Bookin gs.com ??

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Kay Nein

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I had a visit from a rep today regarding this service. Basically selling rooms for you like so many other services that I've heard y'all talk about. Luckily, having been educated by this forum, I was able to ask him a bunch of valuable questions.
Does anyone here have any experience with them or have any feedback you can share? Basically, they list us at no cost to us and with no contract. Reservations made through their site are sent to us for processing (we get CC info to charge deposit). They bill us twice a month for 15% of the reservations they send us. We have back-end access to update the availability calendar on our own.
Any thoughts...?
 
Eh, what, pardon?
Did you mean book ing .co m ?
If you go to book ings . com you get a portal sight, from which if you click book a hotel you get what looks like a goo gle search result, the top entry being book ing .c om
 
pretty sleazy looking site to me. I wouldn't bother with them. If you want to book reservations on line, use Reservation Key and someone we all know.
 
K9, think you mean boo king dot com. (not plural) We had a rep come here back in August. I stewed on it for a while and signed up last week. Went live late Friday afternoon and by Monday had my first booking. Fluke maybe but I was impressed.
After trying Exp ed ia through B&B dot com and being hit with a 30% commission, no info other than name of guest I stopped using them (and they still have not removed my info from their site).
This site has been popular in Europe for quite some time and it is my hope that it will expand our Euro market. They have recently expanded to the US and the rep says they are seeing fast growth in the US market. They just added a search filter for B&B which is nice.
The hardest part will be making sure I keep the availability updated as I book. I am not placing all of my availability on the site, only 1 room right now and do not allow the guest to select a particular room, they will just be promised a standard room.
 
Looked at it, but I can't integrate it at the moment. They are so successful that someone suggested that PCLN should change their name. Here's the article.
 
We started on booking.com a few months ago, although we currently do not make Fri/Sat available through them. At first things seemed good. We got two bookings within the first 1-2 weeks. But we have had nothing since then. It has been about 2.5 months since the last reservation from booking.com. We are probably going to drop them soon as it is not worth the hassle to update.
 
We started on booking.com a few months ago, although we currently do not make Fri/Sat available through them. At first things seemed good. We got two bookings within the first 1-2 weeks. But we have had nothing since then. It has been about 2.5 months since the last reservation from booking.com. We are probably going to drop them soon as it is not worth the hassle to update..
DH22 said:
We started on booking.com a few months ago, although we currently do not make Fri/Sat available through them. At first things seemed good. We got two bookings within the first 1-2 weeks. But we have had nothing since then. It has been about 2.5 months since the last reservation from booking.com. We are probably going to drop them soon as it is not worth the hassle to update.
I did only weekdays with Ex ped ia and was only able to book rooms during our in season and surrounding periods. The closer to off season, - nothing.
 
We use it and get a lot of business - however don't think they have a huge prescence in the USA yet - however if you are trying to target international visitors would be something to consider.
 
I know several businesses registered with them and they seem to get a good number of bookings.
For us we manage to fill our rooms without them, so why would I give them 15%. That seems an outrageously high commission to me.
 
We use it and get a lot of business - however don't think they have a huge prescence in the USA yet - however if you are trying to target international visitors would be something to consider..
We use it and get a lot of business - however don't think they have a huge prescence in the USA yet - however if you are trying to target international visitors would be something to consider.
Cam's I had remembered you mentioning them in many posts and that is the reason I decided to sign up and give them a try... The rep that came by said they were working very diligently to increase the US market and if I recall she stated that they have increased US use by 50% since entering the market.
 
I know several businesses registered with them and they seem to get a good number of bookings.
For us we manage to fill our rooms without them, so why would I give them 15%. That seems an outrageously high commission to me..
Highlands John said:
I know several businesses registered with them and they seem to get a good number of bookings.
For us we manage to fill our rooms without them, so why would I give them 15%. That seems an outrageously high commission to me.
It's quite a bit lower than what some directories here want.
 
I know several businesses registered with them and they seem to get a good number of bookings.
For us we manage to fill our rooms without them, so why would I give them 15%. That seems an outrageously high commission to me..
HJ, you are right that if you are busy enough without this, you shouldn't consider them.
As for the 15%, it is typical commission rate and far lower than most of the other large booking directories out there who charge 30% or more.
Since I am not in major tourist area (although close to one), this opens up the tourist market for me when people do not want to stay in the city center. By only putting 1 room on the site it gives me presence for those that will see my listing then call direct.
 
I had not considered offering only certain rooms or blocking out weekends. Everyone here has such great ideas & so much experience. I appreciate all the feedback.
I think 15% is a fair price for a room that might have gone empty otherwise, especially considering that there is no up-front (or extra) costs and no contract. And we've raised our rates, so it would more than cover this fee.
 
They don't even have the ability to search for some of the smaller towns and cities in our area. But might try it anyways.
 
They don't even have the ability to search for some of the smaller towns and cities in our area. But might try it anyways..
toddburme said:
They don't even have the ability to search for some of the smaller towns and cities in our area. But might try it anyways.
What they did for me is link me with a close by city that they do have searchable. I did notice that Maine, for example, did not have individual city searches, or at least that is how I saw it.
 
I had not considered offering only certain rooms or blocking out weekends. Everyone here has such great ideas & so much experience. I appreciate all the feedback.
I think 15% is a fair price for a room that might have gone empty otherwise, especially considering that there is no up-front (or extra) costs and no contract. And we've raised our rates, so it would more than cover this fee..
K9 said:
I had not considered offering only certain rooms or blocking out weekends. Everyone here has such great ideas & so much experience. I appreciate all the feedback.
I think 15% is a fair price for a room that might have gone empty otherwise, especially considering that there is no up-front (or extra) costs and no contract. And we've raised our rates, so it would more than cover this fee.
Yes and make it your least booked room. Just to test the water!
 
They don't even have the ability to search for some of the smaller towns and cities in our area. But might try it anyways..
toddburme said:
They don't even have the ability to search for some of the smaller towns and cities in our area. But might try it anyways.
What they did for me is link me with a close by city that they do have searchable. I did notice that Maine, for example, did not have individual city searches, or at least that is how I saw it.
.
what they also do which is clever is say you are searching for my town - but its busy due to an event is it flashes up Harrogate is busier than usual could you book alternative dates? if not what they do is pull in the next nearest places ie
Say I was searching for harrogate and just about every harrogate place was full or very high price they would start showing properties a bit further away ie initial search is within 5 miles as it gets busier they may go to 15 miles which means if you are in that band it would increase the possibility of picking up a bit more business.
Sorry not as clear as I would like but hope I have explained properly
 
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