Hillbilly
Well-known member
- Joined
- Oct 22, 2011
- Messages
- 939
- Reaction score
- 17
After talking with many of you through email and phone conversations, here are the thoughts all combined into what I think will really be something, if we work together at this. There are a lot of sites out there for us to be on and many of us pay thousands a year to be listed with them, but let’s all be perfectly honest here. They are more concerned about making a profit than making sure we have guests making reservations. I could give many examples of greed coming from these sites, but many of you have mentioned them to me already, so it would be a mute point. Let's take a look at Groupon and Social Living! Great sites to be on...if you want to work for free. We all know that you have to discount your rooms and then give them 30%-50% commission. Yes,they do sell them for you, however, after all is said and done, you’ve had to drop your rooms almost 60% in some extreme cases! Therefore, how are you really benefitting at the end of the day? The same scenario unfolds with Social Living. However, in the InnRewards program, if you wanted to give that big of a discount, you could... but without paying additional commission to anyone. You get to keep that 30%-50% commission and your guests are, in fact, getting a bigger discount because of it. This is just an example of the benefit your property could see from this program. If you’re a property that does not give discounts, still good! Give a reward of whatever you choose, and the guest still benefits and you still pay no commission whatsoever.
No one is going to tell you what you have to provide, the choice is completely yours. I will say, however, keep in mind that in your off season if you’re trying to figure out a way to pay a bill, you will have a valuable tool at your finger tips. The bigger the reward, the more bookings and the smaller reward, perhaps the less bookings. From the customers end, we feel that it would be a blast to scroll through and see what kinds of perks, gifts, discounts etc. that are available to choose from. From a box of chocolates, to a bottle of sparkling cider or wine, to a free night’s stay... Depending on your reward, a customer may easily be persuaded to choose your property over another. This will be key, if you are needing to fill extra rooms.
Here are a some Q/A and suggestions a few of you had, that we thought were great.
1) Is this part of the guest tracking idea?
Sorry, that ship sank. So...NO!! It is in no way a guest tracking device.
2) Will my reward have to be a discount and a minimum amount?
No! You control whatever you feel you would like to give as a reward. But you will have to offer something or it negates the purpose of what we are trying to do.
3) Will I have to email someone each time I want to change something on my listing.
No. You will have your own owners portal to change your info 24 hrs a day. Your advertisement will have 1 pic and a description of your property and the reward you are giving out. When a customer clicks on your listing, it will go directly to your site. I hate the fact that some of the sites I'm currently paying to be on take my prospective guests to their little web page about my property...then on to my main website. Let's face it, our individual sites are who we are and explain our property better than anyone else could.)
So, this will be a “no middle man” website!!
Will any type of property be able to be listed?
Absolutely not! Hotels, motels, chains, etc. will not be able to list with Inn Rewards.com. This will be specifically for small Inns and Bed and Breakfasts. I’m thinking 25ish rooms per property or less. (Thought’s ?)
Who will have to pay? The customer or the Inn?
I think more people will use the site, if the customer is free. Actually the first 6 months to a year will be free for everyone. That said, I’m thinking I will eventually charge around $20-$25 a year for each property to be listed. Again, the idea behind this site is not money driven. It’s to get more people to choose B&B’s and Inn’s. If we get enough people and the word gets out, we might be able to cancel some of the other extremely costly sites we are on!!
How will people find out about this?
That’s up to all of us and how bad do we want this to work! The sky is the limit if we can get the word out. I do like the idea of having a logo on each property site that guests can click on and it goes to INNrewards.com.
Goal for this site:
The site will be searchable by state or country. As InnRewards get more users, I hope to be able to break that down a little more into greater detail. That will be costly to do and I won’t be able to do that at this time. We really need people to use the site, so I believe every property should be listed free, until the site gets a lot of properties signed up. I do think there should be a team of us that keep in touch and make suggestions. I feel this is very important. This will keep great ideas and knowledge flowing into the site. I’m hoping a few of you would be willing to step up and join the “Directors” so to speak, of this site. We were thinking maybe 10 properties from all over. We could set up a group email where we could talk about thoughts and suggestions for the site and what we can do to make it better. I also think you should be rewarded for your efforts by doing this. We would be able to offer you a free listing, in addition to some extra exposure... or something along those lines, in exchange for your help. It won’t take up a great deal of time, and is not something that you have to help with long term. Perhaps the group could even rotate in and out.
Thoughts on this?
I think this might be a good foundation to start with. More ideas will come, as we move forward.
I would love to be able break the hotel “rut” that so many people are stuck in and get new customers to switch over, giving places like ours a fair try. Bed and Breakfasts and Inns offer a wide variety of exclusive perks and personalization that many people simply are not aware of. Paii has tried with their “Better Way To Stay” campaign, but I’m not sure they are headed in the right direction with this. For example- “Death to Doilies”... If I owned a Victorian inn, I would be really upset about this. Some people like doilies. I don’t think that was a good idea on their part. We should be promoting that all of us are a “Better Way To Stay”. We need to show people all of the great little extra things we do to make each and every one one of our guests feel welcomed and appreciated. I think we have a chance to break out a new message letting everyone know what we are truly about. That message should be about letting our customers know that we really and truly value their business and in return, we would like to reward them for choosing to stay with us.
I think everyone has had really great ideas, and I greatly value your opinions! It is my goal and my greatest hope that this will bring all of us a better tomorrow! Thanks!
No one is going to tell you what you have to provide, the choice is completely yours. I will say, however, keep in mind that in your off season if you’re trying to figure out a way to pay a bill, you will have a valuable tool at your finger tips. The bigger the reward, the more bookings and the smaller reward, perhaps the less bookings. From the customers end, we feel that it would be a blast to scroll through and see what kinds of perks, gifts, discounts etc. that are available to choose from. From a box of chocolates, to a bottle of sparkling cider or wine, to a free night’s stay... Depending on your reward, a customer may easily be persuaded to choose your property over another. This will be key, if you are needing to fill extra rooms.
Here are a some Q/A and suggestions a few of you had, that we thought were great.
1) Is this part of the guest tracking idea?
Sorry, that ship sank. So...NO!! It is in no way a guest tracking device.
2) Will my reward have to be a discount and a minimum amount?
No! You control whatever you feel you would like to give as a reward. But you will have to offer something or it negates the purpose of what we are trying to do.
3) Will I have to email someone each time I want to change something on my listing.
No. You will have your own owners portal to change your info 24 hrs a day. Your advertisement will have 1 pic and a description of your property and the reward you are giving out. When a customer clicks on your listing, it will go directly to your site. I hate the fact that some of the sites I'm currently paying to be on take my prospective guests to their little web page about my property...then on to my main website. Let's face it, our individual sites are who we are and explain our property better than anyone else could.)
So, this will be a “no middle man” website!!
Will any type of property be able to be listed?
Absolutely not! Hotels, motels, chains, etc. will not be able to list with Inn Rewards.com. This will be specifically for small Inns and Bed and Breakfasts. I’m thinking 25ish rooms per property or less. (Thought’s ?)
Who will have to pay? The customer or the Inn?
I think more people will use the site, if the customer is free. Actually the first 6 months to a year will be free for everyone. That said, I’m thinking I will eventually charge around $20-$25 a year for each property to be listed. Again, the idea behind this site is not money driven. It’s to get more people to choose B&B’s and Inn’s. If we get enough people and the word gets out, we might be able to cancel some of the other extremely costly sites we are on!!
How will people find out about this?
That’s up to all of us and how bad do we want this to work! The sky is the limit if we can get the word out. I do like the idea of having a logo on each property site that guests can click on and it goes to INNrewards.com.
Goal for this site:
The site will be searchable by state or country. As InnRewards get more users, I hope to be able to break that down a little more into greater detail. That will be costly to do and I won’t be able to do that at this time. We really need people to use the site, so I believe every property should be listed free, until the site gets a lot of properties signed up. I do think there should be a team of us that keep in touch and make suggestions. I feel this is very important. This will keep great ideas and knowledge flowing into the site. I’m hoping a few of you would be willing to step up and join the “Directors” so to speak, of this site. We were thinking maybe 10 properties from all over. We could set up a group email where we could talk about thoughts and suggestions for the site and what we can do to make it better. I also think you should be rewarded for your efforts by doing this. We would be able to offer you a free listing, in addition to some extra exposure... or something along those lines, in exchange for your help. It won’t take up a great deal of time, and is not something that you have to help with long term. Perhaps the group could even rotate in and out.
Thoughts on this?
I think this might be a good foundation to start with. More ideas will come, as we move forward.
I would love to be able break the hotel “rut” that so many people are stuck in and get new customers to switch over, giving places like ours a fair try. Bed and Breakfasts and Inns offer a wide variety of exclusive perks and personalization that many people simply are not aware of. Paii has tried with their “Better Way To Stay” campaign, but I’m not sure they are headed in the right direction with this. For example- “Death to Doilies”... If I owned a Victorian inn, I would be really upset about this. Some people like doilies. I don’t think that was a good idea on their part. We should be promoting that all of us are a “Better Way To Stay”. We need to show people all of the great little extra things we do to make each and every one one of our guests feel welcomed and appreciated. I think we have a chance to break out a new message letting everyone know what we are truly about. That message should be about letting our customers know that we really and truly value their business and in return, we would like to reward them for choosing to stay with us.
I think everyone has had really great ideas, and I greatly value your opinions! It is my goal and my greatest hope that this will bring all of us a better tomorrow! Thanks!
