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A Completely Uneducated Biased View of Distribution Channels
Ok so I'm writing a blog here. This means that, according to my blog mentor, David Meerman Scott, what I write doesn't necessarily have to be fact. Blogs are not fact-based like journalism (should be!), they are just opinions, like people talking in the pub. If you don't agree with someone's opinion in the pub (as long as they aren't too big and scary!) you would tell them wouldn't you?
So here's my opinion of distribution channels for hotels. None of it is fact, it's just what I think and could most probably be wrong (it isn't though!)
I won't name any particular channels but if you run a hotel you will know who I mean. They sell rooms for you online, at a cheap rate, and charge outrageous commission for doing so - the hotel loses 50% on the room in some cases!
They do this by using their brand name and SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) methods to get you up to the top of the list in Google.
There are two ways of looking at this kind of activity. The channels would like you to believe that some money is better than no money. Without them you won't sell the room, so you may as well take the hit rather than miss out completely.
Another way to look at it is this - the distribution channels are completely monopolizing the internet like a mafia gang would do with a city's drug trade. They make it an unfair playing ground by being so large and not allowing you access to your customer base. Because they have a million hotels on their books in your area, they will always come up first when people search.
It's a bit like what's ruined and 'globalized' every town in the UK. Shopping centres. Big companies buy huge spaces and charge extortionate rates for global names to sell their over-priced wares in. Meanwhile the small shop owner gets put out of business.
The small shop owner has three choices. He either pays the extortionate rates and tries to make a go of it, competing in the shopping centre with larger names. He does the best he can to market his shop and attract people out of the centre, or he goes out of business and lets them win.
Let's take this back to the internet and with distribution channels for hotels. Thanks to the world of social media the web now has no walls and the shopping centre is wide open. Everyone can reach their customers directly with Twitter, Facebook etc and the boundaries of technical know-how are behind us.
So why are hotels still using the distribution channels to sell rooms and paying their extortionate rates?
Educate me please.
paul@bedandbreakfastclub.co.uk
