Posted on

IWBMob is a New Mobile Booking Technology

Bed Breakfast Traveler is a brand operated under the Instant World Booking umbrella. A few weeks ago we introduced a brand new concept in mobile booking.  Yes, Bed and Breakfasts can be booked on the fly, from anywhere. And, as an innkeeper you can host your booking engine on your B&B website, and be assured that people from any location using any type of devise can book your rooms instantly. This includes users of mobile phones, tablets, and any computer.

The first phase of this re-branding has just been released. It’s a mobile-first design. This means that your profile page, and the entire booking process, has been redesigned. Our new design features leading edge mobile aesthetics and streamlined user experience. For users of our new booking engine, the experience will surpass almost any modern booking site available today.

What does mobile-first mean?
Mobile-first means that our site will respond flexibly to all types of computers and devices, with an emphasis on mobile users. After all, more than 25% of worldwide travel bookings are made on mobile devices.  In the coming weeks, additional phases of our IWBmob re-branding will be visible across our entire website.

One thing to consider when selecting your primary booking engine is this. Have you gone through the booking process on multiple different mobile devices such as an iPhone, an Android phone, and a tablet?  Are the email confirmations that your guests receive equally mobile-friendly? Instant World Booking has this all covered for you.

We invite you to check out your new profile pages.  We’re sure you’ll agree that it works better on mobile devices, and is easy for users, than most other booking sites.

Here are some of best profiles we’ve seen. We recommend you check them out for ideas. Remember, add your best photos!

Hotel Convento Santa Catalina, Guatemala
Wander Inn Bunbury, Australia
Amigos Hostel Cozumel, Mexico
Bondalem Beach Club, Indonesia
New Ostel Florence, Italy
Nanu Guesthouse, South Korea

We will soon introduce some innovative methods of integrating your IWB experience with Facebook and other social media. These are brand new innovations that are currently not used by any other booking service. Look for future announcements to learn how to take advantage of these innovations.

For more information, please see:

http://www.instantworldbooking.com/blog_iw/2017/06/introducing-iwbmob-mobile-booking-concept/

 

Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!
Posted on

How to Properly Interact with Facebook Fan Pages

We all know that social media interaction works well for small businesses and tourism and bed & breakfast hotels in particular.  But how does the whole “Like” system work?  And what is the best method of socially interacting with Facebook?

For those asking for clarification on exactly how the “LIKE” procedure should go, here it is. We’ve found that this procedure works best, and is fast when trying to like multiple pages:

1) Log in as your personal page.

2) Go to the facebook fan page you want to like.

3) Click the like button (this increments the like count since you are logged as your personal profile).

4) Click the little down arrow in the upper right corner of your window, and switch to “Use facebook as” your business page.

5) Click the backspace button. This takes you back to the fan page you are liking.

6) Click the like button again. This likes the page as your business page, which has the benefit of allowing you to comment on and continue interaction with the page in the future (Don’t underestimate the value of this step).

7) Now, post a comment on the page you have just liked. This has the benefit of leaving a link back to your facebook page on the timeline of the liked page.

Again, don’t underestimate the value of steps 6 and 7 when it comes to social media interaction. Step 6 allows you to follow the page on your business profile and continue interaction in the future. Step 7 allows you to place a comment and link to your facebook page on the liked page. This means that every person who has liked that page (perhaps hundreds) has the potential to now see your comment and your link in their newsfeed. Since you already liked the page in step 6, you will be able to track and return to that page again in the future to leave further comments, and of course your link.

Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!
Posted on

How to Get Channel Management for your B&B

The interest level in IWB Channel Manager is incredible.  A number of questions have been received about how to get the quickest access to this service.  We’ll answer this question here.

Well, you need to start by having a free listing on BedBreakfastTraveler.com (Instant World Booking), which provides free marketing, a high-end calendar system, and access to all our other services. This can be accomplished in about 3 minutes at the following page:
http://www.bedbreakfasttraveler.com/listings/add_property.php

Once listed, you will have access to a wide array of service options, for example Booking Engines and a low cost property management system called IWBFrontDesk.com.  You can get a free trial of our excellent property management system at:
http://www.IWBFrontDesk.com

Now, for Channel Management, which is the hot topic.  You will have access to get started with IWB Channel Manager, offering management of dozens of booking sites right from one calendar. Once you have your free listing, please log in with the User ID provided, then proceed to the CHANNEL MANAGER page.  There you will find all the information you need.

One thing Instant World Booking prides itself on is being able to provide high-end services at a cost cheaper than any competitor.  For example, we have a guarantee to provide a booking engine for your B&B website lower than any other competing offer.  For some demos on our Booking Engines, please see:

http://www.bedbreakfasttraveler.com/booking-engine.php

Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!
Posted on

Get Free PPC (Pay per click) Advertising from BedBreakfastTraveler.com

BedBreakfastTraveler.com (Instant World Booking) has proven to be very successful in gaining top search engine rankings for its listed bed & breakfast partners. One reason it is important to use the instant booking method is that we use pay-per-click (PPC) advertising to market your property on Google and other sites. Use of a PPC campaign can cost you hundreds of US dollars each month. However, for our B&B and hotel partners who use instant booking, we advertise your property in PPC campaigns for free.

For more information and tips on how to step-up your online marketing, check out:

Online Marketing Tips by Instant World Booking

Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!
Posted on

Rezovation Booking Engine? Switch now and Get $200 Back

If you use Rezovation for your website’s booking engine, or a similar service like Webervations or other BedandBreakfast.com product, consider switching today and get $200.00 back.  Do you want to save a lot of money AND have a superior booking engine for your website?  Check out BedBreakfastTraveler.com (Instant World Booking), and learn why our booking engine services are better than Rezovation and the rest:

http://www.bedbreakfasttraveler.com/booking-engine.php

BedBreakfastTraveler.com offers a superior and more flexible solution for your website’s booking engine.  If you’re already using Rezovation, just compare costs and features.  There’s no obligation or cost to check out a demo booking engine from BedBreakfastTraveler.com.   So, why overpay?  We already offer lower rates than Rezovation and other competing providers.  We also offer more services and options, including deposit and payment options not available elsewhere.  In addition to our already lower rates, when you switch now from a competing provider, receive an additional $200.00 back.  Contact us today for more details and to receive your demo.

Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!
Posted on

Why Instant Booking using an Online Calendar is Best for Bed & Breakfasts

We’ve discussed the request-only versus instant booking methods at some length, but for many bed and breakfasts, the choice continues to be request-only. This is fine, however, there are clear advantages to the instant booking method that far outweigh any administrative inconveniences.  We are happy to work with our partners in any manner they wish, but find that on average, online requests end up resulting in some degree of frustration. Here’s why instant booking using an online calendar is best in almost every situation:

  1. The vast majority of users searching accommodation on the internet want instant gratification. If they have to wait for a response to a request, they disappear quickly. With instant booking, you capture the booking immediately, before they have time to search elsewhere.
  2. Instant booking has a much higher reservation success rate because of (1) above.
  3. Some users will submit a request simply to find out what rates are, and have no intention to book soon. This forces the innkeeper to respond to requests that will never turn into reservations.
  4. A percentage of all users never receive the response email because they are using some free email service (e.g., hotmail, yahoo, gmail etc.) that blocks mail from new senders as spam, and they don’t realize that this is happening. This is a simple fact that affects virtually all online services these days. A user that falls into this category will either disappear or complain that they never received a response. Nevertheless, with instant booking, this is never a problem, since the user receives confirmation directly while they’re still online.
  5. Innkeepers that are concerned with managing a calendar online have many options available to them. If they don’t want to use our interface directly, they can use one of several third party interfaces that feed into our system (you can contact us for recommendations).
  6. The risk of an occasional overbooking is more than offset by the higher level of bookings, income, and benefits mentioned above that can be achieved with the instant booking method.
Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!
Posted on

Return on Investment and the Lifetime Value of a Guest

We recently read with great interest the blog entries by Eric Goldreyer, the CEO of Bedandbreakfast.com. Intelligent and well-spoken, Eric speaks in one article of the Lifetime Value of a Guest. In short, this is the value a B&B earns over a lifetime by bringing in one guest. Lifetime Value of a Guest is usually multiples of the earnings on just the first reservation. The article is worth reading and has several good points to be driven home to innkeepers.

Where we stopped short in our tracks is when Eric illustrates the concept with a typical example. He uses 25% as the typical cost of a reservation. He then goes through the calcuation and reinforces that ROI (Return on Investment) is a primary consideration for bed and breakfast owners.

Please allow me to emphasize, well no … proclaim loudly, that 25% is not anywhere near a good value for B&B innkeepers to be paying for a reservation. Even when the lietime cost of acquiring a client is maybe half of this (12.6% as Eric Goldreyer goes on to explain in his article), it’s still not a bargain for the hotel.

When CEOs of online booking services announce publicly that typical costs of acquiring guests are in the 25% range, it makes us wonder where all the value is going with the high technology available today. In this particular case BedandBreakfast.com is a proponent of all the right concepts, as stated in their other blog entries, including “online reservations, leveraging ratings and reviews, frequent stay programs, etc.” These are all the concepts we at BedBreakfastTraveler.com (Instant World Booking) have been talking about for year. Nevertheless, consider that the cost structure we are able to offer to you, the innkeeper, are roughly one-third the amount you’ll be paying as suggested by Goldreyer above.

This is why we are imploring all bed and breakfasts and small hotels to consider alternatives to their online marketing strategies. Another well-written article by Eric Goldreyer speaks of how to think about return on investment (ROI) for your online marketing spend. Read the article, then consider that BedBreakfastTraveler.com (Instant World Booking) charges no fees to join the service, offers more online, search-engine-optimized content for your property, more photos, and more translated online pages than the competition. Instant World Booking also offers a fully integrated online calendar, with credit card collections, for no sign-up fee or monthly fee. In short, you have zero cost unless you have bookings. And when you do have bookings, our cost is roughly one-third the cost offered by competing services. We encourage you to sign up for a free listing at BedBreakfastTraveler.com (Instant World Booking) today:

http://www.bedbreakfasttraveler.com/listings/add_listing.php

The blog articles mentioned in this article can be found at the links include in the comment below.

Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!
Posted on

Your Bed and Breakfast Information Published in 14 Languages

Want to gain a major boost in internet exposure and traffic for your bed and breakfast? Instant World Booking has introduced a major service for our B&B partners worldwide. Now, when you list your property with us, we translate the information you submit into 14 different languages. We then publish your property on 14 individual multi-lingual webpages, each featuring only your property.

This is a major level of service that only Instant World Booking provides for free to B&B partners. In fact, it’s a must-have service for any lodging who wishes to gain serious exposure on the internet. As always, Instant World Booking’s services are free for bed and breakfasts to use.

Consider that your B&B or inn can quickly and easily have 14 new pages, dedicated specifically to your property, in the most used languages on the internet. Unlike other services, these pages are not simply duplicates with your comments translated. Each page is a full translation uniquely search-optimized to rank high on multi-lingual search engines.

If you haven’t listed yet with BedBreakfastTraveler.com and the Instant World Booking network, this new level of service is yet another reason why no competing service offers more to bed and breakfasts around the globe. We invite you to compare competing services, then check us out.

New also is the ability for you to submit your listing information in the language of your choice. If English is not your first language, not to worry. You can submit your property information in any language you wish, whether it’s Spanish, Italian, Greek, Arabic, etc., Instant World Booking will then take the information you wrote, and translate it into 14 of the most widely used languages on the internet.

To increase bookings, you need to increase your exposure. Get 14 translated listing pages for your property up and running on the web now. List with Instant World Booking today.

For more information, and to list your property, please see:

http://www.bedbreakfasttraveler.com/listings/add_listing.php

Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!
Posted on

Good Photos Increase Bookings – Add Unlimited Photos Today

Want to know the number 1 rule of tourism marketing on the internet? Good Photos Increase Bookings.

Now that doesn’t sound like much of a secret, does it? But surprisingly, almost half of all tourism marketing, especially in the lodging market (B&B’s, Inns, small hotels, etc.) don’t follow this very simple advice.

BedBreakfastTraveler.com and the Instant World Booking network have now made it much easier for you to increase bookings with excellent photos. We now offer unlimited photos for your online listing. That’s right — Unlimited! This feature is new, it’s free, and as always, maintaining a listing with the BedBreakfastTraveler.com is free.

Check out half of the small bed and breakfast websites on the internet. Photos sell rooms! We can’t over-emphasize this simple concept. Look further to the competing booking services around the web, especially those catering to the bed and breakfast and inn market. They offer maybe half a dozen photos or so for a bed and breakfast listing, and their display size is a small image barely larger than a thumbnail. This does very little to sell your rooms and beds. What’s worse? These services are expensive!

If you’re familiar with BedBreakfastTraveler.com, then you already know that we lead the competition in innovative technology. And what’s more simple (yet innovative) than offering unlimited photos for free? No other service offers this, and they know many properties will be willing to pay large membership fees if they did. Don’t pay. Try BedBreakfastTraveler.com.

If you’ve been advertising your bed and breakfast or inn on the internet for a while, you know that good photos do increase sales. And, the more photos you have the better. Don’t include just photos of your guestrooms, but of all common areas of your property, inside and out. Give a real sense of what it’s like to stay in your hotel. And what about your environment? Include photos of the surrounding neighborhood and views from your property. This really sells rooms.

To add your photos, simply sign in to your listing at BedBreakfastTraveler.com, and proceed to the MANAGE PHOTOS page. You can upload an unlimited number of images. And, you can submit images as large as 8MB! No more re-sizing and touching up your photos. Our enhanced system will handle that for you. As a bonus, don’t worry about the format of your pictures, you can now submit JPEG/JPG, PNG, and GIF images.

So get online today, and add your photos. Remember, good photos increase reservations. If it’s been awhile since you’ve refreshed your pics, get your camera out, and start taking new photos.

As always, Instant World Booking looks forward to seeing you on the web. To get listed with our network, simply go to:

http://www.bedbreakfasttraveler.com/listings/add_listing.php

Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!
Posted on

Search Engine Advertising for Cheapskates

A recent letter that crossed my desk suggested that online advertisers should forget Google. Consider search engine advertising for cheapskates, the ad proclaimed, suggesting that Google was overpriced. The advertisement made me stop and think, when advertising our bed and breakfast or small inn on the internet, are we getting the value we need?

So, do we sidestep Google, and move in a new direction towards budget advertisers? We can’t answer that question for you. What we can say is that, when considering what search providers to target, you need to carefully consider your goals, and who you’re trying to reach. Many budget search providers can’t be matched in value or performance, considering the target audience you’re trying to reach. Their flat rate plans can offer an excellent way of controlling costs, considering Google PPC type advertising can quickly run up large bills if you’re inexperienced.

So, when considering paid search advertising, know your audience and who your customer base is. Consider that Google accounts for roughly 60% of online searches worldwide, and Yahoo accounts for about 20%. If you want to try some budget search providers you can definitely gain some value for the amount you pay. But, if reaching the largest possible online audience is one of your goals, then Google and Yahoo cannot be ignored.

If your bed and breakfast targets customers in a particular geographic region, the large providers offer excellent ways to target the placement of your ads geographically, so you don’t have to worry about wasting money on ads displaying in regions where you never expect to gain customers.

To recap, the lesson to learn when considering online search providers is to know your target audience and select the provider that offers the best and most economical method of reaching that audience. If your goal is to reach the largest and most geographically diverse audience quickly, then Google is pretty hard to match.

Bookmark and Share
Link to this post!