Do We Need To Run Ad Campaigns Now Booking Dot Com Are Shedding Jobs?
With the news that Booking dot com are to be making 25% of their workforce redundant, you could be forgiven for thinking that more direct bookings will come your way as their advertising spend lowers. Think again!
Like most businesses, the Dutch-based OTA are looking at ways to get rid of overheads but, unfortunately for hoteliers across the globe, ad spend will not follow suit. “Why?” we hear you ask! In short, their ad spend will not be reduced because this is how they make their money.
The graph below shows their ad traffic before and after COVID-19 in the UK marketplace. You can see that after the dip during lockdown, spend on Google Ads has now risen back to pre-COVID levels.
Booking.com’s ad spend has returned to pre-COVID levels.
A high percentage of the money they make comes from people that are searching on Google and other search engines like Bing for hotel brands. They take the top ad spot which means they appear at the top of the search results page whenever anyone searches for your hotel by name. The potential guest then visits their website and books with them when they would have otherwise come direct.
Never fear, there is a way you can combat this widely used tactic. Run your own brand ads! This reduces your hotel’s exposure to online travel agents and lets your direct web appear at the top of the page when anyone searches for you. The result? More direct bookings and fewer commissions being paid to OTAs. Of course, there is a cost to running these ads but the good part is that this is typically a lower equivalent commission than you would pay a typical OTA, somewhere around 10%. So what are you waiting for?
