What to consider when moving to an alternative Park Management Solution
Switching your Park Management & Online Booking Provider
Moving to a new booking provider is now a very common occurrence, however there are many owners who want to make the move but are hesitant, believing the task as complicated and time-consuming.
Leona Mills, Marketing Manager at CampManager provides insight into the reasons why Parks are on the move, what is involved and what they need to consider before doing so.
4 reasons why Holiday Parks switch to an alternative Park Management provider
1. Ease of use
Your booking system must be simple and easy to use for your staff and online visitors and provide them with all the information they require to make a booking. Your system should provide users with availability and pricing for all your accommodation units or touring pitches from one view, allowing them to select the best one that suits their requirements. If your system does not do this your online customers will get frustrated while navigating through the booking process. Your online booking should be clearly laid out, self-explanatory and intuitive to use otherwise you run the risk of lower booking conversions. It is also important that you and your staff are confident in using the system, that it is quick and straightforward to enter telephone, email and on-spec bookings and that it is tailored to your Park’s individual needs, from the different pitch & unit properties to the different arrival dates and minimum stays.
2. Outdated technology
In a competitive market, it is important that you stay ahead of the game. Your booking system should be continually developing so it remains up to date with your needs and your customers’ needs. A superior solution will be technologically advanced, packed with rich features and flexible functionality. Your system should be able to optimise bookings by placing them on a back to back basis to reduce wasted nights and provide you with direct integrations to different 3rd party booking websites allowing you to maximise revenue opportunities.
3. Poor performance
Parks introduce a management and online booking system as they want to save time, reduce costs, generate more bookings and manage their workload more resourcefully. If your system isn’t contributing to the efficiency and profitability of your business, then you should be questioning why you aren’t getting the desired results. Automated booking confirmations, balance reminder emails and welcome emails with pdf attachments improve your customers’ booking experience and at the same time reduces staff and administration costs.
4. Inferior service and support
A great system is backed up with excellent support. The customer service should be fast, helpful, approachable and available. You should have confidence that the support team is highly skilled and knowledgeable with requests handled in a responsive way. Before making the move to another provider be sure to speak to some of their customers to hear about their experience, if they would recommend the provider and to learn about the provider’s reputation in the industry.
What to consider when making the move
Many parks put up with their current solution because they don’t know what is involved in the migration process. The prospect of moving from one system to another can be daunting but it is actually relatively straightforward.
When is the best time to make the switch?
The end of season is a great time to implement an alternative system as bookings are quieter, Parks may close and it is a time when you have less future bookings in your system. That means now is the time to start looking at alternative providers so everything is in place for an efficient turnaround.
Will there be any downtime during the move?
When you are ready to go live your booking page will simply point to your new system, so the switch is instant and there is no risk of downtime.
What will happen with customer data?
Your customer data will be securely imported across to your new system with any related notes attached to a customer entry, for example, if a particular customer likes to book a certain pitch. No manual effort is required on your part to do this.
Considering moving to an alternative booking system? Talk to CampManager. Visit: www.campmanager.com Email:hello@campmanager.com Phone: 02081 331 005
Share This Post On Social Media:
