Last year we saw the direct booking journey make the move to metasearch. For travelers, it meant a more seamless booking experience. But what did it mean for hotels?
For those hotel companies already competing for traffic and bookings in the metasearch marketplace, it meant greater opportunity for success. For those hotels not yet listed on metasearch, it meant it was high time to change that.
Because metasearch has demonstrated that it’s no longer a trend, but a cornerstone in the industry: good news for the hotels looking to compete online, drive more bookings online, and effectively re-stake their claims in the distribution landscape.
Here’s a look at three ways metasearch is set to empower hotel advertisers to compete in 2018.
#1 High-impact direct bookings
Marketplaces that operate with a CPC model, such as trivago’s, give the advertiser the highest level of control over both the spend on and reach of the campaign. The CPC model can also yield higher profit margins on direct bookings and greater ROI than the CPA model.
Is there a catch? CPC bidding calls for advanced marketing knowledge and experts to constantly monitor and maximize campaign results — and while the larger OTAs and hotel chains generally have both to rely on, smaller OTAs and independent hotels generally do not.
To level the playing field, trivago developed an automated bidding tool that leverages the metasearch’s data and market expertise. With Rate Connect, hotels are empowered to drive high-impact direct bookings and counterbalance the high commission costs of CPA-generated bookings.
#2 Optimized conversion funnels
Building a booking page optimized for conversion across all devices demands data, tech innovation, and professional developers. The big players in the booking world have such resources at their disposal, giving them a natural advantage over smaller players. But leading metasearch companies have these resources as well, and trivago is using what it has to even the odds.
