Web Booking Consolidation Coming
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It also handles back office tasks – the accountancy and reporting, and connects by a dedicated web service called Websync to other web booking services.
"We connect to three channel managers: SiteMinder, Staah and Seekom," says director, Patrick Vallely. "We also have a basic channel manager functionality built into Websync itself, so we can take bookings and availability for a motel and either download or upload that availability to at least half a dozen or more booking websites.
Most motels tend to stick with one or two that they know and trust. As the economy stays tight, the temptation is to maximise bookings by increasing the number of online travel agent's a property can be found upon."
Mr Vallely says increasingly it is technologically educated people who are making travel bookings. "More and more people are wanting instant confirmation. I think the days of sending a letter or even phoning are diminishing rapidly When travellers go to a website, the expectation now is the website will say: "Yes, we have three big rooms. You have now picked one – thank you." The booking is done, the job is over and the person can get on with the next part of their itinerary. As more people travel, they need that instant confirmation."
Mr Vallely says he believes well over half of all bookings are now made in this way in New Zealand. He predicted that printed directories would be the next to suffer a slow decline, which could spur the move towards consolidation as less was spent on print advertising and more and more on web based solutions. "Over time, I really do see a downturn in print advertising. As a software provider, we're unchanged by that. I expect we'll see a greater demand on our web connection services and an expansion of the lists of sites we connect to. "I think consolidation of web booking services will come, eventually. Web booking services are a cheaper than building a print presence in the market, which requires infrastructure, management and printing budgets. "In the short term, we see a burgeoning of different websites popping up, but I think the market over time will thin out. The bigger ones will absorb the smaller as they go, e.g. TradeMe merging TravelBug with Vianet and then BookIt.
"At present, we're in an expansion phase where many web services are pushing themselves towards accommodation providers just to gain the market share before it closes up into a consolidation phase. We're still getting requests from our customers to connect an increased number of website providers. From an accommodation perspective, it's a broadening of our backend services that we're being pushed towards at the moment." So what does he believe this will all this mean for the future of travel agencies?
"I spoke to a travel agent recently and asked him what he thought of their future. He said they thought it was secure because at the end of the day many people will always want the safety net of buying from a person they trust – particularly with international travel. Winging it when you get there is not for everyone."
