The story of BenchDirect begins as far back as the choice of name for the company, The Hotels Network, which was a very deliberate decision. The goal was, and still is, to create a network of hotels and hotel brands that can learn from each other, share within the network, and be collectively more efficient and profitable as a result. The most obvious aspect to share is data, and the company has always incorporated its unique understanding of user behavior and hotel performance across the network into its products and approach to supporting client success.
The launch of BenchDirect is a natural progression of this network knowledge, providing hotels with a totally new and significantly more powerful benchmarking tool. Its competitive analytics focus purely on the direct channel, as “direct” is the company’s speciality - its reason to be. Thanks to BenchDirect, hoteliers can now unravel the building blocks of an effective direct booking strategy by comparing their hotel’s performance across more than 30 key metrics, including website and booking engine traffic, bookings and pickup, future demand, rates and disparities, user profile and behavior.
Juanjo Rodriguez, Founder of The Hotels Network, commented, “THN’s BenchDirect is the first of its kind. Traditional benchmarking products in hospitality only offer you a view of rates and occupancy. You see the end result, a static photo, but you don’t see how or why it happens. By analyzing the full user journey on your direct website, you’ll be able to spot where you are under or overperforming, what the levers are to improve your results, at a granular level. Instead of a fixed photo, you get a live video. Instead of a PDF, you get a full-blown online platform to perform your own analysis.”
The power of the network
With the launch of this new tool, THN is also redefining the concept of competitive sets. Instead of a purely competitive view, where the goal is to beat other hotels, it pivots to a learning paradigm; the objective is to learn together as an industry. With BenchDirect, hotels can of course create their own compset, but also compare their performance to the full destination, other hotels within their brand and even THN’s global network of hotels.
In an effort to support the industry’s recovery, the company wants to provide an opportunity for hoteliers around the world to leverage previously unavailable insights and empower smarter decision-making. Through THN’s network of preferred partners, including Sabre, D-Edge, Mirai, Roiback, Profitroom, HotelRez, DIRS21, Bookonlinenow, Busy Rooms and Hoteliers.com, these partners’ clients can enjoy immediate access to BenchDirect and make a significant difference to their direct channel performance.
Rodriguez concluded, “The power of the network is especially relevant in times of crisis, so let’s go ahead and learn from each other, make better decisions, and build back our industry."
BenchDirect is currently available; and completely free to use, forever. Hotels can sign up today on the THN website to request access to this revolutionary direct benchmarking product.
Tags: The Hotels Network, BenchDirect
