Online shopping has become “default setting” in a lot of business areas, and probably the most widely so in the tourism sector. With the rapid expansion of online booking, businesses operating in tourism are having vast opportunities to market themselves to travelers. However, competition has become even tougher in this sector. Let me only hint at the overwhelming success of such sites as booking.com or hotels.com.
It is a challenge to emerge from this online revolution as a winner. And under these circumstances, the benefit of direct contact with guests has become even more significant.
With millions of tour operators and accommodation service providers on the web, a lot of online services that used to be revolutionary only a decade ago are now considered evident by the visitors of these touristic websites. High-quality web presence, up-to-date information, photo gallery, interactive booking surface – only a few of the multiple tools now regarded as fundamental requirements on a hotel’s, motel’s or guesthouse’s website.
One has to go even further on the route leading to professional customer service. Beside a rich and attractively designed website, the possibility to make direct contact with a service provider is more than important. Of course, website visitors are skimpy, in at least two senses: they do not devote more than a few seconds – in the best case a couple of minutes – to a website; and they are not willing to pay a penny for making contact with the website operator.
Thus, it is the operators’ responsibility to fill in these needs. One-click, free-of-charge direct access to the given hotel’s or guesthouse’s can now be realized with the help of GreenCaller. One more advantage of this solution is that it does not require the visitor to download or install any special software.
According to surveys, 40 percent of all travel arrangements involve preliminary information search on the web. It is this phase where any business – no matter if small or big – can make a leap ahead the others and gain new customers. And this is especially true for tourism businesses. In this field, guests are even more cautious, they tend to ask dozens
of questions starting from the view from rooms, through special rates to nearby attractions and events.
If guests can put all such questions directly and instantly to a contact person of a hotel or a small pension house, the chance to welcome them a few days or weeks later simply multiplies.
What else could a hotel or a lodging house strive for? Especially at such a small investment?
If only we could post in Chinese! According to a recent study, the same text can be up to 70 per cent shorter in Chinese than in English. That is, we could share three to four times more info within – say – a Twitter post with you. Chinese is thus ideal for micro-blogging, as these texts tend to have a maximum expanse of 140 symbols.
