businesses wouldn't go amiss. We have produced a quick and easy to complete survey which hopefully will give a snapshot of the picture across Scotland in the first week of November 2011 and will repeat it quartelry if it produces good enough results. There is a link within the survey to a Broadband speed test (uSwitch) which will allow a like for like comparison of speed across the country.

We'd be grateful if you could take ten minutes to complete the test and we'll publish the results on the TourismMatters facebook page next week

Complete the Survey Here

Thursday, October 27, 2011

Open Rooms Mobile Website for Scottish Hotels


The World is Travelling Light – So Should Your Website…

Mobile is the fastest growing method of accessing hotel information online. This is not the future – it is very much the present.

Online activity reports in October 2011, indicated that 25% of leisure travellers use mobile devices to book rooms, and Google reported that 19 % of all hotel searches happen on mobile devices.

It is becoming more and more important that hotels have a relevant workable mobile presence and whilst all of the Open Rooms websites are optimised to perform on mobile devices having a slimmed down version of a hotel website specifically for mobile users makes increasing sense.

Ayrshire based Hospitality Marketing business have just released pre launch details of their all new Content Managed Mobile Website for hotels - complete with integrated low cost commission online booking capability.

The Open Rooms Pro MM12 package includes aground breaking Content Managed Mobile Website with the full power of the Bookassist Booking Engine inbuilt. It includes mapping, online booking, image galleries and whatever additional pages and dynamic content hotels wish to put on it.

Ian McCaig, MD at Plan B and Managing Partner of Bookassist in Scotland explains, "The content is driven from our tourism database which already powers more than a hundred websites across Scotland. The fact that it is content managed gives the hotelier to target on a daily basis the traveller in the location with relevant offers, news and add ons. The booking is then seamless using Bookassist's mobile technology."

"Designed for ease of use and booking rooms the Mobile Website is an integral part of our wholly upgraded suite of website options for 2012 - the mobile complements the Open Rooms Lite, Plus and Pro packages aimed at all sizes of accommodation providers. We know that providing proper mobile and social media access for hotel guests can create a strong impression of the property and what it stands for." 

How it Works
Open Rooms mobile technology automatically redirects visitors browsing on iPhone, Android and other touch devices to the mobile version of the hotel’s website.

The Open Rooms Mobile site has been designed to be both fast and lightweight so that guests who are roaming will not be subjected to large file downloads and potentially larger billing costs ensuring that the customer gets the best experience possible on every platform - on desktop with Open Rooms Pro and on the go with the Mobile Website.

The Mobile hotel site features:
  • Location-aware mapping with automatic routing from current location to the hotel (where supported by the phone)
  • Room descriptions and photos and integrated customer reviews
  • Integrated photo gallery
  • Fast and easy-to-use full transaction engine for booking
  • PCI-DSS compliant security, credit card verification and SMS booking confirmation
  • Feature entire hotel groups, seamlessly interlinking each hotel.
Ensuring return on investment from your webapp Bookassist booking engine also tracks all bookings through its systems, including hotel webapp bookings. The powerful reporting is based on booking engine integration with the Google Analytics and will show you at a glance how your mobile platform is performing.

Properly built platforms drive conversion. Get your hotel on the move with Open Rooms Mobile.

To find out more about Open Rooms packages visit the Demo Website

For more information on both Open Rooms Mobile website and Bookassist booking engine contact Ian McCaig on 01292 521404 or by email

Monday, October 24, 2011

Dundonald Links recognised for Best Environmental Performance


Dundonald Links has received the ‘Best Environmental Performance Award’ at the recent Ayrshire Business Awards. Over 260 business leaders from Ayrshire and beyond attended the annual awards ceremony which recognises the best performing companies in Ayrshire. The event was held at the Gailes Hotel, Irvine where the BBC’s Kaye Adams presented the awards.

The ‘Best Environmental Performance Award’ award, sponsored by Nestle (worlds leading Nutrition, Health and Wellness Company), has been designed for organisations that demonstrate environmental best practice, ethical best practice or sustainable development. In order to qualify for the final selection process, Dundonald Links was invited to demonstrate these practices and to explain the impact that these initiatives have had on the company.

Dundonald competed with two major employers in Scotland, McCaig Renewable and Lowmac Recycling, for the award.

Bill Donald, General Manager, Loch Lomond Golf Club and Dundonald Links, commented:

“This is a tremendous achievement for the team at Dundonald Links and is testament to all their hard work and commitment in ensuring that the golf course is maintained to the very highest of standards with environmental best practice always in mind.”

The club website also features an environmental policy.

Dundonald Links is committed to the implementation of a wide range of proactive measures, to help protect, and sustain, the local, national, and global environment, and strives for continual improvement of its environmental management systems.

Our Vision

To provide players with an authentic and distinctive links land experience by using best environmental practices and policies.

Our aim is to:
  • Minimise waste, working towards zero waste
  • Minimise energy consumption
  • Protect and enhance biodiversity
  • Maximise the Club’s role to provide the public with knowledge of ongoing environmental issues
  • Inspire others to pursue sustainable resources
For further information, please contact Guy Redford, Director of Golf, Dundonald Links

T: 01294 314000 or E: guy.redford@dundonaldlinks.com

Dundonald Links Best Environmental Performance

Dundonald Links has received the ‘Best Environmental Performance Award’ at the recent Ayrshire Business Awards. Over 260 business leaders from Ayrshire and beyond attended the annual awards ceremony which recognises the best performing companies in Ayrshire. The event was held at the Gailes Hotel, Irvine where the BBC’s Kaye Adams presented the awards.

The ‘Best Environmental Performance Award’ award, sponsored by Nestle (worlds leading Nutrition, Health and Wellness Company), has been designed for organisations that demonstrate environmental best practice, ethical best practice or sustainable development. In order to qualify for the final selection process, Dundonald Links was invited to demonstrate these practices and to explain the impact that these initiatives have had on the company.

Dundonald competed with two major employers in Scotland, McCaig Renewable and Lowmac Recycling, for the award.

Bill Donald, General Manager, Loch Lomond Golf Club and Dundonald Links, commented:

“This is a tremendous achievement for the team at Dundonald Links and is testament to all their hard work and commitment in ensuring that the golf course is maintained to the very highest of standards with environmental best practice always in mind.”

The club website also features an environmental policy.

Dundonald Links is committed to the implementation of a wide range of proactive measures, to help protect, and sustain, the local, national, and global environment, and strives for continual improvement of its environmental management systems.

Our Vision

To provide players with an authentic and distinctive links land experience by using best environmental practices and policies.

Our aim is to:
  • Minimise waste, working towards zero waste
  • Minimise energy consumption
  • Protect and enhance biodiversity
  • Maximise the Club’s role to provide the public with knowledge of ongoing environmental issues
  • Inspire others to pursue sustainable resources
For further information, please contact Guy Redford, Director of Golf, Dundonald Links

T: 01294 314000 or E: guy.redford@dundonaldlinks.com

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Implementing a direct channel management strategy that wins consumers’ confidence

If there's one article any hotelier in Scotland should take ten minutes to read this week it is I would strongly suggest you consider this one. As hotels the length and breadth of Scotland face up to the end of season cash drain it is more critical than ever that a thought out distribution strategy is put in place ahead of the 2012. This article touches on the importance of direct distribution, flash sales, rate parity and added value.
Maybe hoteliers should read this before giving that two night deal for a tenner to every distribution channel in the world!

Published: 11 Oct 2011 on Eye For Travel by Ritesh Gupta
"One of the best things hotels can do to better manage their distribution costs is just to fully understand what all of the costs are in the first place and what levers they can pull to drive the right mix into their hotel at any given time" says Michael Menis, Vice President - Web and Interactive Marketing, InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG).
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) recently introduced what the hotel company described as the “most powerful website guarantee ever by a global travel company”.

IHG is now offering guests a free night if they find a qualifying lower price on any other website. This promise is part of the company’s new initiatives - the launch of `Best Price Guarantee’ and the `Book With Us Advantage’. Any guest who finds a qualifying, lower room price for an IHG hotel elsewhere online will receive their first night free, and the rest of their stay will match the price found. The benefits of the `Best Price Guarantee’ are available at all eight of IHG’s hotel brands.

EyeforTravel’s Ritesh Gupta (italics) spoke to Michael Menis, Vice President - Web and Interactive Marketing, IHG, about this initiative and related issues. Excerpts from the conversation:

The industry has undergone some major and permanent changes in distribution with a lot more transparency across all channels. For its part, IHG has come up with "Most Powerful Website Guarantee Ever”. How do you assess the significance of such move from IHG’s perspective as of today?

We feel as though this is a very significant move on our behalf to educate customers about the value and benefits of booking direct on our websites. Though there is more transparency across all channels, many customers still believe they will get a lower price or a better deal on a third party website, and this new guarantee is our effort to re-educate consumers that they will get the best price, and many other benefits like earning Priority Club Rewards points, when they book direct with us online. We want to show our customers how much we're willing to back up our promise to have the best price guaranteed on our website, which is why we're offering a free night if they find a lower rate through another site online.

How do you assess the approach of hotels’ towards their direct channel management strategy as of today and what do you recommend to them? How can they manage their distribution costs better?
Many of our hotels already do a great job in managing their mix, but other hotels have an opportunity to improve how they are managing that mix. We provide a number of education tools and resources to our hotels to ensure they have the right knowledge to best manage their distribution costs as it is most appropriate for their business and market. There is no one size fits all solution. One of the best things hotels can do to better manage their distribution costs is just to fully understand what all of the costs are in the first place and what levers they can pull to drive the right mix into their hotel at any given time.

What do you recommend when it comes to hoteliers considering their costs and where possible, reallocate those funds to channels that drive more revenue to their hotels? How do you assess the approach for evaluating costs as of today?

Again, there is no one size fits all solution. We provide a number of tools and resources to our hotels to fully understand their costs, their mix, and more. Our goal is to better educate our hoteliers so they have the tools to manage and optimize their business.

The distribution side of the hotel industry is expanding exponentially as new channels have emerged. An effort is being made to address a real imbalance in the hotel purchase process by empowering travellers with better information about the specific rooms in a hotel during the research and shopping phase. What do you make of the efforts pertaining to increasing transparency and personalisation?

We of course want to be as transparent and personal as possible in dealing with our customers, so we see value in many of the new tools emerging. We are closely watching many of the efforts happening in this area, and are exploring and discussing ways it will impact our business and channels in the future. It is still very early on in the scale and adoption of many of these efforts.

Hoteliers acknowledge that there needs to be price parity and rate integrity on retail pricing in both direct and indirect channels. But does price parity really exists in today’s world? There are many instances where OTAs include extras, gift cards or gas cards, on the retail price offered to customers. So while you may see same retail prices on the supplier direct websites and OTA websites, there is clearly a difference in value parity as OTA websites use these extras to convert customers to bookers. How do you assess hoteliers’ concerns?

We think parity does still exist. Part of the importance of the Book With Us Advantage, that we launched along with our new Best Price Guarantee, is to educate customers about the full value of booking direct with us. An example of this is that you can earn Priority Club Rewards points when booking online with us and this is not possible if you book a Holiday Inn via an OTA. We know that many consumers would prefer to deal directly with the business or brand they are dealing with, and sometimes prefer this more than an "extra". Nonetheless, we offer many of the same types of promotions through our brands and direct channels that OTAs offer their customers.

It seems there is an appetite from consumers to always lap up special deals, discounts and special offers. But do you think hotels are in danger of falling into a trap of working with everybody and having discounts all over the place?

In some cases, this is becoming more prevalent and hotels should be smart about what discounts are worth it to provide and when. We know that price is the number one most important thing to a customer when booking a hotel online, but consumers care just as much about the end product they are buying. A discount may get a customer in the door once, but it won't get them to come back if they have a poor experience with a brand or hotel.

IHG has just expanded its relationship with TravelShark. How do you assess options which offer hotels an additional vehicle to be discovered by brand-agnostic, destination-based travel searchers?
This is not something we can speak to at this time.

How do you see the face of online hotel distribution changing in the next 12 months?

As a company we are investing in improving our websites and web value proposition to ensure hotels and customers understand and believe in the value of booking direct with us online. This is what our new Best Price Guarantee and Book With Us Advantage are all about. In the next 12 months customers will continue to have a lot of choices in where they book their travel and we want to make sure they are fully educated and understand their options and what they get from all of them.

A Tourism Matters Three Things To Do This Week Action Plan...
  1. Create your own Best Price Guaranteee and promote it everywhere - your website, emails, bills, Facebook, name badges...
  2. Add value to your own direct bookings - small thing like complimentary tea/coffee at check in, loyalty points, or a gift voucher. Make the difference in value not always price.
  3. Try that price promotion that you're considering running on your own customers - create the package, make it bookable direct only and market the link to your Facebook and email database. Emphasise that's a previous guest "thank you" and see how they respond
If you need help with your online marekting stretegy or need to increase your direct online bookings give us a call on 01292 521404 or email us and we'll see how we can help you in 2012.



Friday, October 7, 2011

Gumtree enters flash sale market with hotel offers


A number of websites are today reporting the entry into the Flash Sales market of Gumtree who are now offering short breaks on their own version of the genre. Discounted Highland hotel accommodation is already featuring on the Gumtree Daily Deals for Edinburgh website and for certain more will follow.

Lots has been written about the whole flash sales promo pricing issues and we're planning a full article next week but you can be assured that this is not the last entrant into this market. Groupon, ItIsOn, Living Social, Great Glasgow Deasl, 5pm.co.uk, Expedia, Booking.com, and STV have all moved into the marketplace.

It is easily forecastable that anyone with a large enough database or readership (Newspapers and magazines boeing the obvious) will produce their own. The more alternatives there are the less effective some will be; the less effective they are the more tha distribution will change. How do hotels deal with it? That's for next week!

As for Gumtree Daily Deals, site users who had sign up to its 'daily deals' service received an email offer for the aforementioned two-night stay in a country house hotel in Scotland for £79, down from £220. Yes we're sure it must have been worth £220 at some point in the past but go look yourself...

Like other flash sale sites such as Groupon, Gumtree's deals are available for only a limited period - in the case of the hotel offering a couple of days.

Gumtree, is better known as a place to search for accommodation, work or second-hand goods and attracts close to 14 million visitors a month, and they plan to use social media to ask users what offers they would like.

Nothing really revolutionary there and certainly no big unique selling point. although it also claims that it will be the first flash sale service to consult with its customers via Facebook and a selection of deals will be tested by a group of volunteer bloggers who will write reviews of their experience to share with users. Again a slight add on but one that can easily be replicated by anyone with followers and a Facebook page.

Hamish Stone from Gumtree said: “Online shoppers are becoming increasingly savvy to the offers that are available, both on the high street and online.  With Gumtree Daily Deals we are creating a new and unique service that lets our users tell us what they want to see on offer."

The initial thought is one that we hang onto as a core - "Flash Sales" or good old fashioned promotional pricing is a strategic way to fill some rooms but shouldn't be a single marketing strategy. The big issue however is trying to keep control of the offer as an inhouse promotion on the hotel's own website or in collaboration with destination marketing sites locally. They may not have the distribution but if a hotel has 5000 names on its mailing list and you send them a direct "Flash Sale" linked up to online reservations the return on investment may be massively increased.

Who knows. Why not just try it...




The French Rule on OTA "No Rooms" Practices

You know the media are always mocking our Gallic cousins at the slightest opportunity but sometimes we really should be applauding their actions against multi national domination! We may have laughed at their aims to protect their language on the Internet but maybe they're not wrong. The following is from HotelMarketing.com and highlights a really serious issue facing hotels in Scotland as well. 
When No Rooms available flags up in one of the market dominating OTA's do you really think that the consumer rushes directly to the hotel website to check? No the majority probably just go to the options and when they find a property with availability will then price compare. But the original hotel with "No Availability" loses out. Fair? Well the French legal system doesn't think so.
"French websites of Expedia, TripAdvisor and Hotels.com are obliged to change their unfair practices with regard to provision of information hotel availability and prices, according to a French Court ruling.
SYNHORCAT, one of the French HOTREC member associations, had launched a case at the Paris Commercial Court, claiming that the above mentioned websites were providing misleading and false information.

As an example, Hotels.com and expedia.fr were claiming at some hotel booking searches “No rooms are available at the selected dates”, but that was only true for bookings via that site, because rooms were still available via direct booking or other channels. This practice was unreasonably drifting away guests to other accommodation providers in the neighborhood, causing economic damage to hoteliers.

In its ruling of 4 October 2011, the Court supported SYNHORCAT’s claim and obliged the French websites of Expedia, TripAdvisor and Hotels.com to change their unfair practices and to pay compensation for the damage caused to the French hotel industry.

Didier Chenet, President of SYNHORCAT, further explained: “We will continue pursuing the adoption of fair practices in other areas of online distribution as well, like the authenticity of travellers’ opinions, legality of contracts between hoteliers and reservation sites, including fair practices in relation to reservations of restaurants”.
Surely we need to be turning to our hospitality representatives and encouraging them to turn their focus on issues that are seriously impacting on the profitability of our own hospitality sector. When are Scottish businesses and organisation going to act to protect their own brands, margins and futures? On this basis maybe a copy of this should make its way to the BHA, Scottish Tourism Forum and the Tourism Minister. Any takers?