Do you remember the time when reserving a hotel room was a time-consuming task that required a lot of work on the part of the guest? But, today, it is as simple as a few clicks or phone calls. 

Are you curious to know different ways to get hotel reservations? There are two basic types that can be differentiated:

1. Online sources
2. Offline sources

Online Sources:

Online booking refers to any booking made through an online source. A hotel controls a variety of internet sources. These online sources are further classified into two categories:

1. Direct
2. Indirect

Direct Online Source:

A direct online source is one in which the entire reservation process is handled directly between the hotel and the customer, without any agent. The reservation is made on the hotel’s website using an online hotel reservation system.

Indirect Online Source:

The term “indirect online booking source” refers to a booking that originates from other third-party online booking platforms, for which the hotels must pay a high commission to the mediator.

There are two main sources of indirect online bookings:

1. OTA’s
2. Meta-Search Engines

OTA:

In today’s world, digital travel agents produce more than 70% of the business, making it necessary for a hotel to advertise themselves on as many platforms as possible to achieve maximum visibility and a greater chance to get hotel reservations.

Meta-Search Engines:

Meta-search engines are a set of databases gathered from all of the search engines such that, whenever a user enters a search query, it combines all of the data and delivers a result that is relevant to your hotel search.

For example, when a visitor searches for a hotel on TripAdvisor, all of the rates from various platforms, including the hotel’s direct website, are displayed in a single window, and you can make a reservation for hotel from any of the options. Here, TripAdvisor, who used Meta-Search Engines, is the indirect booking source.

Offline Sources:

In the case of offline sources, there are several methods to get hotel reservations. Any booking in which manual interaction is necessary at every step is referred to as an offline source.

A phone call, for example, can be a source of offline booking as there are many occasions where a hotel reservation center receives many public inquiry calls in a day from a direct customer asking about room availability and best offers, and any inquiry that results from such calls can be classified as offline booking. 

Therefore, most of the available offline bookings come from offline travel agents or destination management businesses.

All the methods combined provide many ways for a customer to make a reservation for hotel at their convenience and comfort. But, it also overwhelms hotel reservation staff with overwork, as it makes the entire hotel reservation process very complicated and increases the possibilities of human errors in overall functioning. 

Thus, your hotel needs a hotel reservation software to minimize errors such that the entire hotel reservation system works in a more effective and error-free manner.

Since every hotel has a limited number of rooms, it’s tough for reservation staff to manage the full hotel reservation system with such a broad range of sources without making mistakes.

As a result, the hotel reservation booking system plays an important role in the smooth operation of the hotel booking. However, as time passed, traditional hotel reservation software were unable to bridge the gap with online channels and thus, bringing in the smooth integration with all online sources to sync the entire hotel reservation system working in sync with the actual inventory status. 

As a result, central reservation system software was created in modern times, which has an integrated channel manager to fill the gap with online sources and interact with other sources, allowing the hotel reservation process to run smoothly.

Some of the primary advantages are stated below since it handled the major pain points of the hotel reservation system working and assisted in simplifying how to get hotel reservations.

1. Inventory Upgrades in Real Time through Online Channels

Previously, the hotel staff had to update their inventory every time there was a booking update by traveling to each OTA’s extranet individually, which took a lot of their time and increased task duplication and the margin of error, which might result in overloading or underbooking.

On the other hand, the channel manager pulls live inventory from the hotel CRS and pushes it to all of the OTA’s networks at the same time, automatically updating it whenever inventory status changes.

This simplifies the inventory management process to a considerable part, saving hotel employees’ time and allowing them to focus on providing excellent customer service and fine-tuning the hotel reservation system performance.

2. Accurate Selection of Booking Source

Also, in the past, it was tricky for hoteliers to differentiate between different sources and to identify the source for a specific booking. But a cloud-based central reservation system software addressed this issue, and as with every online hotel reservation, the system also registers the source of the booking, which can be generated in a report form, making the reporting task within the hotel reservation process much easier.

3. Easy to Access

Since the cloud-based hotel reservation system software has a user-friendly interface, it is very simple to use. This allows reservation personnel to process reservations and support the delivery of services quickly.

4. Centralized Reservation Monitoring

The hotel reservation booking system enables the hotel to manage all of its reservations from any supplier in a single system. This enables the hotel to better understand its inventory situation and allows the booking manager to play with available inventory to increase profit. It also allows the reservation manager to see the complete reservation system from a single dashboard.

5. Easy Integration

It provides for integration with other accessory systems and enables the hotel management to control the entire operation through a single system, allowing for centralized monitoring and timely corrective action in the event of any departure from the specified target route.

6. Interdepartmental Coordination

It facilitates the integration of all major departments with one another for better information flow and helps in the advancement of service standards, which creates a positive impression in the minds of the tourists and helps in providing a better stay experience for the guest, which in turn helps in spreading the better word of mouth promotions in the hospitality market, which helps in enhancing the company’s positive reputation. 

Get Hotel Reservations For Your Next Visit With All These Methods

That’s all for the article. We hope you have understood the best way to reserve a hotel from the list mentioned above. 

To run your hotel business smoothly and efficiently, you must use hotel management software such as AxisRooms. This will surely increase your revenue and efficiency. 

Partner with AxisRooms today!