How DataTrax Can Help to Integrate Your Tour with OTAs like Expedia, Hotwire, and Viator

Posted by Peter Hilliard on January 21st, 2016

How DataTrax Can Help to Integrate Your Tour with OTAs like Expedia, Hotwire, and Viator

Every year over 140 million travel reservations are made on the internet. For today’s tour operators, enhancing your online presence and creating a simple, streamlined booking process is crucial for driving business growth.

Whether partnering with an Online Travel Agent (OTA) or enhancing your own website, are you prepared?

Benefits of Listing with an OTA

As travellers plan their vacations online, you can expand your company’s exposure and attract new customers by featuring your tours on an OTA website. By working with an OTA, you can become part of a dynamic travel package, letting travellers imagine your tour as a piece of a larger, thrilling experience!

Top OTAs include:

  • Expedia, an industry leader, has global exposure in over 70 countries and has been named as Top Travel Company by Travel Weekly. Expedia lets visitors select a destination, and then offers a selection of tours to choose from. Customers can bundle their activities with their flight and accommodations, simplifying and streamlining their holiday planning.
  • Hotwire offers discount prices on airfare, accommodation, and holiday packages. Like Expedia, Hotwire makes it easy for travellers to plan their complete vacation in one spot.
  • Viator is focused solely on selling unique, hand-picked activities to their customers. Let your tour be one of them. Viator’s selection is backed by over 500,000 reviews, and their website allows customers to purchase tickets on the spot.

As you’re pursuing partnerships with these and other leading OTAs, don’t forget to look after your own website. Some consumers still put more trust in your company’s official, dedicated website. For them, an OTA is a gateway to your site. Be prepared to make processing direct bookings simple and quick when customers find you.

How to Prepare to Partner with an OTA

  • Stand by Your Value: Your tour is going to be listed alongside competitors, and you might be tempted to engage in a price war. Instead, emphasise the high-value perks and indispensable local knowledge your tour offers.
  • Capture Attention: OTAs will need to build a profile for your company and tour. Make it easy for them by supplying enticing, vibrant photos and dynamic descriptions that will attract the attention of would-be travellers.
  • Easy Booking: You need to make it easy for the OTA and customers to book tickets for your tours. Make sure you choose the right, easy-to-use software to streamline real-time integration – including tour capacity – and avoid frustrating complications like overbooking.

DataTrax Technologies: Trusted, Integrated Tour Booking Solutions

At DataTrax, we design real solutions for real tour operators that integrate with leading OTAs, including Expedia, Hotwire, and Viator. Tickets sold through these online partners can be easily scanned and validated when a customer arrives for their tour. Are you concerned about keeping ticket sales up to date? Our tour booking software tracks booking in real time, feeding that data into readily available reports.

The right booking system will streamline and simplify the process for you and your partners, making it easy for you to expand your exposure and grow your business.

DataTrax booking solutions are designed by tour operators for tour operators. We provide automated booking technologies to customers across the world, making it easier to run and grow their businesses. Contact us to learn more about our products and services.

Try our ROI calculator to see how much your business could save with DataTrax!

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Peter Hilliard

About Peter Hilliard

Peter Hilliard is the Founder, President, and CEO of DataTrax. He began his career as a tour bus operator with a single bus, until he realized that a better solution was needed for automating and tracking ticket sales. Led by Peter’s expertise in the tour industry and ticketing automation technologies, DataTrax has grown over the past 20+ years into an international leader in ticketing solutions.