For hotels, boosting direct bookings is a common goal that offers big benefits, including:

• Cost savings
• Increased revenue
• Ownership of guest data
• Added insights
• More control over the guest experience
• A stronger hotel-guest relationship
• Improved brand loyalty
• Reduced dependency on OTAs

With a combination of the right tactics and industry-specific technology, you can increase your hotel’s direct bookings and leverage all the associated benefits. 

The best hotel direct booking strategies anticipate consumer wants and needs, make direct booking easy for potential guests, and effectively drive prospects along the path to purchase.

With these 12 powerful tips, you can increase direct bookings for hotels through tactics such as a simple booking process, inspiring FOMO, relevant messaging, and chatbot integration.

1. Provide an easy direct booking experience

If your hotel is losing online reservations to OTAs, it’s time to adjust your strategy, beginning with your hotel’s direct booking engine.

Most customers research a property directly before making a reservation, which means they are already on your site and ready to book. So why aren’t they? It is likely your booking process is not as intuitive, easy to use, or informative as it should be.

Updating your software to a mobile-first, optimized hotel booking engine can provide key decision-making information and an intuitive reservation process. Fuel’s booking engine integrates seamlessly with your existing site to provide a better experience for mobile and desktop users. Its straightforward interface eliminates second guessing and early exits—and increases your ratio of hotel direct booking vs. OTA reservations.

2. Encourage bookings with FOMO marketing tactics

Tapping into customer FOMO (fear of missing out) with marketing strategies is a powerful way to increase hotel direct bookings, conversion rates, and advance reservations. Social proof, urgency, and scarcity are main drivers behind purchase decisions.

A hotel booking engine integrated with real-time property management system (PMS) data can help you deploy FOMO-based direct booking strategies to encourage reservations on your hotel’s website or mobile app. Here are some examples:

• Use your website or the Fuel booking engine to highlight limited room availability with a countdown message (“Only 4 rooms left!”). Scarcity and demand concerns can drive guests to book—and may even encourage them to do so farther in advance than usual. 
• Add social proof messages to your mobile app’s push notifications to engage customers by showcasing a surge in popularity for a property or room they’ve been browsing. This message can be simple: “This property is very popular for these dates,” or “This room was booked 7 times today.”
• Send personalized marketing emails with deal deadlines to increase booking urgency. Limited-time discounts give prospective guests a feeling of exclusivity and encourages them to act.

3. Deliver relevant messages pre- and post-booking

Providing relevant, timely digital communications is a hotel direct booking strategy that boosts reservation rates by keeping your brand top-of-mind for prospective and returning guests. 

Employ a guest messaging solution to create individual profiles and personalized audience segments for your direct marketing campaigns, then tailor your SMS or email strategies to these audience profiles. Custom messaging builds guest relationships using touchpoints before, during, and after their stay. 

A successful communication strategy increases brand loyalty and drives repeat direct bookings. With Fuel’s guest messaging solution, you gain access to analytical reporting that provides valuable insights into customer habits and performance metrics. Your hotel can then use this data to inform future campaigns and promotions.

4. Engage guests with a mobile app that supports increased hotel direct bookings

Offering a hotel mobile app to guests can improve direct bookings by eliminating the clutter and distraction of online search engines. The Fuel hotel mobile app’s embedded booking engine works seamlessly with your PMS to give guests tools to plan and book their trip.

An intuitive, capable mobile app can become guests’ preferred reservation method. The app provides a VIP experience that improves guest engagement with your brand. 

The benefits of a mobile app extend beyond booking, creating a truly contactless experience for guests. Encourage guests to use your app to check in, access digital room keys, and explore additional services. Push notifications provide opportunities to engage guests long after their stay, helping you build loyalty and offer promotions for direct bookings. 

5. Integrate a reservation chatbot on your website

Integrating a chatbot onto your hotel website can engage site visitors in new and innovative ways. For example, a reservation chatbot automatically generates responses to frequently asked questions without requiring extra work from your staff to manage the bot itself. 

A chatbot engages visitors by grabbing their attention throughout your site, and it can then boost direct revenue by showing them exclusive offers. A robust chatbot offers personalized recommendations based on guest questions, creating a seamless shopping experience. 

6. Provide upsell opportunities in your booking engine

Increase direct revenue with every reservation by seamlessly marketing upsells during the initial booking. Your booking engine can drive upsells and RevPAG by helping guests visualize the difference between room types, encouraging them to choose a higher-value room. 

Demonstrate relevance in your packages and add-ons by including high-quality photos alongside them. Showcase your breakfast via a real photo of your F&B options—not a stock photo. This and other small touches allow guests to feel like they are creating a curated experience for their stay, not just booking a place to sleep for the night. 

A streamlined booking engine shows visitors your property’s available packages and add-ons. Even if the guest does not select an add-on when booking, it helps guests start to think about upgrades and increases the likelihood they’ll upgrade at the property itself.

7. Use SEO to increase website traffic

To grow your hotel’s direct bookings, you need to get more eyes on your direct channels. Search engine optimization (SEO) is a set of strategies to enhance your website based on best practices for appearing in Google and other search engines. Use SEO to climb the ranks in search results so that your website appears in searches relevant to your area, such as hotels near major landmarks. Here are some basic SEO strategies you can employ on your site:

• Optimize every page of your site for specific, relevant keywords.
• Follow E-E-A-T best practices wherever possible.
• Make your entire website, including your booking engine, mobile-friendly.

SEO is essential to direct bookings, as it helps you compete with other hotels and OTAs targeting keywords in your area. 

8. Personalize your email communications 

If you’re reaching out to past guests, you want to do so in a way that is personalized to their specific interest and booking profile. Let the month of their previous booking, location, past packages, or other profile data inform your marketing efforts.

For example, use email automation to set up a recurring program that reaches out to guests with upcoming birthdays, suggesting a discounted hotel stay to celebrate. Personalizing communication can also be as simple as building out more dynamic, engaging welcome emails. Think beyond the standard confirmation details and include a warm greeting, introduce your staff, and give guests an idea of what to expect when they arrive. You’ll have more engaged guests ready to purchase add-ons, boosting direct revenue. 

9. Turn User-Generated Content (UGC) into direct booking potential

UGC is content (often photos) created by your guest, rather than by you as the brand. It can increase your hotel’s perceived authenticity and boost its reputation by showing real people promoting your property. 

People are more likely to trust recommendations from their peers, so make it easy and rewarding for guests to make those recommendations. Encourage guests to share their experiences on social media platforms using a branded hashtag you display on signs throughout the hotel. You can even turn it into a contest with a prize or relevant on-property discount (such as a free drink at your hotel bar) for guests who participate.

Incorporating UGC into your overall marketing plan can increase your online visibility and create an opportunity to encourage repeat bookings.

10. Market your expertise with local partnerships

Collaborate with local businesses and attractions to offer unique experiences to your guests. For example, partner with nearby restaurants, spas, or tour operators to create special packages, which you can promote on your website and during the booking process.

Offering guests a broad range of local experiences establishes your hotel as an area expert. And, even if it doesn’t drive significant revenue, including packages in your booking engine entices travelers to book directly through your website to take advantage of these exclusive add-ons.

11. Drive increased hotel direct bookings with compelling offers and rewards

Provide incentives and offers that make booking directly with your hotel more appealing than booking anywhere else. You can make direct bookings more attractive to consumers through:

• Exclusive deals and packages
• A price-match guarantee
• Enhanced room selection
• Upfront pricing (without hidden fees)
• Personalized services
• Loyalty-based rewards, perks, and upgrades

12. Deliver exceptional customer service

Ultimately, the biggest key to keeping customers coming back is to provide an excellent guest experience. This generates brand loyalty and drives repeat customers to your website—not OTAs—when booking their next stay. Prioritize positive interactions and aim to make guests feel welcome at every customer touchpoint, from the first website visit, throughout the booking process, during their stay, and in your follow-up and ongoing communications.

The best way to get more direct bookings for any hotel is to enhance the guest experience and improve guest satisfaction through the strategies we shared above. Add in industry-leading technology—such as Fuel Travel’s hotel software solutions and our meaningful, actionable analytics—and you’ll soon be on a steady path to success.

Let Fuel Travel help you turn first-timers into frequent guests and get more of them to book directly with your hotel. Schedule a demo of any of our products to see the potential they hold for your business, and get started today!