WHAT EVERY HOSPITALITY PROFESSIONAL SHOULD KNOW ABOUT BOOKING ABANDONMENT
What is Booking Abandonment?
Booking Abandonment is a phenomenon in the hospitality industry where potential guests begin the process of booking a stay online but abandon their efforts before finishing. It happens at such a high rate (up to 81%) that a mini-industry has developed to try and solve the problem.
Why don’t users finish the booking process?
According to a survey by salescyle.com there are 6 main reasons people start the booking process, but don’t finish it.
- 39% are just looking or want more information
- 37% think the price is too high, or are comparing prices
- 21% need to check with other travelers
- 13% things the booking process is too long
- 9% have technical issues
- 7% have payment issues
Looking at the first couple reasons, it appears that abandonment might just be a normal part of the lodging research process. Obviously potential guests need to know about offerings, amenities, and prices before they make a decision to stay at a certain property.
Unfortunately, the bottom half of the list reveals a bit of a different story, a story of a broken process. While the majority of abandonments are just side effects of shopping around, a full 29% of abandoned booking efforts are a result of problems with the process itself.
How can hotels recover this lost 29%?
1) Simplify
Gathering more and more information from consumers is a major trend in e-commerce. While great for building databases and generating emails lists, it can result in slower online transactions. One reason that 13% of potential guests think the booking process is too long could be because hotels ask them for too much information.
Even if that’s not the culprit, looking for ways to simplify transactions is a good idea for any business that utilizes the internet to make a sale.
2) Research
It’s important to keep in mind that the stats from salecyle’s survey give broad industry trends and each property or brand will have their own strengths and weaknesses when it comes to their booking. Anyone looking to address booking abandonment should conduct their own research and analytics to determine the biggest problems with their particular process.
Plus doing research could reveal glaring technical or payment processing issues that need to be addressed.
3) Let the experts handle it.
Abandonment by itself has become such a problem that specialized solutions have been developed to address it. Companies like Zdirect and Adobe have had success helping hotels recover bookings lost through abandonment.
Before throwing money at an outside solution though, it’s important to do your homework first. You’ll want to ask questions like:
- “Can a simple website redesign fix this?”
- “How much is booking abandonment really costing us?”
- “Will finding a solution be more expensive than the money lost through abandonment?”
