New website needs embedded PMS/booking engine

gillumhouse said:

This is my personal opinion - 13 rooms is NOT a small inn and I would never lease a web site. It is cheaper and smarter to OWN your domain and content to build cewdubility and longevity so if you have a disagreement, you can take your marbles and go to another host. Making changes to a web site content is not all that difficult nor usually time consuming. Even if it is, it is MINE! Leasing can have disadtrous results.
since they are telling you RezKey will not work with their system, I am actually shocked that THEY are not telling you who to use - after all, THEY own your site, not you..

Click to expand...

• Cloudbeds
• ThinkReservations
• Odysys

Innkeeper1979 said:

We are leasing a new website from Odysys, and Reservation Key isn't recommended because it's outdated and can't be embedded into the website AND doesn't interact properly with Google Analytics. I am looking for recommendations! We have a small inn with 13 rooms.

Click to expand...

Momma Smurf said:

Innkeeper1979 said:

We are leasing a new website from Odysys, and Reservation Key isn't recommended because it's outdated and can't be embedded into the website AND doesn't interact properly with Google Analytics. I am looking for recommendations! We have a small inn with 13 rooms.

Click to expand...

Interesting. What's outdated about RK? John has been making updates almost daily for the past few months including new themes and responsive formats. Lots of new capabilities and User Friendly upgrades.
Also it can be directly embedded using an iFrame. The date pickers and search boxes are also easily embedded.
Doesn't interact properly with GA? Actually, you can insert GA code into RK and works fine.
Sounds like Odysys impropaganda .....

Click to expand...

Momma Smurf said:

Innkeeper1979 said:

We are leasing a new website from Odysys, and Reservation Key isn't recommended because it's outdated and can't be embedded into the website AND doesn't interact properly with Google Analytics. I am looking for recommendations! We have a small inn with 13 rooms.

Click to expand...

Interesting. What's outdated about RK? John has been making updates almost daily for the past few months including new themes and responsive formats. Lots of new capabilities and User Friendly upgrades.
Also it can be directly embedded using an iFrame. The date pickers and search boxes are also easily embedded.
Doesn't interact properly with GA? Actually, you can insert GA code into RK and works fine.
Sounds like Odysys impropaganda .....

Click to expand...

Momma Smurf said:

Sounds like Odysys impropaganda ....

Click to expand...

kschnepp said:

gillumhouse said:

This is my personal opinion - 13 rooms is NOT a small inn and I would never lease a web site. It is cheaper and smarter to OWN your domain and content to build cewdubility and longevity so if you have a disagreement, you can take your marbles and go to another host. Making changes to a web site content is not all that difficult nor usually time consuming. Even if it is, it is MINE! Leasing can have disadtrous results.
since they are telling you RezKey will not work with their system, I am actually shocked that THEY are not telling you who to use - after all, THEY own your site, not you..

Click to expand...

Hi Gillumhouse,
All Odysys customers own their websites. If they choose to leave the website goes with them. The subscription model is in place to keep initial costs down and to provide marketing services such as SEO, Adwords PPC, Retargeting, local search, etc.
Regarding booking engines, the following are worth taking a look at:

• Cloudbeds
• ThinkReservations
• Odysys

Hope this helps clear up any confusion. Cheers!
.

Click to expand...

kschnepp said:

Hi Gillumhouse,
All Odysys customers own their websites. If they choose to leave the website goes with them. The subscription model is in place to keep initial costs down and to provide marketing services such as SEO, Adwords PPC, Retargeting, local search, etc.
Regarding booking engines, the following are worth taking a look at:

• Cloudbeds
• ThinkReservations
• Odysys

Hope this helps clear up any confusion. Cheers!

Click to expand...

gillumhouse said:

kschnepp said:

gillumhouse said:

This is my personal opinion - 13 rooms is NOT a small inn and I would never lease a web site. It is cheaper and smarter to OWN your domain and content to build cewdubility and longevity so if you have a disagreement, you can take your marbles and go to another host. Making changes to a web site content is not all that difficult nor usually time consuming. Even if it is, it is MINE! Leasing can have disadtrous results.
since they are telling you RezKey will not work with their system, I am actually shocked that THEY are not telling you who to use - after all, THEY own your site, not you..

Click to expand...

Hi Gillumhouse,
All Odysys customers own their websites. If they choose to leave the website goes with them. The subscription model is in place to keep initial costs down and to provide marketing services such as SEO, Adwords PPC, Retargeting, local search, etc.
Regarding booking engines, the following are worth taking a look at:

• Cloudbeds
• ThinkReservations
• Odysys

Hope this helps clear up any confusion. Cheers!
.

Click to expand...

kschnepp said:

Hi Gillumhouse,
All Odysys customers own their websites. If they choose to leave the website goes with them. The subscription model is in place to keep initial costs down and to provide marketing services such as SEO, Adwords PPC, Retargeting, local search, etc.
Regarding booking engines, the following are worth taking a look at:

• Cloudbeds
• ThinkReservations
• Odysys

Hope this helps clear up any confusion. Cheers!

Click to expand...

Thar's OK, I will just stick with RK. I like them AND their price.
.

Click to expand...

Momma Smurf said:

Innkeeper1979 said:

We are leasing a new website from Odysys, and Reservation Key isn't recommended because it's outdated and can't be embedded into the website AND doesn't interact properly with Google Analytics. I am looking for recommendations! We have a small inn with 13 rooms.

Click to expand...

Interesting. What's outdated about RK? John has been making updates almost daily for the past few months including new themes and responsive formats. Lots of new capabilities and User Friendly upgrades.
Also it can be directly embedded using an iFrame. The date pickers and search boxes are also easily embedded.
Doesn't interact properly with GA? Actually, you can insert GA code into RK and works fine.
Sounds like Odysys impropaganda .....

Click to expand...

kschnepp said:

Momma Smurf said:

Innkeeper1979 said:

We are leasing a new website from Odysys, and Reservation Key isn't recommended because it's outdated and can't be embedded into the website AND doesn't interact properly with Google Analytics. I am looking for recommendations! We have a small inn with 13 rooms.

Click to expand...

Interesting. What's outdated about RK? John has been making updates almost daily for the past few months including new themes and responsive formats. Lots of new capabilities and User Friendly upgrades.
Also it can be directly embedded using an iFrame. The date pickers and search boxes are also easily embedded.
Doesn't interact properly with GA? Actually, you can insert GA code into RK and works fine.
Sounds like Odysys impropaganda .....

Click to expand...

Momma Smurf,
You are correct regarding google analytics. I believe the conversation was primarily about our request to setup ecommerce reporting and cross-domain tracking for our performance dashboard. 3rd party retargeting/remarketing scripts as well. When asked about alternatives to RK we provided three systems that we like. Regardless, I don't think a perfect booking engine exists, rather it's whatever works best for each innkeeper.
So no impropaganda here! Just trying to provide our customers and innkeepers with useful industry information.
One thought on iFrames: I'm not sure an iFrame would be the best choice for embedding a booking engine. It would probably be fine for the date selector feature, but maybe not so much for the booking engine results. Consider this, if the booking engine results page was long, you would have multiple browser scroll bars. That's not an ideal user experience on desktop and certainly not on a mobile touch screen device. I suspect it would negatively impact conversion rates. If embedding the booking engine results is a requirements, maybe explore using a JavaScript library, the <embed> HTML element, possibly even the <object>, or select a booking engine that allows you to add your custom header and footer HTML.
Cheers!
.

Click to expand...

kschnepp said:

Momma Smurf,
You are correct regarding google analytics. I believe the conversation was primarily about our request to setup ecommerce reporting and cross-domain tracking for our performance dashboard. 3rd party retargeting/remarketing scripts as well. When asked about alternatives to RK we provided three systems that we like. Regardless, I don't think a perfect booking engine exists, rather it's whatever works best for each innkeeper.
So no impropaganda here! Just trying to provide our customers and innkeepers with useful industry information.

Click to expand...

One thought on iFrames: I'm not sure an iFrame would be the best choice for embedding a booking engine. It would probably be fine for the date selector feature, but maybe not so much for the booking engine results. Consider this, if the booking engine results page was long, you would have multiple browser scroll bars. That's not an ideal user experience on desktop and certainly not on a mobile touch screen device. I suspect it would negatively impact conversion rates. If embedding the booking engine results is a requirements, maybe explore using a JavaScript library, the <embed> HTML element, possibly even the <object>, or select a booking engine that allows you to add your custom header and footer HTML.
Cheers!

Click to expand...

Momma Smurf said:

kschnepp said:

Momma Smurf said:

Innkeeper1979 said:

We are leasing a new website from Odysys, and Reservation Key isn't recommended because it's outdated and can't be embedded into the website AND doesn't interact properly with Google Analytics. I am looking for recommendations! We have a small inn with 13 rooms.

Click to expand...

Interesting. What's outdated about RK? John has been making updates almost daily for the past few months including new themes and responsive formats. Lots of new capabilities and User Friendly upgrades.
Also it can be directly embedded using an iFrame. The date pickers and search boxes are also easily embedded.
Doesn't interact properly with GA? Actually, you can insert GA code into RK and works fine.
Sounds like Odysys impropaganda .....

Click to expand...

Momma Smurf,
You are correct regarding google analytics. I believe the conversation was primarily about our request to setup ecommerce reporting and cross-domain tracking for our performance dashboard. 3rd party retargeting/remarketing scripts as well. When asked about alternatives to RK we provided three systems that we like. Regardless, I don't think a perfect booking engine exists, rather it's whatever works best for each innkeeper.
So no impropaganda here! Just trying to provide our customers and innkeepers with useful industry information.
One thought on iFrames: I'm not sure an iFrame would be the best choice for embedding a booking engine. It would probably be fine for the date selector feature, but maybe not so much for the booking engine results. Consider this, if the booking engine results page was long, you would have multiple browser scroll bars. That's not an ideal user experience on desktop and certainly not on a mobile touch screen device. I suspect it would negatively impact conversion rates. If embedding the booking engine results is a requirements, maybe explore using a JavaScript library, the <embed> HTML element, possibly even the <object>, or select a booking engine that allows you to add your custom header and footer HTML.
Cheers!
.

Click to expand...

kschnepp said:

Momma Smurf,
You are correct regarding google analytics. I believe the conversation was primarily about our request to setup ecommerce reporting and cross-domain tracking for our performance dashboard. 3rd party retargeting/remarketing scripts as well. When asked about alternatives to RK we provided three systems that we like. Regardless, I don't think a perfect booking engine exists, rather it's whatever works best for each innkeeper.
So no impropaganda here! Just trying to provide our customers and innkeepers with useful industry information.

Click to expand...

Wait, what did I miss? Where oh where was setting up ecommerce, cross-domain tracking mentioned? Please direct me to that??
Also, RK can set up ecommerce in GA.

One thought on iFrames: I'm not sure an iFrame would be the best choice for embedding a booking engine. It would probably be fine for the date selector feature, but maybe not so much for the booking engine results. Consider this, if the booking engine results page was long, you would have multiple browser scroll bars. That's not an ideal user experience on desktop and certainly not on a mobile touch screen device. I suspect it would negatively impact conversion rates. If embedding the booking engine results is a requirements, maybe explore using a JavaScript library, the <embed> HTML element, possibly even the <object>, or select a booking engine that allows you to add your custom header and footer HTML.
Cheers!

Click to expand...

I have embedded RK as an iFrame. The solution was simple to avoid a scroll bar. All I had to do is adjust the height. Here is the syntax, easy peasy:
[iframe src="https://v2.reservationkey.com/xxxx" width="100%" height="3021"]
Nope, no scroll bars and integrates beautifully.
Who are you anyway? If the impropaganda shoe fits....
.

Click to expand...

kschnepp said:

Momma Smurf said:

kschnepp said:

Momma Smurf said:

Innkeeper1979 said:

We are leasing a new website from Odysys, and Reservation Key isn't recommended because it's outdated and can't be embedded into the website AND doesn't interact properly with Google Analytics. I am looking for recommendations! We have a small inn with 13 rooms.

Click to expand...

Interesting. What's outdated about RK? John has been making updates almost daily for the past few months including new themes and responsive formats. Lots of new capabilities and User Friendly upgrades.
Also it can be directly embedded using an iFrame. The date pickers and search boxes are also easily embedded.
Doesn't interact properly with GA? Actually, you can insert GA code into RK and works fine.
Sounds like Odysys impropaganda .....

Click to expand...

Momma Smurf,
You are correct regarding google analytics. I believe the conversation was primarily about our request to setup ecommerce reporting and cross-domain tracking for our performance dashboard. 3rd party retargeting/remarketing scripts as well. When asked about alternatives to RK we provided three systems that we like. Regardless, I don't think a perfect booking engine exists, rather it's whatever works best for each innkeeper.
So no impropaganda here! Just trying to provide our customers and innkeepers with useful industry information.
One thought on iFrames: I'm not sure an iFrame would be the best choice for embedding a booking engine. It would probably be fine for the date selector feature, but maybe not so much for the booking engine results. Consider this, if the booking engine results page was long, you would have multiple browser scroll bars. That's not an ideal user experience on desktop and certainly not on a mobile touch screen device. I suspect it would negatively impact conversion rates. If embedding the booking engine results is a requirements, maybe explore using a JavaScript library, the <embed> HTML element, possibly even the <object>, or select a booking engine that allows you to add your custom header and footer HTML.
Cheers!
.

Click to expand...

kschnepp said:

Momma Smurf,
You are correct regarding google analytics. I believe the conversation was primarily about our request to setup ecommerce reporting and cross-domain tracking for our performance dashboard. 3rd party retargeting/remarketing scripts as well. When asked about alternatives to RK we provided three systems that we like. Regardless, I don't think a perfect booking engine exists, rather it's whatever works best for each innkeeper.
So no impropaganda here! Just trying to provide our customers and innkeepers with useful industry information.

Click to expand...

Wait, what did I miss? Where oh where was setting up ecommerce, cross-domain tracking mentioned? Please direct me to that??
Also, RK can set up ecommerce in GA.

One thought on iFrames: I'm not sure an iFrame would be the best choice for embedding a booking engine. It would probably be fine for the date selector feature, but maybe not so much for the booking engine results. Consider this, if the booking engine results page was long, you would have multiple browser scroll bars. That's not an ideal user experience on desktop and certainly not on a mobile touch screen device. I suspect it would negatively impact conversion rates. If embedding the booking engine results is a requirements, maybe explore using a JavaScript library, the <embed> HTML element, possibly even the <object>, or select a booking engine that allows you to add your custom header and footer HTML.
Cheers!

Click to expand...

I have embedded RK as an iFrame. The solution was simple to avoid a scroll bar. All I had to do is adjust the height. Here is the syntax, easy peasy:
[iframe src="https://v2.reservationkey.com/xxxx" width="100%" height="3021"]
Nope, no scroll bars and integrates beautifully.
Who are you anyway? If the impropaganda shoe fits....
.

Click to expand...

Momma Smurf,
LOL! looks like a good solution!
I am the CEO of Odysys. I use CEO loosely because we are a small team located in Bend, Or. and we all wear many hats! I typically check in on this forum every few weeks to see what is going on. Thanks for posting your solution!
.

Click to expand...

I am the CEO of Odysys.

Click to expand...

seashanty said:

Odysys,
Since you are here ... please explain why rezkey is not recommended?
Since the person using your services wants to use it, as many innkeepers here do, and they DON'T find it to be outdated and are happy with it .... even though you don't recommend it, it seems to work with your sites..

Click to expand...

Innkeeper1979 said:

Following up on my first post, please allow me to be more specific, because this post is getting negative feedback I wasn't expecting, and that it doesn't deserve. I am not knocking Odysys in any way. They are a small business, not an evil overlord. Everyone I have dealt with there has been super helpful, and they were able to present my boss with a less expensive option that will hopefully bring us better response and more business. I love our new website, and that lots of webinars are offered to further educate front desk staff. I'm embarrassed that the head of the company has had to run damage control!
I also love Reservation Key. It was in this forum that Res Key was recommended to me and it has been a perfect fit for the inn for several years. Because of that success with the Innspiring forum, I came back for another try at picking your collective brains. I apparently failed at expressing accurately what I needed, but I am delighted to read that Res Key might still work for us. I have contacted them for further information.
I appreciate everyone's attention to this and, again, apologize for not taking more time to word my post more accurately ;-).

Click to expand...

gillumhouse said:

Innkeeper1979 said:

Following up on my first post, please allow me to be more specific, because this post is getting negative feedback I wasn't expecting, and that it doesn't deserve. I am not knocking Odysys in any way. They are a small business, not an evil overlord. Everyone I have dealt with there has been super helpful, and they were able to present my boss with a less expensive option that will hopefully bring us better response and more business. I love our new website, and that lots of webinars are offered to further educate front desk staff. I'm embarrassed that the head of the company has had to run damage control!
I also love Reservation Key. It was in this forum that Res Key was recommended to me and it has been a perfect fit for the inn for several years. Because of that success with the Innspiring forum, I came back for another try at picking your collective brains. I apparently failed at expressing accurately what I needed, but I am delighted to read that Res Key might still work for us. I have contacted them for further information.
I appreciate everyone's attention to this and, again, apologize for not taking more time to word my post more accurately ;-).

Click to expand...

Please understand, it was the word LEASE that tripped my switch. There are so masny out there that offer "free" or cheap cost web sites that get people "Hooked" into a monthly fee that is more over time than would have been paid to have a top=drawer web site created. Buutique comes to mind first. Then if you left, you lost everything because they owned it.
I am happy to hear that this is not the case for you. That fear is what ran up my flagpole to begin with. Since I know nothing about the tech side (my years in dp are so long ago it would now be condisered Neandrathal). It is not that those of us on this site ate negative, we are protective of each other and especially of newbies who have not had exposure to all the rip-offs we have seen through the years.
Stick around, we have lots of opinionsd and truly try to help.
.

Click to expand...

Innkeeper1979 said:

gillumhouse said:

Innkeeper1979 said:

Following up on my first post, please allow me to be more specific, because this post is getting negative feedback I wasn't expecting, and that it doesn't deserve. I am not knocking Odysys in any way. They are a small business, not an evil overlord. Everyone I have dealt with there has been super helpful, and they were able to present my boss with a less expensive option that will hopefully bring us better response and more business. I love our new website, and that lots of webinars are offered to further educate front desk staff. I'm embarrassed that the head of the company has had to run damage control!
I also love Reservation Key. It was in this forum that Res Key was recommended to me and it has been a perfect fit for the inn for several years. Because of that success with the Innspiring forum, I came back for another try at picking your collective brains. I apparently failed at expressing accurately what I needed, but I am delighted to read that Res Key might still work for us. I have contacted them for further information.
I appreciate everyone's attention to this and, again, apologize for not taking more time to word my post more accurately ;-).

Click to expand...

Please understand, it was the word LEASE that tripped my switch. There are so masny out there that offer "free" or cheap cost web sites that get people "Hooked" into a monthly fee that is more over time than would have been paid to have a top=drawer web site created. Buutique comes to mind first. Then if you left, you lost everything because they owned it.
I am happy to hear that this is not the case for you. That fear is what ran up my flagpole to begin with. Since I know nothing about the tech side (my years in dp are so long ago it would now be condisered Neandrathal). It is not that those of us on this site ate negative, we are protective of each other and especially of newbies who have not had exposure to all the rip-offs we have seen through the years.
Stick around, we have lots of opinionsd and truly try to help.
.

Click to expand...

Again, my apologies for not being more specific. I was trying to do too many things at once and have learned a valuable lesson about posting without reviewing my facts first! I appreciate being looked after, and I do value the opinions and information posted in this forum! While the innkeeper has been in the business for almost 40 years, I'm only 12 years in and always learning. ;-)
.

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