Hotels can identify third-party sites competing for their direct bookings, estimate commission leakage, and activate an AI Marketing Agent to protect their branded search.
Vancouver, Canada, 18 August 2026 – Operto today launched a new assessment that gives individual hotels visibility into how predatory OTAs are targeting their brand in search, which third-party sites are competing for their guests, and the potential revenue impact on their property.
Predatory OTAs, also referred to as rogue OTAs, and third-party booking sites bid on hotel names in Google Search, often appearing above a hotel’s official website when a traveler searches specifically for the property. Operto data shows that branded hotel searches feature competing OTA ads 75% of the time, while the average hotel competes with nine predatory OTAs for its own name, with GuestReservations, ReservationsDesk and HotelsOne among the most active.
Operto’s new assessment brings that problem down to property level. In around five minutes, a hotel can identify the third-party sites bidding on its name, see how visible they are in search, and estimate the commission leakage and lost revenue associated with guests being diverted away from the direct channel.
The assessment comes as hotels face a significant blind spot around guests who have already decided where they want to stay. While hotels invest heavily in generating demand and encouraging direct bookings, third-party sites can insert themselves at the final stage of the journey by advertising against the hotel’s own name.
Operto estimates that 8% of direct bookings are lost to third-party booking sites. Beyond the commission paid when a booking is diverted, hotels can also lose control of the guest relationship. Travelers booking through third parties may face additional fees or restrictive cancellation terms, sometimes without realizing they have booked outside the hotel’s official website.
Once a hotel understands its exposure, Operto ONE’s AI Marketing Agent can take action to protect its branded search. The agent continuously monitors Google Search, runs and optimizes brand protection campaigns, identifies predatory OTAs targeting the property, and reports misleading ads to Google.
The Marketing Agent handles campaign execution and optimization in the background, removing the need for hotels to continually monitor search results or manage Google Ads campaigns themselves. Hoteliers retain oversight of important actions and receive proactive updates when activity changes, while also being able to ask the agent which sites are advertising against their property, how their visibility is changing, and how many direct bookings have been recovered.
The capability is designed to make brand protection accessible to independent hotels that may lack the distribution, marketing, or paid-search expertise needed to continuously monitor and respond to brand hijacking.
Tim Major, CEO of Operto, commented: “Hotels put an enormous amount of work into earning a guest’s decision, yet even when someone searches for a property by name, there can be multiple third parties waiting to intercept that booking. For many hoteliers, the scale and financial impact of that activity at their own property has been difficult to see.
“Our assessment gives hotels a much clearer picture of what is happening around their own brand: who is competing for their guests, how visible those sites are, and what that could be costing them in commission and lost direct revenue. From there, the Marketing Agent can actually do something about it, continuously monitoring and protecting branded search on the hotel’s behalf. It gives independent hotels a level of visibility and protection that previously required considerable time and specialist expertise.”
Hotels can complete the assessment, estimate their potential commission leakage, and learn more about Operto ONE at operto.com/one.
About Operto ONE
Operto ONE helps independent hotels protect their brand and direct bookings from predatory OTAs. Its autonomous AI platform continuously identifies predatory OTAs competing for a hotel’s branded search and works in the background to defend guest intent before a booking is lost. The result is stronger direct demand, greater visibility, and more guests booking through the hotel’s intended channel. Hotels can start a free trial to instantly see which predatory OTAs are targeting their property and activate continuous brand protection in minutes at operto.com/one.
