Two Can Play At This Game: Hotel Brands Bite Back At Google with RoomKey.com
Article posted January 12, 2012 in Evision Worldwide News, Search Marketing News
It turns out the major hotel brands aren’t taking Google encroaching on their territory lying down. If Google is going to create Google Hotel Finder, they’re going to create their own hotel booking search engine.
Choice Hotels International, Hilton Worldwide, Hyatt Hotels Corporation, InterContinental Hotels Group, Marriott International and Wyndham Hotel Group — normally intense rivals — have partnered to launch Roomkey.com. Their aim: create a search and booking experience that’s easy, streamlined and trustworthy.
These hotel groups certainly seem to be excited about the launch. As Tnooz says:
The normally-fierce rivals are crawling over themselves to talk up Room Key, with is being described as “unique” (Chuck Sullivan, Hilton Worldwide), “well positioned” (John Wallis, Hyatt), an “industry first” (Steve Sickel, IHG), having “immediate scale” (Shafiq Khan, Marriott) and promising “clear benefits to the industry and consumers” (Flo Lugli, Wyndham).
At present, it’s not possible to book on the RoomKey.com site; in fact, while the site has a pleasingly clean design, its functionality is relatively basic. They’re hoping to capture users due to sheer convenience, with future enhancements like independent reviews already announced. The question is, can they compete with Google’s already prominent role in the travel buying-research process? Even with the backing of six of the largest hotel groups, it will be an uphill struggle.
What this means for:
Small/Independent Hotels
In some ways, from the perspective of non-participating hotels, RoomKey.com is like the worst combination of an OTA and a competing hotel website. But smaller hotels often compete in niche markets or with offerings that are not or cannot be matched by the huge hotel brands. That doesn’t change. If anything, it just reinforces the need for smaller hotels to make sure their websites keep up with technological trends, offer the fresh content search engines favor, and are primed to optimize conversions so a higher proportion of existing traffic books. (Keep an eye on our Learning Center – we’ll be starting a series about conversion optimization later this month).
You can bet Google will be keeping an eye on this, but they’re probably not sweating over it yet. RoomKey.com is positioning itself as a convenient, trustworthy way to research rates; but it simply does not have the scope, depth, breadth or name recognition of Google. Additionally, it does not appear that RoomKey.com offers a dedicated mobile site, which leaves Google with a huge advantage in an increasingly mobile marketplace.
Participating Hotel Brands
While we wouldn’t go so far as to say this move smacks of desperation, it does suggest the depth of concern hotels have over their eroding control of online visitors. For these six players to come together and cooperate, this is an issue they clearly take very seriously — and they’re also obviously increasingly aware that they need to capture travelers at every stage of the buying process — starting with initial research. As they begin to add the new features they’ve announced, like independent reviews and social sharing, RoomKey.com could start to gain traction fast. Their online efforts are growing ever more sophisticated.
OTAs
The Online Travel Agencies are already aware of just how resource-intensive it is to launch and brand a travel-shopping site. And OTAs found their success in an era before major hotel brands realized just how important it was to compete online. RoomKey.com is trying to find its footing in a cutthroat industry with every other player knowing what they need to do to stay on top. Plus, RoomKey.com just doesn’t have anywhere near the functionality of the OTAs. So, like Google, the OTAs won’t be sweating this quite yet; but also like Google, they’ll be watching.
