A well-designed and implemented distribution strategy is a structured approach to managing and optimizing your hotel’s presence across multiple distribution and booking channels.
NB: This is an article from Lighthouse
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It should ensure that listings are accurate, up-to-date and strategically aligned with your revenue goals.
This includes balancing direct bookings, OTAs, GDS platforms, and wholesalers to reach your target audience effectively. A well-planned strategy will not only help your hotel maintain control over your inventory and room rates but also enhance your competitive edge in the market.
Taking a strategic approach to hotel distribution offers significant advantages. It ensures that your hotel is visible to the right travelers, at the right time and on the most effective channels.
By prioritizing key markets and leveraging high-performing booking channels, you can drive bookings, maximize occupancy and increase revenue.
Additionally, a cohesive strategy enables better cost management by reducing over-reliance on high-commission platforms and encouraging direct bookings.
Effective distribution strategies rely heavily on software tools that streamline channel management. Advanced platforms, such as channel managers and revenue management systems, improve visibility across multiple channels, provide real-time data insights and reduce manual errors.
These tools allow hoteliers to analyze performance metrics, identify opportunities and adjust pricing or inventory allocation quickly, ensuring maximum profitability and efficiency.
How to create a strong hotel distribution strategy
A strong hotel distribution strategy is dependent on a number of key ingredients – understanding your audience, channel selection and data-driven decisions – all of which should be periodically reviewed and honed for future recipe perfection.
Let’s dig deeper.
Understand your audience and how they make travel plans
Before taking action, analyze the available data, using it to determine who you’re trying to target, where you should be targeting them and when.
Ask yourself:
- What demographics are we looking to target? Where do my target guests live and how old are they?
- What is their reason for traveling? Leisure or business?
- How do they book accommodation? What channels do they use? Do they book in the travel agent’s office or online?
- How long before their stay do they book accommodation? What is their booking window?
- How long do they stay with you? What is their average length of stay (LOS)?
- What days of the week do they tend to book? Weekdays or weekends?
Then group your ideal guests into different segments depending on their motivations for traveling, their needs and their buying habits.