In an age where the modern traveller is flooded with options and information, we explore how hotels and tour operators ensure they stay relevant and top of mind to their target audience.
The internet has brought about major changes in how the hotel and tourism industry works. It has impacted how hotels do business and how travellers find, pay for and experience their travel destinations. Recently there has been an added complexity to the market with the development of the shared economy and the emergence of online marketplaces such AirBnB, VBRO and FlipKey. This has seen some consumers opt for the more homey feel in their travel, disrupting the mainstream hotel business
To adapt, hotels have to embrace new tactics and technology to keep up, stay competitive and remain profitable. They have to offer added value for travellers and where possible, shorten the customer journey by making it easy to find, book, and pay for their accommodation. At the forefront of this new technology is Pesapal. Through its Reserveport product, they offer a one stop shop customizable booking portal.
The portal enables the hotels to directly supervise the booking process. Once set up, the portal is designed to integrate with the hotel’s Property Management System (PMS) to ensure that online-bookings are coordinated with the hotels’ capacity in real-time. This means that even daily administration functions such as inventory management are also factored into the platform.
The platform also offers Social Media integration where people can make direct bookings via Facebook making it easy for hotels to pursue direct conversions through this channel. The best part about the platform is its ability to accept different modes of payments including mobile money and card payments. This is particularly important in the East African Region where mobile money is second to cash when it comes to money transactions.
Pesapal has provided this service for most major hotels chains in the region including Serena Hotels, Heritage Hotels and Pride Inn. Pesapal not only works with hotel players, the platform is also available for airlines with FastJet recently partnering with them to process their online mobile payments.
Reserveport is not Pesapal’s only investment into the Hotel and Tourism Industry. Through Ticketsasa, they also provide subsidized hotel packages for travellers across East Africa. Find more about Reserveport here.
