Finding and booking hotel rooms online has become the norm. As a hotel owner or manager, you need a powerful online presence to reach potential guests across various booking sites and channels. This is where channel management software comes in.
What is Hotel Channel Management Software?
Channel management software is a technology that enables hotels to manage room inventory and rates across multiple online sales channels from a single dashboard. Instead of manually updating each booking channel, channel managers make the process automated, efficient, and centralized.
When a booking occurs on any site connected to your channel manager, the software automatically updates availability across all other sites to prevent overbookings. The channels stay in sync with your latest room types, prices, promotions, restrictions, and more. This saves you significant time while expanding your reach.
Now let’s explore six key ways a channel management system helps transform your hotel’s online presence and performance.
1. Expanded Online Distribution
A channel management solution enables you to showcase your property on more sites simultaneously, increasing your exposure. Typically, you can connect to:
- Online travel agencies (OTAs) like Booking.com and Expedia
- Metasearch engines like Trivago and Kayak
- Global distribution systems (GDSs) like Sabre
- Local travel sites
- Your hotel website and booking engine
More distribution means more visibility to potential guests. Even if you already use some OTAs, a channel manager makes it easier to onboard additional channels, promote time-limited deals, and experiment to see which sites deliver the best conversion rates.
2. Centralized Management Saves Time
Updating each sales channel one by one is hugely time-consuming. A channel manager acts as a central hub to publish changes once for all connected sites.
When you create or edit a room type, rate plan, restriction, promotion, etc. in your property management system (PMS), the channel management software handles pushing these to all your sites. The days of slow, manual work are over.
3. Increase Online Revenue
With enhanced exposure and efficiency comes higher online revenue. A channel management system makes it simple to adjust rates based on demand, run Flash sales, showcase rooms to new audiences, and more.
More bookings directly translate to more dollars. One study showed hotels utilizing channel managers experienced over 20% revenue growth in just one year after implementation. The software pays for itself through the additional sales you’ll achieve.
4. Avoid Overbookings and Errors
There’s nothing worse than realizing you’ve overbooked rooms because your OTAs weren’t synced with actual availability. Channel management software eliminates this risk.
When guests book via connected sites, reservations automatically flow into your PMS. Available inventory counts get updated in real-time across channels. The central availability ensures you never promise the impossible by accepting more reservations than rooms.
5. Leverage Valuable Data and Insights
With a channel manager, you gain access to robust analytics on your sales performance. Dive into metrics on important factors like:
- Top booking channels
- Popular rate plans or room types
- Seasonal demand changes
- Lengths of stay
- And more
By understanding this data, you can tailor your pricing, promotions, etc. to drive more revenue. The built-in reporting makes optimizing your strategy simple.
6. Streamline Operations
At its core, hotel channel management software aims to automate tedious tasks to improve efficiency. Staff spend less time performing manual updates across systems and channels. Automation gives them time back to focus on guests and optimizing operations.
You save money on payroll expenses while accelerating workflows. And guests receive better service and accuracy around reservations. It’s a win-win situation.
Key Features to Look For
All channel managers share the goal of centralizing channel distribution. However, software and features can vary significantly across providers. As you evaluate options, keep these key capabilities in mind:
Two-Way Integration
The best channel management tools offer two-way integration between your PMS and booking channels:
- Push updates to pricing, availability, etc. from your PMS out to all channels
- Pull reservations from channels back into your PMS
This automation in both directions is vital for synchronization. Confirm the software handles both pushing and pulling data in real time.
Channel Connection Abilities
Carefully review which booking channels each software integrates with. Most connect to major OTAs and metasearch engines. But you want to ensure niche sites important to your region are also options.
Ideally, the platform makes it simple to turn channel connections on or off anytime. This flexibility lets you experiment to see which delivers the best ROI.
Payment Processing
See what payment processing capabilities are baked into the channel manager. Can it handle deposits and cancellations across channels? Does it support processing in multiple currencies?
Payment handling not only improves workflow automation, but also ensures guest reservations are properly secured.
Bi-Directional Rate Management
Bi-directional rate management allows setting default rate plans, restrictions, and more in the channel manager to push to the channels as well as pull rates from the OTAs back into the channel manager. This helps guard against errors.
Comprehensive Reporting
Robust reporting is vital to maximize revenue opportunities from channel marketing. Prioritize solutions providing deep analytics into metrics like:
- Commission rates
- Top booking sites
- Reservation pace
- Lengths of stay
- Cancellation tracking
- And more…
Understand your data to adjust strategy for better conversions and RevPAR.
Automated Notifications
Choose a system that allows you to customize notifications for important events like reservation requests from channels or when channels go offline unexpectedly. Quick automated alerts reduce risks and keep you informed.
Top Channel Managers For Hotels
Many solutions exist to help hotels manage online inventory better. Here are ten top options to consider:
1. SiteMinder – As the world’s leading hotel channel management provider, SiteMinder is used by over 36,000 hotels worldwide. It focuses specifically on the needs of hotels vs. general vacation rental managers.
2. Cultuzz – A fast-growing channel manager with one of the highest channel connection counts (150+ channels) and the best usability for streamlining tasks.
3. Cloudbeds – An independent platform with award-winning support from channel experts dedicated fully to hospitality. Offers integrated payment processing.
4. STAAH – Specializes in best-in-class connectivity for hotels focused heavily on OTA bookings over independent websites. Specific versions are available for bed & breakfasts.
5. RateGain – Used by big brands like Best Western, this channel manager sports great automation for updating connections.
6. AxisRooms – Made specifically for hotels, AxisRooms is tailored for India and Middle East regions with many localized channel connections.
7. MyAllocator – One of the rare platforms enabling hotels to continue using an existing booking engine while also benefiting from channel management perks integrating the engine.
8. Octorate – A channel-focused system allowing hotels to consolidate multiple types of bookings sources including OTAs, tour operators, wholesalers, and loyalty programs.
9. Vertical Booking – Specializes in connectivity to alternative lodging sites like Airbnb helping hotels maximize distribution with channel manager automation.
10. AvailPro – Robust channel manager allowing unlimited OTA connections and offering a free Branded Website Builder to publish room availability.
This list covers some of the top providers but many choices exist. Carefully weigh factors like your region, size, existing systems, and budget when deciding on the best channel management software for your property’s needs.
3 Tips For Getting The Most From Channel Management
While software does the heavy lifting of distribution automation, hotels play an important role too. Follow these tips:
1. Actively Monitor Performance
Don’t “set and forget” your channel management system. Consistently check reporting on metrics for each site like:
- Click-to-book ratios
- Average daily rates
- Commission rates
Adjust underperforming channels or shift the budget toward better-converting ones.
2. Promote Special Offers
Take advantage of software automation to easily push flash sales, last-minute deals, packaged promos, and more across multiple sites simultaneously. Limited-time rates help increase revenue.
3. Stay Vigilant With Reservations
No technology is foolproof. While rare, glitches can happen. Audit reservation accuracy daily across your PMS and booking channels to catch any hiccups promptly.
Conclusion
A channel manager makes reaching guests online easier than ever. The software handles the heavy work of distribution and synchronization across OTAs, travel sites, your hotel website, and more.
Picking software with comprehensive integration, analytics, and automation unlocks major time and revenue advantages. More exposure and bookings translate directly into hotel growth.
It’s time to leverage channel management software to transform your hotel’s online presence and boost direct bookings. With the right solution, managing all your availability, rates, inventory, and reservations from a single dashboard is no longer a pipe dream.
The key is selecting software providing:
- True two-way, real-time sync between your property management system and all online channels. This prevents overbooking risks.
- Connection capabilities to the booking sites and OTAs most popular in your region. Local options may differ.
- Robust analytics into performance metrics across all connected channels, rates, room types, etc. Study the data to optimize strategy.
- Easy creation of targeted promotions and rate rules to help drive incremental revenue during high and low-demand periods.
- Automation of mundane tasks like posting room updates across channels so your staff handles guests rather than paperwork.
- Instant notifications if channels fall offline or reservation requests come in so you respond ASAP.
Evaluating solutions against these criteria helps identify the right platform for your unique business goals. Carefully consider factors like your existing tech stack, size and location of your property, target guest demographic, and budget.
Channel management empowers hotels of all sizes to take their online distribution into their own hands for greater exposure, bookings, and revenue. The centralized control offered by software streamlines complex channel marketing to help better manage inventory and pricing.
Take advantage of the technology to list your rooms in more places without additional workload. Let channel intelligence open doors to new guest segments. And leverage actionable insights to optimize performance.
Take back control of your online distribution with the right channel management solution as your partner. Join the thousands of hotels already using platforms like the ones profiled here to save hours of manual efforts daily and sell more rooms across more channels.
Your guests are searching online. Now you can more efficiently ensure your rooms reach them wherever they book.
