In today’s digital world, hotel channel management is not just a challenge but a great opportunity for hoteliers. Channel management has matured over the years from manual management to automated methods. Everyone from independent hotels to large hotel chains are leveraging the benefits of channel management software instead of employing a large staff to constantly monitor engaged channels. With the increase in demand, several software providers have come up with products catering to channel management. Each product is built to cater to a specific need, some offerings are a part of a larger property management software while others are simplified versions of channel managers. Amidst this chaos selecting the right channel manager is a task for hoteliers. The cheapest option may not be the most effective and the most expensive property management software might do little in value addition for your hotel.
The cost, however, should be among the last considerations when selecting the right channel manager for your hotel. After all, it is going to be an important avenue of generating revenue for you. The key points to consider should be functionalities that are offered and how they enhance your ability to monitor and control channels as well as your property. Here are some key points that you should consider before selecting your channel manager software:
(1) Types of channels that can be managed using the channel manager
An efficient channel manager should not just connect with your online channels. It should be able to cover multiple channel sources. Inability to manage bookings from offline agents, direct booking from the hotel’s own online booking engine, and directbookingsalong with online sales platforms will do more harm than good and is an absolute must if you want worthwhile inputs for your revenue management strategy.
What Djubo Offers
DJUBO not only covers all major online hotel booking channels in India but also takes care of direct bookings and bookings through offline agents.
(2) Number Of Connected Channels
This number would give you a clear idea of whether you have all the channels you wish to connect with on one platform or is there any channel you may still have to manage separately.
What Djubo Offers
As of now Djubo covers over 26 online channels apart from the hotels booking engine and provisions for managing inventory with offline agents.
(3) Ease Of Connecting A Unavailable Channel
There might be a channel which is not in the list of connected channels. In such a case, it is important for the hoteliers to know what provisions are offered for manually inserting additional channels and if the same functionalities are carried with the manual set-up.
What Djubo Offers
As mentioned earlier Djubo covers almost every major as well as multiple minor online hotel booking platforms in India. Moreover it incorporates allows for addition of offline agents. The team at Djubo is highly vigilant of any new channel that is coming up and working towards covering all online channels globally.
Manual addition although a feature which might be useful for channel managers that do not cover minor online travel agents, is a tedious task. Djubo makes it redundant by continuously updating its distribution partners. For a full list of channels available on Djubo, click here.
(4)Cloud –Based Channel Management
Your all-in-one channel management software should be accessible from any place and any device which means it should be cloud-based. That way, you can undertake other priority tasks and still keep an eye on the hotel reservations. All you need to do is bring your laptop, smartphone or tablet. Moreover, selecting a cloud-based service ensures that you don’t have to worry about upgrading your own hardware or software. Cloud-based systems are built for redundancy. If one server breaks down, backup servers ensure that the service remains online. Thus, relieving you of maintenance and backup of hardware.
What Djubo Offers
Djubo is completely based in the cloud, liberating you of all the hassles of setting up hardware and software. Djubo also offers a mobile client that allows access to the portal through your smartphone. Another added benefit Djubo offers is the ease of collaboration with booking charts and analytics.
(5)Simplification of Sales Desk Management
The channel manager should simplify the processes of your hotel. Integration at the front desk will help you better manage your inventory. Other important aspects to keep in mind are:
Most channel managers only focus on online portals and have to be managed and updated manually.Manually updating the channel manager requires an almost equal amount of effort as doing channel management on paper. An effective channel manager should be able to simplify work for your sales desk by interacting directly with the hotel’s own booking engine and the central reservation system to push room inventory in a smart manner and as per your requirements across all channels. In addition to that an effective channel manager should allow for managing confirmations and tentative bookings through a single platform. A channel manager capable of accomplishing all these task in essence constitutes an effective sales desk management.
What Djubo Offers
Djubo uses an intelligent algorithm to automatically manage distribution of your hotel room inventory across all the channels with minimal human intervention. In addition to that it offers a direct-booking engine management and a centralized reservation manager to automatically updates available inventory on all channels in real-time. Because your inventory is automatically reduced across all sites when a booking is made from any site, there’s no manual work involved, and you maximise your revenue and increase the efficiency of your sales desk.
(6) Effortless Hotel Sales Channel Management
A system that fails to provide a systematic manner of room distribution, runs the risk of double booking rooms leading to loss of revenue, customer dissatisfaction and a lot of hassle rectifying the situation. The important questions that need to be answered in this case are, does the channel manager provide access to all your channel management data in one place and if it is capable of providing an overview of your distribution history.
What Djubo Offers
Djubo offers a single-login access to every functionality across multiple properties and offers comprehensive analytics data of your room distribution that allows you to take strategic business decisions. Djubo offers a single-login access to every functionality across multiple properties and offers comprehensive analytics data of your room distribution that allows you to take strategic business decisions.
(7) Real Time Updates
An efficient channel manager should be able to update room availability in real-time. If your hotel room is not available on an OTA when a traveller is looking for it, is simply throwing away revenue. Your revenue management strategy will be in vain if the technology is unable to support it. Besides the whole function of deploying a channel manager is to increase visibility and generate revenues.
What Djubo Offers
Djubo is as real-time as it gets. A smart algorithm allows Djubo to push out the latest room inventory and prices across the channels.
(8) Training and Support
On the off chance that abreakdown occurs or something goes wrong, you have to realize if you can depend on channel manager to provide rapid support.
A critical property management system is at the centre of running your business, so be sure to select a vendor that is anything but difficult to reach.
What Djubo Offers
Djubo has at its core, a team that is dedicated to improving the product at every possible instance. Djubo support can be availed through email or through phone. Djubo has an easy-to-use and intuitive interface, which should be absolutely no trouble being used without any training. But in case you face any trouble, assistance is just a call away.
(9) User levels and access rights
Data is the key to creating the right marketing and revenue management strategies for your hotel. Which creates the need to collaborate and protect data at the same time. Make sure your channel manager allows for varying access rights at various user levels.
What Djubo Offers
Djubo provides multi-level access rights by means of 4 roles - Chain Admin, Property Admin, Reservations Manager and Front Office Manager all with different set of restrictions and rights.
(10) Flexibility
In the end the channel manager of your choice should offer you flexibility in terms of payments. It is also advisable to try a hotel management software beforehand to assess that it offers all the functionality that fit your hotel’s need. Also a pay-as-you-go payment should also allow you to minimize risk in case it does not work. The key point to consider is to watch out for the fine print. Does the contract lock you in for a fixed period of time? Do the payments increase after a certain amount of usage? Is the functionality limited in lieu of future payments?
What Djubo Offers
Not only is Djubo easy to implement and adopt, there are absolutely no strings attached. We are so sure of the capability of our hotel management solution, we offer a simple pay-as-you-go payment plans with flexible payment terms. And you can quit when you want, which we don’t think you will, considering no one has till now.
