Room Mapping – A Modern Tech
The turn of the millennium brought with it several technologies that completely transformed the global business environment. Technologies such as the internet and social media provided a lot of advantages to many businesses that were aware of the potential of these new media. As a result, the companies that were able to incorporate these newer technologies like Hotel and Room Mapping into their existing mixes enjoyed a certain competitive edge over the companies that relied heavily on traditional technologies. The travel and hospitality sector is no stranger to such changes having constantly transformed itself through the ages depending on the needs and requirements of society. The advent of the internet and social media platforms enabled travel and hospitality providers with a much-needed platform to showcase their listings. The 2000s saw the rise of several online travel agencies that aggressively expanded their markets in new and emerging markets due to the rapid boom of the travel industry. There were several reasons behind the shift in the industry: Shorter travel time between locations Better communication between long distances Easier access to information New and emerging markets in Asia, Latin America and Africa New opportunities through strategic business ventures Rise of the niche industries A shift in the mentality and psyche of people People are much more open towards online booking platforms today when compared to the general population before the internet revolution. This is because the internet provides people with a direct channel to market their products and services thus leading to better relationships between the provider and the consumer. Therefore, niche industries found their footing leading to a lot of more people travelling regularly for their business needs. The hospitality providers needed to understand the shift in the market and orient their ways to better meet the needs and want of their target market. Several technology companies started operations to meet these growing needs of the business when it came to optimizing their business practices. If businesses were to evolve into the digital era, they needed to do away with their archaic technologies and incorporate these newer ones to reach more audiences and provide better services. The shift towards an online business model by travel agencies was a step in the right direction but since the market was new, these companies struggled to find the most optimal ways to sell their products. What is Room Mapping? Room mapping has emerged in the 21st century as one of the leading services in the field that has more or less become a staple over the years. Mapping in the industry ensures accurate and precise data flow between various nodes thus removing duplicate and erroneous listings on any given platform. With modern cloud-based systems being able to handle thousands of transactions simultaneously, the need for proper, updated and unique listings on one’s platform is greater than ever. When a supplier or an OTA works with multiple suppliers or provides data to multiple other sources, mapping that same data and updating it across all channels can become an extremely tedious process. Hotel and room mapping APIs automate the entire process so that inconsistencies within the system can be removed with a simple click. Online Travel Agencies face the issue of duplication when it comes to rooms listed on their website. Every data provider provides each room of a hotel differently but in reality, the same room is listed multiple times with different attributes. Room duplication is a tedious problem since every supplier has different standards when it comes to offering room data. Room Mapping aims to improve the customer experience while finding the right room and optimizes profitability for the business. Room mapping is a process of identifying room level data via multiple parameters, detecting which room listings are the same and discarding duplicate results. It is carried out to display rooms accurately meanwhile sorting them by various filters according to the user’s preference. It is crucial to uniquely identify categories across multiple providers along with Room type, Description, Room ID, Amenities, Bed type, Policy, and much more for a better customer experience. Why Room Mapping? One of the biggest challenges faced by the travel fraternity is the lack of any global standard when it comes to distributing content. Each channel focuses on its own set of rules when distributing content and this makes it extremely hard for suppliers to consolidate the data that is being sent out. It has been established through years of research and simulation that cross table mapping is a multi-step process, i.e., the travel businesses usually send their data to a data management company which then converts that content into their own set of codes which are then represented in a huge XLS table. This process alone, if not automated, can take up to a month depending on the type of data that is being consolidated. This mapped data that is consolidated is then sent to the various travel businesses for sale on their marketplace. As the number of listings and overall conversions on platforms increases, manually mapping and updating this data is next to impossible. An automated AI dependent algorithm that instantly maps the data that is being consolidated across various supplier points will readily fasten up the process of mapping. Therefore, room mapping is quickly turning out to be one of the most essential and critical technologies in the travel industry, the absence of which can vehemently hamper the overall potential of any given business. If you want to read more about the history of room mapping and the attributes that you need to focus on, you can read our blog here that discusses in detail the role of accuracy and coverage in room mapping and the ways it can make or break modern travel businesses. You can also click here to learn more about us at Vervotech and the ways our AI-based room mapping API, Vervotech Mappings, are helping leading travel businesses worldwide consolidate their content.Vervotech Mappings is a leading Hotel Mapping and Room Mapping API that leverages the power of AI and ML to
5 Reasons Why Your Travel Company Needs Hotel and Room Mapping Tools
Are you an OTA or hotel distributor? Do you end up paying a refund to your customer by selling the wrong hotel or room due to duplicate or wrong or poor inventory description? If yes, then you need to understand hotel and room mapping. Currently, the accommodation segment of the hospitality industry relies on multichannel distribution to gather hotel data. Different accommodation providers such as metasearch, OTAs, tour operators, bed banks, consolidators, intermediaries, and suppliers, display the unique names of the exact same hotel or room, leading to duplication and bad customer experience. This ongoing industry-wide challenge can be solved through hotel and room mapping tools. Hotel mapping tool aggregates data of various hotel properties from different sources, resulting in standardized and unified hotel data. Some of the hotel data are hotel name, hotel address, geocodes, property type, hotel images, etc. Whereas room mapping tool works in a similar fashion as hotel mapping. It intelligently analyzes, identifies and sorts multiple rooms sent by different suppliers via various parameters such as room type, amenities, bed type, description, policy, etc., so that the same room does not get listed on your portal twice. Let’s dive into why your travel company needs hotel and room mapping tools. Why Hotel & Room Mapping are Important for Travel Businesses Here are five reasons why any business that sells hotels or rooms should invest in hotel and room mapping tools. #1 Remove duplicate hotel and room listings When tour operators or OTAs source hotel data from more than one supplier or distribution partner, there is a possibility of duplicate hotel data and inconsistent hotel listings. This duplication issue can hurt your travel business and end-user experience. To solve this, every travel business must invest in hotel mapping software. Automated hotel level mapping tool delivers standardized hotel data for each property and removes duplicate listings from your hotel inventory. Similarly, room level mapping provides enriched room content, both descriptive and illustrative, with zero duplicates. Recommended: Hotel Data Duplication: How To Solve The Growing Challenge For Hospitality Industry #2 Up-to-date hotel and room data Did you know your travel platform could be selling stale hotel content that could impact your business and customer experience? Stale content majorly occurs when you don’t keep up with the constant changes that hoteliers make, such as room availability, address change, new upgrades in amenities, etc. The ideal way to optimize hotel and room data is through mapping tools. Hotel and room mapping removes outdated and incorrect information and provides an up-to-date hotel property list and room content. This will ensure that your platform has the freshest content for your customers, enhancing your customer retention and brand loyalty. #3 Maximum hotel inventory coverage Did you know OTAs, tour operators sell only 60% of the hotel inventory? This results from unmapped hotel inventory, leading to business loss and missed booking opportunities. Hotel and room mapping gives you a business advantage to sell hotel inventory that was previously out of sight to customers. Currently, leading mapping providers offer maximum hotel coverage of 98%. #4 Hotel data ownership on distribution channels As an accommodation provider, it’s easy to lose ownership of your data in the swarm of multichannel distribution. But with the implementation of hotel and room mapping, you instantly regain control over how your data is showcased on distribution channel websites or portals. Mapping ensures that any change in your property listings is instantly reflected in the master database of the distribution partners. This way, irrespective of how often your data is distributed, you have complete ownership of your hotel and room data. #5 Smooth content distribution Due to the fragmentation of distribution channels, it becomes difficult for travel businesses to distribute hotel and room content efficiently. This causes data inconsistency, data unavailability, data loss, stale data. The good news is hotel and room mapping simplify hotel content distribution smartly, letting travel businesses focus on revenue-generating tasks and business-critical functions. As a travel business, you must have hotel and room mapping in your distribution strategy. Without mapping, your platform might have duplicate listings, inaccurate data, stale information, which can directly lead to revenue leakage, impact your customer booking experience and put your brand reputation at stake. It’s time to leverage technology, make mapping part of your business strategy, and deliver a frictionless end-user experience. Vervotech is a leading Hotel Mapping and Room Mapping API that leverages the power of AI and ML to quickly and accurately identify each property listing through the verification of multiple parameters. With one of the industry’s best coverage of 98% and an accuracy of 99.999%, Vervotech is quickly becoming the mapping software of choice for all leading global companies operating in the travel and hospitality industry. To learn more about Vervotech and the ways it can enhance your business in the long run contact us: sales@vervotech.com
