The way that hotels are booked is constantly changing as new technologies emerge. From the earliest days of hospitality, when people just walked through the door, via telegrams and the invention of the phone, the process of booking has been in constant flux.
Most recently, changes have been driven by the emergence of the internet.
Data released this week by hotel technology company TravelClick shows the current state of play. The chart below shows the booking channel for hotels in North American markets made by individual travellers and business travellers for advance bookings for the third quarter of 2016.
The chart suggests that a third of all hotel bookings in these markets are now on hotels' own websites, suggesting that hoteliers' efforts to prioritise brand.com are working.
Just over a fifth of bookings (21.6%) are made through online travel agents, such as Expedia and Booking.com.
John Hach, TravelClick's senior industry analyst, says, "The power of digital continues its influence in pretty much all aspects of life and the hospitality sector is no exception. For several quarters now, the OTA, brand.com and GDS channels have specifically continued to drive revenue for North American hoteliers and it's clear that the mobile and online trend will continue throughout the rest of 2016 and beyond."
Source: TravelClickMarket share is likely to change as we get closer to the point of travel, with the GDS more likely to be used closer to the date of travel. In Q2 2015, GDS represented 19.3% of market share and TravelClick says its share in Q2 2016 is up 6.0%.
TravelClick's North American Distribution Review is based on data for 25 major North American markets, comprising 231 million annual room nights and $37 billion in annual room revenue.