What chatbots taught me about direct bookings

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After deploying over a thousand chatbots for hotels, it is clear that chatbots have a strong direct booking booster. And, I have come to understand some basic flaws of hotel e-commerce that might be worth thinking about.

Hotel websites are empty shops

Traffic acquisition is much too expensive to let your online visitors alone once they are on your website. So how do you engage them and convince them to book with you? We already know that chatbots and direct bookings for hotels are related. AI and especially chatbots allow you to convert an anonymous visitor into a qualified lead. You can convince and get back to these leads once they have initiated contact with your chatbot. At the very least, your bot will always obtain their desires and contact details. In most cases, the bot will make the sales and sometimes, hand over to you.

GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) is not a barrier as long as you are in a position where you reply to a conversation initiated by your customer. It is quite different from annoying ads.

Let’s take a simple example. Between July and August 2018, Kyriad Bercy Hotel in Paris received over 120 booking requests from Zoe (their chatbot). Not all requests were converted. Most of them were handled by Zoe through its connection to their booking engine. In cases where the customer didn’t finish the process, Zoe sent a report containing the name, request and contact details for the human team to take over and close the deal!

100% conversion is a dream. However, there is room for improvement from the 2-3% average where most hoteliers are stuck today. Do not expect bots to solve all your problems. They help you scale customer interactions, but are only a tool in a global e-commerce strategy based on customer engagement. The key to increasing conversion is to create the right dynamic between your staff and your bot, so that you can start selling proactively.

Direct booking shouldn’t be only for heroes

Booking a room depends on 3 variables:

  • Capacity to buy
  • Motivation
  • Call to action

The capacity to buy depends mostly on your revenue manager. As a marketer, you can leverage motivation and call to action. If you expect your customers to do all the work, it is normal that only 2-3% of them end up with a direct booking. By showing each customer what he wants to see on demand, you boost his motivation and engagement. Of course, it won’t convert every customer.

However, between converting everyone and only selling to a highly motivated customer, there is an opportunity you might want to address – the hesitant customers. Those are the visitors you want to target with your chatbot. A conversational interface removes the pain from the sales process.

E-commerce chatbots are designed to guide customers

Consider the dynamics between chatbots and direct bookings for hotels. Hotel Chatbots provide the right suggestion or call to action at the right time to close the deal. Or, they pass the conversation a human being. Chatbots make the sale when they can. When it is too complicated for them, they hand over to a human being.

Chats have been around since the 90s. But, they didn’t gain traction in hotel e-commerce because they required too many human resources. Chatbots change the game as they automate 50 to 80% of customer interaction, making it possible for hotels to pursue hesitant customers.

Unimaginative people still see chatbots as a gadget.

If what you are looking for is a virtual human being, then yes, you will be disappointed. However, if what you are after is a tool to increase conversion then you might want to get your own ASAP. Too much effort is wasted in selling to customers that are already convinced. Once you have a decent booking engine you should really start focussing on hesitant customers because they are the key to increasing your direct sales.

If you’d like to discuss more about chatbots and direct bookings for hotels or have questions about artificial intelligence, please visit our website or contact Benjamin Devisme at bde@quicktext.im.

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