Strategies for Selecting Mobile Travel Technology Partners

In our last Hub on building mobile apps and websites, we strongly recommended that hotels and tourism suppliers work with travel technology companies in developing their Mobile solution. While there are many innovative tool and resources for deploying a Mobile Smartphone website or native app, the tourism market is unique and any such solution needs to be an integral part of n overall strategy.

In this article we look at what you should expect from your travel technology supplier


1. Smartphones are an opportunity to generate a direct relationship with travelers. Do not rely on Online Travel Agents like Expedia to do this for you. They don't, they will create their own relationships with your guests and you will loose the opportunity to build your own Social Network and direct Bookings.

2. Many of the new booking engines use Ajax and require a large display. They are not easily deployed on Smartphones. Make sure your supplier has a strategy to re-design and re-deploy a Mobile Bookings solution.

3.Ask your supplier about Rates and Bookings marketing. What marketing, if any, do they do? Is this the right choice for you? In the current market Best Rate guarantees, Loyalty programs, Special Deals and Promotions, Affinity groups, Themes/niche marketing, Local Booking partnerships and Packages are all important Tourism marketing options that travelers are seeking. Travelers also like instant quotes on your ads and they like Shopping carts where Hotels and Activities can be added for future consideration and packaging.

Checklist of Mobile Bookings and Smartphone Options

Best Available Rates and Loyalty programs
Affinity Group Pricing (Corporate, AAA, Firemen etc)
Themes Marketing like family holidays, romantic getaways,, adventure etc
VacationSpecials Marketing and Special Deals promotion
Local Partners Collaborative Marketing
Packages Marketing
Air Travel add-ons
Upgrades: Rooms, Meal plans, Extras
Flexible Family Plans
Flexible Inventory and Payment options
Effective Bookings Widgets
Direct Bookings without commissions and transaction fees
Cost Compare, Travel Shopping
Travelers websites

4. Consider their Marketing connections:

Facebook: Can they load your content and Bookings to Facebook. Cant they offer special group rates, coupons or discounts to Facebook fans?
GDS: Can they load rates and marketing data to Global Distribution Systems
RSS: Do they have a strategic publishing system that will put your content on Travel Shopping and Booking Channels?
Web2.0: Do they have a social media marketing strategy. Social Media and Web2.0 properties are become vital to marketing Travel.

5. Consider your back-end integration. If you have a Property Management System (PMS) it may be important to integrate this with your overall Marketing and Channel management. The problem here is that many conventional PMS suppliers have not specialised in Web2, Facebook, RSS publishing and downstream Tourism marketing. If you have a legacy system, ask your PMS vendor what they can do to integrate you with Facebook and Tourism publishing systems that can market your brand

6. Build your own Facebook hotel and tourism marketing and bookings page. Facebook is a leader in mobile marketing with a early start and a sound strategy. They have build both web-apps and native-apps for iPhone, BlackBerry, Palm and Android. They are now focusing all development on a mobile platform for all mobile and Smartphone devices. arcResbookings.com for Facebook was one of the very first applications for direct hotel and tourism bookings on Facebook. Many independent hotels use this application, building a loyal network of Facebook Fans and Fan Bookings. arcResbookings.com for Facebook offers instant hotel Smartphone presence and very strategic Facebook Travel Marketing. See the quickest way to get get your hotel content and booking options on facebook

Sorry, I can't help blowing our trumpet (ever so softly).

Here are some reasons why you might consider AXSES:

Our Tourism marketing is based on arcRes' integrated Tourism platform for Bookings, Marketing, Packaging and Publishing. The information you enter into arcRes will create your iPhone Web app and your Smartphone Bookings engine. It will also publish your Rates and Content to many additional Travel sites and provided extended services to your guests.

arcRes is a complete Integrated Travel Platform that can publish your content, rates and bookings to Facebook as well as many Travel Booking Channels. arcRes publisher and Bookings Engine can enhance your own website, offering several types of Bookings Widgets that have been shown to increase visitor interaction and bookings. It allows you to display Holiday Special deals, Packages and alternative Rate plans on your regular Website, on your Smartphone Website and on downstream Travel Shopping and Marketing Channels. It can distribute your Bookable Promotions for marketing on our International Travel Themes sites and included on Google Maps, Google Shopping, Android Travel Shopping and many other tourism sites. It can load all rates and marketing data to the Global Distribution Systems (GDS) and to a network of affiliate Travel Marketing Portals.

AXSES arcRes network is constantly expanding. It was recently used to add Hotels, Attractions and Tourism activities directly into http://travellersInsights.com, our destination Magazine; a coffee table magazine that is also published on the net to many Ezines and eMags.

To the best of our knowledge, arcRes for Smartphone and the SmartphoneTraveller Marketing System, is in a class of its own.

Try it at http://smartphonebookings.com