TripAdvisor’s Instant Booking Added Yet Another Feather In Its Cap With Hilton Worldwide
It seems that the time has finally come for TripAdvisor’s Instant Booking platform to shine. Shortly after Expedia joined the Instant Booking foray, now Hilton with its 13 brands has become a part of the Instant Booking platform. The development means that currently nine out of the top ten global hotel chains are present on Instant Booking, the odd one out being InterContinental Hotels Group. Along with these hotel chains, Priceline and Expedia, the world’s top two OTAs in terms of global reach, are also present on Instant Booking.
The Hilton brands starting from Embassy Suites to Hilton Garden Inn and Waldorf Astoria will be included on the Instant booking platform very soon. This would significantly increase the number of properties on Instant Booking with Hilton’s 789,000 rooms across 104 countries. Though Hilton had so far marketed itself through TripAdvisor, now users can book its properties through TripAdvisor in addition to booking through Hilton’s own website.
Similar to Instant Booking’s other partners, for Hilton’s featured properties, too, TripAdvisor will be handling the booking while Hilton will be looking after the transaction and customer service. Hilton was attracted by Instant Booking’s lower commission rates as compared to its other OTA peers such as Priceline and Expedia.
Hilton’s inclusion on TripAdvisor’s platform raises suspicions that maybe its “Stop Clicking Around” messaging to promote direct booking through its own website has not been quite successful, so far. Though hotel bookers will continue enjoying a lower rate if they join Hilton’s loyalty program, HiltonHonors, and book through Hilton.com, however, industry experts surmise the direct booking promotions by most hotel chains might not have been such a hit with users, after all.
TripAdvisor’s Instant Booking platform that was launched in mid-2014 in the U.S., and gradually rolled across the globe, is still finding it difficult to attract users. The result has been a sharp decline in the company’s revenues per hotel shopper. Also, since hotels comprise almost 80% of TripAdvisor’s revenues, and Instant Booking is the primary driver of the hotel segment, TripAdvisor’s performance has received a major setback. As a result of this, the company’s stock price is currently trading at around half of its mid-2014 stock value.
TripAdvisor’s transition from a metasearch and reviews platform to an online booking site is taking time as people mostly browse through the hotels on its websites and go to other OTA sites or independent hotel websites to complete their bookings. Coupled with this is the problem of mobile conversion, i.e., though more people visit the website through mobile, the conversion to a confirmed booking from mobile is far less than that of those from desktop sites. However, the Instant Booking experience for the user has also been confusing so far. With an inconsistent way of advertising its booking feature and frequent experimentation by the company to fine tune the user experience, TripAdvisor’s Instant Booking still seems to be grappling for a solid foundation that might help with user expansion.
However, Expedia’s presence (along with that of Priceline) has definitely raised Instant Booking’s desirability in the eyes of hotel bookers. Now, with the addition of Hilton, Instant Booking’s appeal might increase even further.
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