Turning Online Lookers To Bookers Using Click To Call
Posted on 03-10-2005

- By John Piescik

The online travel and hospitality industry is booming. Forrester Research predicts that in 2005 online travel spending will exceed $63.6 billion -- up from $53.4 billion in 2004. However, the internet can be a double-edged sword for travel and hospitality vendors.
On the one hand it presents potential travelers with easy access to your products and services. On the other hand, it gives them an incentive to look elsewhere for a better deal.

For online travelers, brand loyalty is rare and website abandonment is common. In addition, 47 percent of those who research their travel plans online don't purchase their travel online. (FORRESTER RESEARCH, 'Who Isn't Buying Travel Online', August 8, 2005)

So how can travel and hospitality providers turn online lookers into online bookers? The answer is simple...by incorporating an easy, cost-effective means to connect with prospective travelers and guide them through the online purchasing experience.

Online travelers generally abandon web sites because they have pricing issues or technical support issues. During the infancy of e-commerce, many online travel and hospitality companies felt they could address these concerns by providing prospective customers with self-service tools, such as FAQs. However, with complex sales, like purchasing airline tickets, making hotel reservations or booking travel packages, companies are beginning to understand that they need to be more effective at securing, supporting and retaining their online customers.

To do this, many companies are turning to click to call technology. Click to call lets users click an HTML button embedded on a web site, e-mail, banner ad, search engine or online directory listing, and immediately speak with a customer service representative over their PC or Phone.

So why use click to call instead of a toll-free number? Data. Unlike a toll-free phone number, with click to call services, companies can control when and where online visitors can migrate from the Web to the phone sales channel and track their activity each step of the way.

Traditional telephony is a black hole of information. Click to call provides online travelers the convenience of telephone support, but also allows the company to continue to track valuable customer data and behavior in order to facilitate the sales process.

Using strategic customer engagement tools, like click to call buttons, online travel and hospitality companies can capture all pertinent customer information and actively engage customers to help them complete the online purchase.

Imagine a customer is browsing your web site. They see a travel package they like, but are uneasy about the price or the terms and conditions. They select a click to call button to speak with a customer service representative. On the other end of the phone, the sales agent answers the phone and immediately receives information regarding the caller; what page of the web site they called from, where they were beforehand, the price of the package they're considering, etc.

Based on this information, the sales agent can help the customer find the package that's right for them. Agents can 'co-browse' with potential customers by sending out web pages to the customer's computer screen to compare different packages or to upgrade the existing package. Together, the agent and the customer find the best deal on your site...and not your competitor's.

Companies across the travel and hospitality industry are recognizing the importance of keeping customers engaged online, and are incorporating click to call technology as part of their online sales process.

Recently, the Red Lion hotel brand re-launched its web site. As part of that redesign, the company incorporated click to call as a way for consumers to initiate a web-based conversation from key pages within the site. Potential bookers could talk to a Red Lion guest service agent, either via telephone or an internet-connected PC. Calls could be automatically directed to the appropriate person or department based on the page in which the inquiry is made including reservation agents, national sales, and the company's loyalty program service agents.

"We want our guests to 'Stay Comfortable' and everything about the site is built around ease of use and helping customers get all the information they need at exactly the moment they need it," explained Barry Hughes, Vice President, Marketing and Distribution. "Consumers continue to shift their research and booking activities to the web and our new site gives them a comprehensive toolset to make the best and most informed decision possible - all in one place."

For Red Lion, the online experience was an important way to provide their customers with unequalled access to rates and information. Adding the click to call feature was a big part of them helping to achieve that.

At Continental Airlines, the company's web group began working with their customer support team to determine which parts of their web site were causing the highest levels of abandonment, and when abandonment was occurring near a point of sale.

The company decided to deploy click to call technology on their purchase completion page when a customer would type a credit card number incorrectly. Also, if a customer attempted to leave the site at the point of purchase, a prompt would ask them if they would like a customer service representative to phone them.

When customers decided to use the click to call option, Continental found that 35 percent of the calls resulted in sales. According the surveys of the airline's click to call customers, 22 percent of these callers said that without the option they would have abandoned the site.

In a recent study of online consumers, Jupiter Research found that 73 percent of consumers preferred phone-based customer service to FAQs, Online Chat or e-mail. For consumers who spent $500 or more online in the past six months, Jupiter found they were much more satisfied with the phone than any other customer service touch points.

Today, companies like Spa Finder, ClubMed, Continental Airlines, Ebookers, Red Lion and Hilton are employing click to call to reach out to current and prospective customers. Clearly, these services are improving online sales conversion rates, reducing web site abandonment and delivering higher customer satisfaction.

Some companies are even adding call tracking services in addition to click to call as a means of tracking lead generation and proving the ROI of print and online advertising.

'The extreme ease of implementation of this technology, and the additional supporting reports, make this new tool an invaluable asset to increasing bookings. Spa and resort properties should take advantage of this advanced technology,' said Pete Ellis, Chairman/CEO of Spa Finder.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
John Piescik is Chief Operating Officer of eStara, Inc.