TravelClick’s New Solution Combines Predictive Data & Machine Learning

NATIONAL REPORT—Since its acquisition by Amadeus in August, TravelClick has rolled out one of its first solutions aimed at informing hospitality marketing campaign planning and maximizing bookings.

“Amadeus has a fantastic vision and ambition in hospitality and a great set of products,” said Greg Sheppard, SVP of business intelligence & data products, TravelClick. “When we combine that with TravelClick’s products and a great team, we are all very excited for the future. We are working hard on developing a solutions portfolio that will allow us together to serve an even broader range of hotels with technology that suits their business needs best.”

Chief among the new solutions in the portfolio, TravelClick has extended its guest management solutions (GMS) with the addition of Demand360 for the Campaign Advisor toolkit.

“We noticed many hoteliers struggled recognizing when they were behind the market on bookings and we identified what was missing—simply knowing when to invest in campaigns for those need periods to raise occupancy,” said Sheppard. “Demand360, TravelClick’s competitive market intelligence product that provides forward-looking reservation metrics and position compared to competitive set, was a no-brainer to add to our already thriving Campaign Advisor toolkit to connect the dots and address this common pain point for hoteliers.”

One of the challenges for hoteliers was not being able to get a clear picture of how their forward-looking occupancy compared with their competitive set to inform campaign planning.

“Noticing this constant struggle, we turned to TravelClick’s Demand360 intelligence to see how we can incorporate its forward-looking data into our existing Campaign Advisor tool,” he said. “When combined, we realized we had the proprietary power to ultimately give hoteliers the inside knowledge they need to leverage market data and confidently calculate the best times to run campaigns and capture maximum demand.”

In a constantly evolving industry, Sheppard explained that the Campaign Advisor with Demand360 is meant to alleviate hoteliers’ stress of the unknown by taking the guesswork out of marketing and providing recommendations on when to run marketing campaigns based on predictive occupancy in the market.

“As a result, hoteliers will optimize their marketing investments and maximize bookings when they need them most,” he said. “This launch is part of TravelClick’s overarching mission to add even more innovation to our cutting-edge cross-product solutions. No one else in the industry has our data-driven marketing optimization capabilities, which puts customers who use TravelClick’s suite of solutions ahead of the curve.”

The benefits to hoteliers are numerous, including the ability to understand their projected occupancy compared to their competitive set.

“This new addition will empower hoteliers by taking the speculation out of marketing and providing recommendations on when to run marketing campaigns based on predictive occupancy in the market,” he said. “For the first time, hoteliers will be able to easily identify the most valuable time periods to run campaigns; pinpoint peak market occupancy as to avoid offering discounts and packages during those times; and deploy marketing campaigns when needed most.”

In beta testing, hoteliers are expressing strong positive feedback for the new solution. “They are thrilled with the market insight it provides them and are using it to inform and adjust their campaign planning to address times when they are behind the market on occupancy,” he said. “We’ve come a long way with providing advanced marketing solutions for hotels, but know there is still more opportunity. We’ve got quite a bit more in the works across our solutions portfolio.”