Por Chema Herrero

One of the tools with the greatest growth in recent years in the tourism sector has undoubtedly been the Channel Manager. A fundamental tool to guarantee a quick and efficient distribution of prices and inventory.

This tool has evolved from models that offered a single channel, to two-way models that guarantee not only the possibility of integrating prices in the channels with which a hotel works but also being able to integrate sales directly into the PMS.

Furthermore, many of them include a more or less powerful list of business rules that allow the hotel to establish differentiated distribution strategies.

It is precisely because of the importance that we mentioned that the configuration of the product lines that we create and the links that we establish between them must be taken very seriously. There are real “suicides” in the configurations of a hotel’s channel manager that are very important to solve.

For this reason, at Bedsrevenue we recommend that when you change or redefine the products in your channel manager, you do so by taking certain measures:

• Create an initial diagram on paper (product tree) that gives you a complete view of what you will have to map.
• Focus on the master rooms as a base of operations from which to establish supplements or discounts that facilitate inventory and price changes.
• Determine if you should have all the products in each channel and, if applicable, limit them from the first mapping.
• Avoid creating mapped, undeleted rooms that can “strangely activate”
• Manage the possibility of setting business rules that limit the availability of the last LRA rooms

Although it may seem that it is not important, the truth is that a poor configuration of the channel requires a lot of time to make price changes or restrictions, when we execute a Revenue Management strategy with dynamic rates.

Minimizing these times and gaining control and efficiency is possible with good planning of connections, activities and supplements. When we do not know how to establish it, it is advisable to put ourselves in the hands of a consulting firm that can help us with its initial configuration.