Hilton Sees Online Bookings Surpass Those From Call Centers

Hilton Hotels Corp. today announced that in October the monthly number of rooms booked on its branded Internet sites for the first time surpassed the amount of rooms booked through its call centers. Further proof of the Web's importance as a hotel distribution channel came today from Internet consultant TravelClick, which said third-quarter U.S. hotel Web bookings grew 13.3 percent over the same period last year.

Hilton booked 972,000 rooms on its sites in October, while 863,000 room nights were reserved through its 16 call centers worldwide. "More than 13 percent of all reservations were booked through [Hilton's branded Web sites], a 30 percent increase over last year," said Tom Keltner, president of brand performance and development. "We expect this figure to increase to 15 percent by next year."

Meanwhile, the number of reservations Hilton received in October through third-party Web sites, such as Expedia, Hotels.com or Priceline, fell. "These sites accounted for approximately 2.5 percent of all our bookings, a decrease of 3 percent over last year," Keltner said. Hotel companies, including Hilton, during the past two years have taken steps to regain control of inventory that they had allotted to the third-party sites in 2001 and 2002.

"These are great numbers. For hotel companies such as Hilton, they represent significant savings since bookings made through the proprietary sites are the lowest cost to the hotel company," said Norm Rose, president of Travel Tech Consulting in Belmont, Calif. "But 13 percent of all reservations, even if that number is up 30 percent since last year, is still a small percentage. Considering how important corporate bookings are to hotel companies, the more pertinent question for the hotel companies is when they expect to start direct connections for their best clients right into their central reservations system?"