It is almost impossible to pick up a trade journal or newspaper today and not read something about web site analytics. Google is giving it away free and experts are saying you can't run a web site without it. So what are analytics really all about? Let's begin by first looking at the need for analytics. For a web site to perform well and deliver an acceptable ROI, it has to be perfect or as near to perfect on many levels and in many areas before it can achieve business success. To do this you need to understand how the various components of your site are performing. And to do this you need access to metrics or analytics that will allow you to measure and benchmark your customer's experience and overall satisfaction with your web site. You need to understand what makes your web site visitor tick. READ MORE

The goal of customer segmentation is to better understand your web site visitor and to use that knowledge to enhance your web site's ROI. An effective segmentation strategy drives revenue growth by increasing your ability to meet your site visitor's demands. Segmentation's greatest impact is on the top line, increasing the number of site visitors and your look to book ratio and increasing the lifetime value and loyalty of your customer. This article examines customer segmentation in the online hospitality sector and how to structure your web site to maximize the value of your most important web site visitors. READ MORE

Studies that go as far back as 2000 confirm that shopping cart abandonment continues to be one of the most pressing problems for web site marketers. Reports from Andersen Consulting and Forrester Research both confirm shopping cart abandonment rates of 25%. Jupiter Communications reports a shopping cart abandonment rate of 27%. eMarketer reports 32%. NetEffect and Greenfield Online report a rate of 67%. Hospitality web site's "look to book" ratio is a benchmark that can be directly compared and related to shopping cart abandonment. There is no real difference between making buying something online and making an online reservation. Both require the use of a credit card and a commitment to make a purchase. READ MORE

Think about it - feedback from your web site is an unbelievable source of information that should be one of the most valuable weapons in your entire marketing arsenal - especially when it comes to building customer loyalty and enhancing customer satisfaction. I said should be, because web site owners must first be able to collect and interpret that feedback so they can turn it into action. Do you have a plan for collecting and responding to customer feedback? A note of caution - soliciting customer feedback without the proper tools and plan of action is even more dangerous than doing nothing at all. It's like asking a guest if they enjoyed their stay and leaving before they can respond. READ MORE

Whether you have $5,000, $50,000 or $500,000 to invest in creating a promotional web site, the one factor that remains the same is that most likely, the goal of the site is to support a promotion that increases your brand awareness and drives traffic to your main web site to increase online reservations. If you do undertake to create a promotional web site, it is imperative that you establish metrics to monitor, gauge and evaluate the success of that site. Without that vital information, you might as well be throwing your promotional dollars out the window because you will never really know whether your investment in the online promotional web site met, fell short or exceeded your objectives. Let's look at the kind of real time information you need to be able to capture and measure once you've created a promotional web site... READ MORE