SiteMinder Analysis Finds Online Hotel Bookings in Spain Have Doubled in Five Years

A country analysis by the hotel cloud platform SiteMinder has revealed online hotel bookings in Spain have virtually doubled over the past five years. The finding is based on data from Euromonitor International, which reports that hotels in the world’s most tourist-ready economy earned €7.3 billion from bookings made through the Internet in 2017 – or, 98 percent more than the €3.7 billion registered from Internet-based hotel bookings in 2012.

This announcement comes as SiteMinder counts down to its sixth consecutive appearance at Fitur, the world’s tourism trade fair for the Ibero American markets, this week.

The analysis by SiteMinder suggests Spain’s hotels are capitalizing on the growing volume of tourists arriving each year – by taking ownership of their supply. While third-party sites continue to contribute 57 percent of the country’s online hotel sales, their contribution is a drop from the levels seen in previous years and it is expected to drop to below 50 percent within the next three years.

Direct hotel bookings have grown 113 percent in the last five years, indicating a closer relationship between Spanish hotels and their guests, SiteMinder said. A holistic distribution strategy therefore should be a priority in 2018, for any hotel in Spain that is looking to compete and stand out in a highly-saturated market.

Barcelona remained Spain’s most popular destination in 2017, followed by Madrid and Palma de Mallorca, which attracted the second and third-highest number of arrivals into the country. Almost four-in-five travelers were under 50-years-old.