Marketing

There is a pattern I keep seeing in founder and executive teams: Marketing gets switched on, budget gets deployed, a campaign goes live, invoices come in and the anxiety kicks…

📅 Uber partners with Expedia to launch a travel booking portal in its app for U.S. users, now allowing hotel reservations alongside rideshares and food orders. Announced on Wednesday, this collaboration offers a new distribution channel for Expedia and hoteliers. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, previously CEO of Expedia, aims to drive subscriptions to Uber One, capitalizing on high-priced, albeit infrequent, hotel bookings.

🛫 Surveying 3,500 travel decision-makers globally, Expedia Group Advertising found travelers spend an average of $500 USD on non-travel purchases per trip, in addition to $2,000 USD on the trip itself. U.S. travelers average $660 USD on non-travel purchases, while French and Australian travelers spend $650 USD and $610 USD, respectively. Notably, 75% of Gen Z travelers make non-travel purchases, with 87% making additional buys post-trip. Travelers are open to relevant advertising, finding it useful and inspiring.

📈 Independent luxury hotels struggle with intermediary platform commissions. These platforms control introductions, while hotels control experiences, leading to a demand origin problem misdiagnosed for 20 years. Despite strategies like channel rebalancing to reduce operational costs and increase direct bookings, the issue persists. Hotels remain unaware of potential guests until competitor platforms introduce them. Without addressing demand origins, hotels cannot fully govern guest relationships, even when direct bookings increase.

📈 Hotel owners often criticize Booking, Expedia, Airbnb, and Trip.com for controlling customer relationships, impacting demand and pricing. The key takeaway is to use online travel agencies (OTAs) to increase reach but maintain control over customer relations. Visibility through OTAs without brand control reduces hotels to mere inventory, allowing OTAs to dictate prices. This advice comes from Practice Hospitality, emphasizing strategic brand management in the travel industry.

💻 In the evolution of hotel distribution, connectivity models have shifted from real-time "pull" methods to proactive "push" systems and now to hybrid solutions, blending both for optimal performance. These models directly impact guest experience, scalability, and accuracy. The pull model, effective in early distribution days, faced scalability issues with high volume. The push model handles high traffic but risks outdated data. Hybrid models offer flexible integration, crucial for maintaining accurate availability and rates without overloading systems.

💸 Independent hotels face OTA commissions of 15%-25%, impacting profitability. Direct bookings retain full revenue, enhancing profitability. To reduce OTA dependence, hotels should develop direct booking strategies featuring seamless websites, highlighted direct booking benefits (like best rate guarantees and exclusive packages), and effective marketing (SEO, email, social media). This balanced approach strengthens guest relationships and protects profit margins while still leveraging OTA visibility. Gradually increasing direct booking share is key to long-term success.

📺 In April 2026, NMG Network launched Journey TV and OUTRIGGER Journey in Honolulu, Hawaii. OUTRIGGER Resorts & Hotels guests can now enjoy four in-room entertainment channels focused on Hawai’i music, Hawaiian culture, surfing, and Japanese language, curated by NMG Network. The program also includes a print edition distributed throughout OUTRIGGER properties. Joe Bock and Sean Dee highlight the initiative's aim to deepen guests' connections to Hawaiian culture through curated storytelling and immersive experiences.