Top Tips on How to Build the Best Booking Flow for Your Travel Booking Systems

As users become much more sophisticated online, long gone are the days where you simply offered a one size fits all package.  Nowadays travel sites need to provide not only full quote and book services, but also be able to cater for optional extras, additions or amendments, and allow customers to self manage this process.

With this in mind, it is useful to understand what extra add-ons or features you will need to incorporate into your booking flow.

Why?

There are a number of reasons.  Firstly, by building this into your booking flow, users will be able to book everything they need in one place for their travel arrangements - you will be able to flag or highlight options they might not have considered or didn't realise they needed. 

This provides a complete customer experience and will aid conversion.

Secondly, by integrating options into the booking process, you will hopefully increase revenues from offering value added services to the user.

Thirdly, the travel booking systems need to reassure the user at every stage during their research or buying process. 

These are the simple things but they need to be integrated as some of the following elements will help with the decision-making processes and reinforce trust.   

These elements include:

•         Up to date photo portfolio
•         Independent reviews
•         Ratings
•         Contact Information
•         Resort / Hotel Information
•         Destination guides
•         Trade and Association logos
•         Upsells and recommended complimentary offerings
•         Guarantees – money back / price match

As a travel website you need to ensure your customer journey is as easy and reassuring as possible.

One final thought you can give is being able to suggest ideas to users that visit the site.  Sometimes users are given too many options and then will freeze and probably do nothing. 

If you can guide users or, in some cases, create that sense of urgency – for example, this is the last room available for your dates – you can help users make the right decisions.

With the advent of more and more people accessing the Internet via mobile devices, you need to ensure your booking flow works in the same way as it would on a desktop computer.  That's not to say it needs to look exactly the same, but the user will be taken through the same flow process.

This provides consistency for the user as more and more people use multiple access points before booking (i.e. they research on a desktop PC at the office, then maybe look at some more options on their mobile phone on the train home, and then look to book from their tablet sat in front of the TV at home.) 

If you can understand this diverse journey and make sure your booking system can cater for it, you will be in a much better place.

Summary

Hopefully you can see that a booking system is much more than simply offering a search, quote and buy online system.  By carefully mapping out each stage of the process then creating the flow, you will be much better placed to drive and convert site traffic.

To find out how we can help you with your travel booking flow, why not get in touch? At CSI Media we are experts in the provision of travel booking systems and will be more than happy to discuss your requirements and offer ideas of cost-effective solutions.