Every unsold night is gone forever
Perishable inventory changes the math. A discount that fills a room beats a margin you never earn. But only if you know which nights are actually at risk.
Travel & Hospitality benchmarks
- Direct booking share
- +58%Direct booking share
- OTA commission spend
- -22%OTA commission spend
- Avg. direct-site conversion rate
- 4.1%Avg. direct-site conversion rate
- Repeat guest rate
- +33%Repeat guest rate
Drawn from Digital Squad engagements with travel and hospitality brands. Your realistic range comes out of the audit.
Trusted by teams at
What holds travel and hospitality brands back
The same four constraints show up in nearly every travel & hospitality engagement we start.
Platform dependency erodes margin
Booking platforms deliver volume at a commission that consumes a large share of contribution. Direct booking share is the single number that most determines profitability in this category.
Inventory expires
Unlike products, an unsold night or seat has zero salvage value. That changes how discounting works. When the alternative is nothing, the right price is anything above marginal cost.
Demand is seasonal and event-driven
Flat monthly budgets are wrong in a category where a single week can carry a quarter. Pacing has to follow demand, not the calendar.
Buyers compare in a marketplace you don't control
Even people who find you directly frequently check a platform before booking. Your direct experience competes against an aggregated one.
What we do differently for travel and hospitality brands
Model contribution by channel, not revenue
A direct booking at a lower rate frequently beats a platform booking at a higher one once commission is included. Most operators report gross revenue by channel and never see this.
Give people a reason to book direct
Not price-parity workarounds. Real reasons. Room choice, flexible cancellation, loyalty credit. Competing on price against a platform you also list on rarely ends well.
Pace spend against forward occupancy
Advertising should intensify against soft dates and pull back on periods already filling. This requires connecting media decisions to the booking system, which most operators never do.
Own the branded search moment
Someone who found you on a platform and then searches your name directly is the cheapest direct booking you can get, as long as platforms bidding on your name don't intercept them first.
Services that move the needle for travel and hospitality brands.
We'll recommend the smallest set that unblocks your actual constraint, not the biggest bundle.
Travel & Hospitality results, in detail.
Full case studies with the numbers, the mistakes, and what we'd do differently.
Travel & Hospitality questions, answered straight.
Reduce, rarely eliminate. Platforms bring in real discovery you can't copy, and operators who drop listings entirely usually lose more bookings than they gain in margin. The goal is shifting the mix: capturing the people who would have booked anyway, at a better margin.
How each service works for travel and hospitality brands
Other industries we serve
Let's talk about your growth constraint.
A free 30-minute teardown built around how travel and hospitality brands actually grow. You keep the findings whether or not we work together.