Kayak CEO says it as it is and 4 more stories
BOOKING'S PREDICTIONS FOR 2017
Booking's predictions for next year are are interesting. Not revolutionary but interesting. In summary, it's going to be more about experiences than before (hm did Airbnb get an early read). As hoteliers it means do our job more and better. As tech companies for hotels it means, don't bother serving software that doesn't make service better.
HOTEL YEARBOOK ON HOTEL TECH
It's pretty darn good. If you're into hotel technology, I advise you download it and read it. It's long, it's a bit too sponsored and it's in PDF (yeah I know) but it does have a lot of great viewpoints on everything that's happening in hotel technology today and what is going to be happening in the years to come. Plus there's a pretty cool ad on page 99, if I may say so myself ;-)
META-SEARCH'S SHIFT INTO OTAS
We all love a bit of controversy and Book on Google plus Instant Book on TripAdvisor both seem to point that Meta search engines want to get into the OTA space. Not everyone agrees that this is a great move, financially it would make it better for hotels (they wouldn't pay for clicks on every meta-search but only the one that converts). But to cut through the noise, Kayak's CEO Steve Hafner's view at Phocusright is the most informative piece I have read on this topic in a long time.
GOOGLE ADS ADDED 30+ CHARACTERS
For AdWords geeks this is a big deal, for hotels it is good to know. While is it always nice to have more space to work with, it is highly doubtful that a hotel will notice a huge change in reservations. The problem that needs to be solved here is how to bring in new visitors, AdWords will help convert OTA bookings to direct but what do if the problem is with the top-line?
AIRBNB TRIPS
While there are many opinions on the possible success (or more accurately failure) of Airbnb trips, I find the very idea that they moved into the travel planning and booking space rather than the hotel space quite interesting. OTAs evolved away from there (Expedia does some but Booking does none). Yet there is a lot of truth in the fact that making the travel experience better is something hotels (think concierges) are brilliant at.