The hotel industry has seen tremendous growth in the past few years as millions of hotel properties are now offering their guests online bookings. Online hotel reservations have become a very popular method for booking hotel rooms as travelers from around the world can make room reservations from the comfort of their homes. You can also book hotels in Santa Monica at www.surestaysantamonica.com/.
Direct Hotel Bookings attract frequent, loyal leisure and unmanaged business travelers, who focus on schedules, and convenience.
Hotel websites cater to this audience with more personalization and loyalty, whereas online travel agencies appeal to different types of travelers like infrequent, leisure travelers who take very few trips a year and are more price-sensitive.
A recent survey taken in 2008 says that only 39% of online travel sales are made through online travel agencies, whereas the remaining 61% are made directly at hotel websites. Clearly, the percentage of travelers making online bookings via OTA's is less than half compared to bookings made directly at hotel websites.
An increasing number of hotels now have their own websites with a booking engine attached to their website to permit people to book rooms in real-time. This way hoteliers can market their hotels directly to their guests through their websites.
One big reason why the majority of the customers are using hotel sites to make their reservations is that hotels have significantly improved their websites providing better navigation, design, and content.