Launch: Best Converting Design for Hotel Upselling So Far

From the Oaky blog:

How have you been keeping busy during the COVID-19 lockdown?

Here at Oaky, it’s been all hands on deck to further improve our product and increase our current average ROI of 13.8. Why? Because our goal is to make you the upselling rockstar you were meant to be, so you can make the most of market recovery when the time comes.

Keep reading to find out what we’ve been up to and why it’s amazing news for you!

“The art of upselling can be described as being relevant without being intrusive. It’s about finding the perfect combination of delivery and timing. In this exciting release, we’ve analyzed millions of upsell transactions and are proud to unveil our best-converting guest-facing design yet. By adding curated Covid-related offers that are highly relevant in these times, we hope to give our customers a well-deserved boost in average revenue per guest as they reopen.”

Erik Tengen, Co-Founder of Oaky.

Data-driven redesign to increase hotel sales

Just like the world’s best (actual) rockstars keep working on their songs and tweak their performance until it’s just right, our team is constantly working on improving Oaky, so your results keep getting better. This drive to continuously do better led us to redesign Oaky’s interface several months back. After weeks of hard work, the new version went live.

“We were excited to launch our first redesign and will keep updating the interface to further optimise conversion rates for upgrades and deals because this is crucial for our clients, especially in the aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis.”

Victor Lee, Front-End Developer at Oaky

After a few more weeks of intensive data collection, analysis and testing, the team found out which tweaks to make, so your upsells reach a maximized conversion rate.

Now, the new design is ready to go.

Here’s what’s new, different and better about it.

What’s new in the latest version of Oaky?

The goal of redesigning Oaky was to make the platform more user-friendly and increase the deal and upsell conversion rate of 10.8%.

Extensive A/B testing revealed which changes were necessary to achieve this.

Here’s what we did to improve conversions and increase hotel sales:

1. In our first redesign, the upgrades were positioned below the recommended offers which meant many guests overlooked them or simply didn’t scroll down far enough to see them. To make the upgrade offers easier to find and increase conversions, they now have their own tab.
   
   
2. While horizontal scrolling through a set of offers made it easier to display all three categories, this layout made it harder for guests to find and select a deal or upgrade they liked. By implementing three tabs for featured offers, upgrades and deals, offers can be neatly grouped and are easier for guests to browse by scrolling vertically.
   
   
3. While the first redesign looked great for desktop users, the mobile interface needed a few more tweaks for the best user experience.

“It was great to see the product team’s dedication to increasing the conversion rate and creating an attractive new design at the same time.”

Natasha Juneja, Product Owner at Oaky

What are the benefits of Oaky’s new design?

Of course, all of these changes were made with you in mind, so let’s look at how you’ll benefit from them.

1. Increased conversion rate of room upgrades – sell more room upgrades without doing more work
2. ‘Recommended’ section displayed in a separate tab – show recommended deals for the guest
3. Upgraded mobile-friendly user interface – convert smartphone users with an improved layout and flow
4. Improved guest experience – stay true to your brand with a customisable, attractive interface that can be tailored to your style

Tests have shown that these changes have a positive impact on upsell and deal conversion rates. However, due to the current situation, collecting enough data to see the redesign’s impact across the board will take some more time.

How to further improve your deal and upsell conversion

Of course, there are plenty of things you can do to increase your conversion rates as well. Follow the steps below and you’ll be on your way to becoming an upselling rockstar.

• Create offers that sell
  Get creative and offer deals your guests can’t help but go for. Here are some questions to get you going:
  – What do your guests love/need/want?
  – What is a unique service you have at your hotel?
  – How could you make your guests’ stay more fun/easy/enjoyable?
  – Head over to this article for more tips on creating the ultimate upselling offers.
• Implement segmentation
  Send the right offer to the right guest to sell more upgrades and deals. The more targeted your offers are, the better they will perform. Learn more about using Oaky to segment and target your guests here.
• Analyse & optimise
  Leverage the data on the Oaky dashboard to see how your deals are doing. That way you can remove the ones that aren’t converting and tweak the ones you want to push by updating the photos, descriptions and call to action buttons.

When you bring these tips together and use a powerful upselling platform, creating a customised experience and maximising your guest spend becomes almost effortless.

Talk about the ideal way to get back on your feet as demand slowly returns post-COVID-19…

Source: Launch: Best Converting Design for Hotel Upselling So Far