De Historiske Hotels and Restaurants Doubles Online Booking Revenue
De Historiske — Hotels and Restaurants group of Norway has been busy celebrating its biggest-ever increase in online revenue. The Norwegian group switched to SynXis, a key component of Sabre Hospitality Solutions that provides global distribution and Internet marketing solutions, and its Guest Connect booking engine in January of 2009. Since making the switch, De Historiske has watched their online booking revenue double in the first half of 2009 compared to same-store-sales from the previous year. De Historiske has also reported an increase of nearly 80 percent in the number of room nights booked at their properties from January to August 2009 compared with the same period prior year.
"We chose our distribution partner carefully and had high hopes for SynXis when we switched our properties to Guest Connect," says Nils Henrik Geitle, managing director of De Historiske group, which is comprised of 38 unique and historic properties. "However, the results we have witnessed have far surpassed our expectations. Guest Connect has allowed us to expand our offerings, merchandise and market our unique selling points, offer packages, and increase conversions in a way that best benefits each of our distinct properties. We have been able to add incremental revenue to each booking while also increasing customer satisfaction when they book via our web site. We're also benefitting from itinerary booking functionality to allow guests to make multi-property, round-trip bookings, and are looking into ways to further leverage the other offerings Sabre Hospitality Solutions can now offer us. Needless to say — we are thrilled."
De Historiske recognized the growing trend towards direct-to-property bookings and the strong value of this channel in terms of low transaction costs and high amount of control over its marketing. The Guest Connect booking engine was launched in response to hoteliers' need for a booking tool that would enable them to maximize revenue from their own website. In addition to its revenue management-enabling features such as dynamic packaging, promotional pricing, filtered searches and an image gallery to increase merchandising opportunities, the booking engine also went through extensive consumer usability and satisfaction testing to ensure customer ease of use, and a higher Look-to-Book conversion ratio. Hoteliers using Guest Connect report immediate returns on investment using the integrated, comprehensive tracking tools the booking engine has to offer.