E-tourism: Regiondo Pro puts the booking of leisure activities at your fingertips!

After airlines, hotels, catering, entertainment and sports ticketing, leisure also turns to be "bookable" online. The startup Regiondo Pro offers an online activity booking software.

Launched in 2011 and with an annual growth of over 100%, the company has signed several new distribution partnerships with OTAs and other travel portals. 

	Yann Maurer, founder of Pro Regiondo credit : Pro Regiondo website

 

Regiondo Pro solution's concept

The start-up offers a simple user interface that can manage one's own booking calendar and configure a booking widget for their own website RegionDo
credit : Pro Regiondo website

Regiondo Pro is a  solution for booking business of online entertainment. The integration of customizable booking engine is within the provider's website, no computer knowledge required. With Regiondo Pro system, providers of leisure activities increase their sales by 30% a year on average. 

The start-up digitizes an inventory that until now existed only offline.  75% of reservations are made ​​online, but less than 2% of providers of recreational activities have a reservation solution on their website. Those who developed their own solution are faced with high maintenance costs and often abandon their project along the way. Beyond that, those companies do not have the opportunity to distribute their offerings on other websites because their reservation system does not communicate with other sales channels. With their API, they connect more than 200 distribution channels to their inventory. This is why the smart solution Regiondo Pro offers true added value for providers of leisure activities seeking both a solution of reservation and distribution.

Regiondo Pro solution's business model

With Regiondo Pro solution, it is possible to sell both online tours, outdoor activity such as rafting or canyoning, escape games, and also online tickets to amusement parks or zoos. This tool is essential to meet the demand of tourists who want a simple way to book their activities once they arrive in the destination. The market is estimated at nearly 6000 leisure activity providers that may use this system to manage all their bookings.

Regiondo Pro solution receives a 5% commission +0.49 cents per ticket sold on all reservations done through their system. Any offer having been posted on their system can also be sold on their distribution channel partners. 

The company has no real competitors in Europe . Some leisure distribution portals such as SmartBox or Viator exist but no competitors upstream of the value chain digitize the available inventory as Regiondo Pro solution does. Indeed, the start-up offers a simple user interface that can manage one's own booking calendar and configure a booking widget on their own website. 

In other countries, similar companies such as Rezgo in Australia or Booking Boss in Canada exist. However, their products are not suitable for the European market. The Regiondo Pro service provides a user interface, a CMS and a purchase tunnel in French, English, German, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese and is also compatible with all payment methods online used in Europe.

The Start-up aims to continue to digitize the leisure industry and to help providers to professionalize their offer through this online booking solution. However, it is a long way to go as there are thousands of activities' providers in each touristic destination. The next challenge will be to identify each of them and persuade them to join Regiondo Pro. Moreover, Regiondo Pro service may face competitors based in other countries such as Rezgo or Booking Boss that would like to conquer the European market in a near future.

By Joëlle CALAFELL, Anaïs DAFRI and Kim TUONG

Source:  Regiondo Pro met la réservation d'activités de loisirs à portée de clic!, Tourmag.com, 11th March 2016

Personalization tools for hotels on the rise

The concept of personalization is not entirely new in the hospitality industry – travellers’ expectations for quality and value constantly change, which in turn pressures hotels and airlines to adapt their offers. A growing number of travellers expect more from their stay in a hotel, and personalized products and services become increasingly important to them. This fact is underlined in a research study conducted by the InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) in 2013, which shows that 54% of travellers say they feel more valued if hotel services are personalized and 59% find a hotel significantly more comfortable with these personalized services.1

Circumstances like these have resulted in the rise over the last few years of personalization tools and applications available to hotels around the world. Such tools can come in various forms: either as tablets or similar devices installed in guest rooms, as apps that can be downloaded by travellers, or as a mobile website freely accessible for the guests. These tools all store information and are linked with the various hotel systems, enabling the guests to personalize their stays while providing the hotel with valuable guest information. Providers for these information management tools and applications are increasingly third-party suppliers.2

An example of such personalization software is “GuestDriven”, an iPhone app developed by the Montreal-based company of the same name (formerly known as MConcierge). It serves both as an information provider for the hotels that use it and a tool for guests “to request room service orders, wake-up calls, and look up directory information”.2 Its ultimate aim is to provide “a real-time platform for guest and hotel to communicate throughout their stay”.³ Guests’ experiences are customized by obtaining information about their preferences via various social media channels, without selling this information to outside parties. The hotels can benefit from this application as they receive information “about a guest’s history, spending power, interests and social media influence”. 4 This data allows them to adapt and tailor their marketing efforts as well as plan their long-term strategies, with the ultimate goal of increasing sales. Recently, the company has managed to attract more than $3 million in funding from “Plaza Ventures, Real Ventures and Structure Capital as well as hospitality angels Tony Cohen (CEO of Global Edge Investments and an executive vice president at Crescent Hotels & Resorts) and Bob MacDonald (CEO of Maritz Loyalty)”.4

GuestDriven on Pinterest

Retrieved from https://twitter.com/GuestDriven/status/397503060034875392/photo/1

Of course the software mentioned above represents just one of several tools currently available for hoteliers. Not only are hotels active in these personalization efforts, but other players in the hospitality industry, such as airlines, have also seen an increase in use of such instruments.3 

The personalization technologies such as GuestDriven are intriguing ideas but hotels and other companies using them are going to have to be completely upfront with their customers about what kind of information they will access and how it will/can stay confidential. Additionally, companies need to keep in mind that not all guests will choose to participate in such a program, as some may find it an invasion of privacy or may not use social media (key to GuestDriven’s design).

Aline Biber & Caitlin Richardson

Sources:

(1) ehotelier.com. (2014, January 23). Travellers want personalization from their hotel brands. ehotelier.com. Retrieved from http://ehotelier.com/hospitality-news/item.php?id=26901_0_11_0_C

(2) Markwart, W. (2012, December 07). Latest hotel technologies empower guests to customize their stay. HotelierMagazine.com. Retrieved from: http://www.hoteliermagazine.com/hotelier-magazine/featured-articles/69-featured-articles/992-latest-hotel-technologies-empowering-guests-to-customize-their-stay.html

(3) Slade, H. (2014, February 18). Sushi on arrival? GuestDriven raises $3M to give hotels guests' social media info. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/hollieslade/2014/02/18/sushi-on-arrival-guestdriven-raises-3m-to-give-hotels-guests-social-media-info/   

(4) Schaal, D. (2014, February 18). GuestDriven attracts $3 million in funding for mobile personalization tool. Skift. Retrieved from http://skift.com/2014/02/18/guestdriven-attracts-3-million-in-funding-for-mobile-personalization-tool/ 

Image source:

GuestDriven. (2013, November 4). Hello ‪#Pintrerest, it's been a little while. Retrieved from

https://twitter.com/GuestDriven/status/397503060034875392/photo/1