How to stop losing bookings for your hospitality business

In this video we are going to talk about the five stages of the booking process. Number one, which is plan. So this is where a guest, a potential guest will start their search. So plan stage somebody who's right at the very start who has an idea of a town or a city that they want to go to, that is York. But they are trying to find the place. So as you can see, free. Out of the four properties that come up are online travel agents, metasearch websites and they're paying Google alone. So make sure that you have got at least a basic listing on these websites. Trivago, booking.com, tripadvisor, make sure that you've got a Google business page. Just make sure that whatever your unique selling point, you get it on your website and then you'll get seen. So step number two is research. How can you get them to go from a scroll to a click? It comes down to images. That first image has to draw people in. So for example the ox pasture, beautiful gardens, a countryside property, you know, travel lodge. It's all about budget but it's a really nice clear image with nice bedding. A bad example would be this one here. It's dark, dingy. Make sure that you've got your price point sorted, make sure you've got all of your amenities sorted and also as well make sure that your reviews are in line. Make sure that your listing is set up correctly and it's attracting the type of people that you want in your property. Stage number three of booking process is decide today's value deal. It's got a big thumbs up. So say it's a preferred partner. Superb in the reviews. Only one room left on the site, free cancellation, no prepayment needed. What it's doing is making the person who's clicked onto this page book and it's giving them all the reasons why they should book. Everywhere you go down on here it is telling the person to book now or you'll lose this room. And this is one of the main reasons why booking.com and the OTAs just smash it. Everything here is in one area and it is easy to just to scroll down. Doesn't matter whether you're on a phone or on a desktop. I love using the Atlanta installation Scarborough as a great example of the work that Ed's done here on the website. You'll see here that you don't see on most websites giving information about Scarborough. Got the food hygiene rating, you know, pictures, photos, reviews, which is a really big thing as well when you're on the website and you're scrolling down now, have a little look around. After a certain while the popper draws your attention to it. Step four of the booking process is the actual booking itself. And these guys win so many times when it comes to business. They've done the section, they've chose their room, they click onto here, given all the reasons why. So no account needed. It only takes two minutes to book. Again, really persuasive. Make sure you don't ask for a lot of information here. Simple. First name, last name, phone number, email address, that's really all that is needed at this stage. The rest of the information you can get at a later date. And again, look what's happened here on booking.com. they've seen that you've been sat here waiting on the deciding page on the booking page and a little pop ups come up. It's almost yours, we just need a few more details. You can't save your reservation if you leave this page. Once it's gone, it is gone. So. And the price match as well. So it's really, you know, they do hammer home and this is why they get so many bookings. The final stage of the book booking process is buyer's remorse. First tip is email the guest within 24 hours of booking. It shows personalization. It also helps with giving any important information or collecting some more information from the guest. So a nice simple reach out to the customer who has made the booking will make a lot of difference. Number two, add in non refundable rates. Another option, send your guest a text message. Emails can go missing and finally you've got to give them something that the other guys won't. And this is where you can work with your local community. One thing you could do again is get local vouchers. You could get money off again. You can send it a week before arrival, 24 hours before arrival or you can send it at the point of booking. Just to say, just to let you know, here's a little present. Thank you for booking with us. Thank you for booking with an independently owned property. We've got you. You can go to boostly.co.uk blog and there's his own section for the booking process which you can find right here. You can also go and see really other cool features and blogs that we've, we've had in the past, including interviews with other hospitality owners. The new Boost hospitality podcast, how to blogs. There's everything in here so we'd love for you to go and check that out and leave some feedback if you want to follow us on Twitter, on Instagram, on Facebook? It's at Boostly uk.