Online direct bookings must increase.
That’s a mandate for nearly all hoteliers, and it places a premium on central reservation systems (CRS) – still the overwhelmingly preferred solution for distribution and digital marketing, regardless of chain size.
NB: This is an article from Oracle Hospitality
But did you know that one out of three hotel chains reports missing more than 30% of required CRS functionality? And 6 in 10 say they’re missing at least 20% of needed functions/services.
In other words, dissatisfaction with current CRS is the rule rather than the exception, according to a key finding of a just-released, global research study conducted by analyst firm, h2c.
Assessing the state of central reservation systems – and, more importantly, identifying missing features and recommending IT improvements – served as the impetus for the study, which surveyed more than 90 hotel chains. The research effort included expert interviews with chains in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, the Americas and Asia Pacific – representing more than 11,000 properties and 1.7 million rooms worldwide.
The study’s findings are valuable because they can help hoteliers better understand their CRS requirements and plan for the evolution of distribution management tasks. (Oracle Hospitality was one of several sponsors who commissioned the report, which can be downloaded here).
Based on the findings, h2c forecasts that PMS and CRS solutions will continue to merge in the future, either in the form of hybrid solutions or as entirely new hotel management platforms.
The following are some of the key highlights from The Next Generation Central Reservation System – Implications for Future CRS Developments:
- Customer Relationship Management (CRM) poses the largest demand for CRS integration. Small and medium-sized hotel groups, with or without full-fledged loyalty programs, are under intense pressure to improve their guest experience to better compete with the personalization capabilities of global chains. CRS integration is minimal and even non-existent in some regions, making it a critical priority for CRS vendors to address – either with a proprietary product or a third-party integration.
- Internet booking engine (IBE) reservations are the greatest value driver, but underperforming. Though hotel chains are changing their online sales policy (including price disparity and/or offering free benefits) to compete against OTAs, the IBE needs to facilitate more sophisticated business rules. Such trends are mandating a reinvention of the IBE, which would enable more e-commerce functionality such as discounting packages.
- Future distribution management tasks will shift to non-CRS systems. From the hoteliers’ perspective, some key CRS tasks such as availability and rates (ARI) management, will likely migrate to other systems in their IT portfolio or become part of a still-to-be-developed platform solution.
Although respondents readily cited their CRS deficiencies, many struggled to identify means to remedy shortcomings. Such issues underscore the need for technology providers/CRS vendors to collaborate with clients to truly understand problems before driving innovation with new features.
“Today’s guests increasingly demand a hassle-free journey,” said Laura Calin, vice president, strategy and solutions management, Oracle Hospitality. “The findings of the h2c report clearly indicate that the hotel industry is challenged to meet such expectations. At Oracle, we’re working diligently with our customers to simplify and integrate solutions, making it easier to leverage technology to attract new guests and win the loyalty of existing ones.”
