BookIt suppliers will soon find themselves squarely on the map with the announcement by Yellow™ that it has chosen BookIt to deliver live rates and booking functionality for the recently re-launched Yellow™ Maps site.

"We are delighted to have been selected", explains Ryan Baker, Director of BookIt Ltd. "The team at Yellow evaluated the different options available to them, and we were always confident that BookIt was the right solution."

Working with Auckland based Marker Studio, BookIt will provide live feeds of product rates and bookings availability within a new dedicated accommodation search feature on Yellow™ Maps. Visitors to the new website will be able to search, locate, compare and book from a range of available options.

Campbell Brown, Senior Product Manager for Yellow’s Digital Media team, will head up the project.

“The partnership with BookIt is a great fit for us”, explains Campbell. “Yellow Maps is a key component of our digital strategy and providing accommodation search is a natural progression for this site.  Along with the fundamentals like maps, driving directions, and business listings we needed the best possible solution for accommodation search.  With the BookIt solution we are able to directly access the data that we need and present this on a map specific to the user’s requirements. 

“BookIt’s software also gives us a full, out of the box, online booking engine that we can plug directly into the Yellow Maps website.“

If you are a tourism operator and have not yet signed up for a free BookIt account, we have a simple piece of advice for you, do it now! Any operator, large or small, whether accommodation, transport or activity, can register with BookIt and have their products advertised on a range of leading travel websites, soon to include Yellow™ Maps.

The new look Yellow™ Maps site launched on April 10th 2009 with another release that will include the BookIt function set for mid June 2009.

 

APPLICATIONS FOR THIS POSITION ARE NOW CLOSED

We are seeking an experienced, junior to intermediate .Net developer to join our Dunedin team. This is an excellent opportunity to work as part of one of New Zealand's most innovative IT companies in an exciting and fast growing Software as a Service (SaaS) application team.
 
This is a challenging role and you will need to be well organised and have a strong sense of initiative. You will be able to demonstrate the following abilities:
 
• ASP.Net, C#, .Net Web Services & SQL Server databases
• A well rounded knowledge of general web technologies such as HTML, CSS & XML
• Object oriented programming and multi-tier application development
• Excellent communication, both verbal and written
• Time management skills and an ability to work to deadlines and work unsupervised
 
Experience in the following areas is also an advantage:
 
• SQL Reporting Services
• Knowledge of the travel and tourism industry
• Production e-commerce and financial systems
• Requirements engineering and experience with the full SDLC
 
This is a perfect role for a first-rate software engineer who is looking for a chance to grow to the top of their field. You will be working in a development capacity and contributing to the development of high profile, high volume e-commerce systems for a range of clients including some of New Zealand's largest organisations.

If you know you've got what it takes, send your CV and covering letter to ryan@bookit.co.nz.
 
You must be eligible to work in NZ to apply for this role.

The team here at BookIt are stoked to have been named as a finalist in the IRL Emerging Company category of the PricewaterhouseCoopers New Zealand Hi-Tech Awards. The finalists were announced last night at simultaneous functions held in Auckland and Christchurch. Kirstin and I attended the Christchurch event and had an excellent night meeting a number of the sponsors, organisers, judges and fellow entrants.

The PwC NZ Hi-Tech Awards is dedicated to recognising excellence and success and is the only Awards programme to fully focus on New Zealand's software, electronics, biotechnology, telecommunications and creative technology industries. This year's awards saw a record number of entries, 160 in total.  Winners of the awards in each category will be announced at a black-tie, Gala event to be held in Christchurch on the 1st of May.

Until then, we'll keep on emerging!

The fourth annual Fraud Awareness Week was kicked off earlier this month with a speech by Hon Heather Roy, Minister Of Consumer Affairs at the Trade Me offices in Wellington.

Fraud Awareness Week is run in New Zealand by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs and the Commerce Commission as part of the Australasian Consumer Fraud Taskforce - a group of 19 Australian and New Zealand government agencies. The Taskforce works together to reduce the incidence and impact of frauds and scams and, each year, co-ordinates an information campaign for consumers timed to coincide with other global consumer fraud prevention activities.

In the world of online bookings, attempted fraud is an unfortunate inevitability. But don't worry, we've got your back. The team at BookIt have intercepted a number of fraud attempts over the past few years successfully preventing any losses on behalf of our customers.

The most common scam is for a fraudster to make a large booking using a stolen credit card. Shortly after making the booking, they will ask for a full refund to be made, either to another credit card, or via an international transfer service such as Western Union. It is very important to never process a refund to another credit card or via Western Union. All refunds should go through the BookIt system and will automatically be processed back to the original credit card.

If you receive a booking that looks suspicious, don't hesitate to contact us immediately. We have a number of measures in place to detect and avoid internet fraud and are here to help.

For more information visit http://www.consumeraffairs.govt.nz/scamwatch. SCAMwatch is an information service provided by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs.

With an ongoing focus to both market and sell New Zealand's ultimate urban destination online, Positively Wellington Tourism recently launched new booking capability on the WellingtonNZ.com website using the BookIt system. This allows visitors to easily compare a range of instantly bookable accommodation and activities, including up-to-the-minute rates and availability.
 
Jamie Crump, New Zealand Marketing Manager at Positively Wellington Tourism, explains: "In addition to providing a significantly improved booking experience for visitors, the BookIt system includes a user-friendly back-end for our tour, attraction and hotel partners to manage inventory and bookings. Using BookIt we are also able to offer prompt and flexible payment terms to our suppliers. The feedback so far has been excellent."
 
In the first few weeks since going live with BookIt, Positively Wellington Tourism has already seen an increase in booking numbers when compared to their previous booking function. This is set to grow with the addition of cross-selling and travel packages to the website.
 
"The setup for our website couldn't have been easier and the results speak for themselves. The admin tools in BookIt are so easy to use and we now have access to lots of reports to monitor results and use. We are already working on some exciting new ideas for the booking features on our website." explains Megan Leith, Online Development Coordinator at Positively Wellington Tourism.
 
An important feature for Positively Wellington Tourism was BookIt's integration with various channel managers. The booking functions - including calendars of live rates and availability - are all fully integrated into WellingtonNZ.com using web services. Within 10 minutes of launch, operators were receiving bookings and in the first few weeks 91% of all bookings had been confirmed instantly. We are looking forward to working with the team at Positively Wellington Tourism to build on this great start.

 

We would like to say a big "thank you" to all our clients and suppliers for your support this year. It has been a great year for us and we are looking forward to working with you in 2009.

Have a very merry Christmas and fantastic New Year!

There has been a lot of excellent advice published recently in terms of what tourism operators can be doing to fight the recession. In this Newsletter we look at how you can implement some of this advice via your BookIt account. All of the tips provided are things you can do for free and BookIt are just a phone call or email away to help you.

Read the rest of the November newsletter

Each week our BookIt reporting suite emails me a report containing recent customer feedback reviews that have been placed. These are reviews that have been submitted by travellers who have recently completed a booking and are invited to submit their rating and comments on the experience. On average we receieve a 20-30% response rate to the feedback forms each week.

Going through the report today I found myself engrossed and an hour later I had read every single one of them. Feedback after feedback was glowing, 5 out of 5 stars and filled with comments such as:

Excellent service and have already recommended
WOW! What an experience
We had a wonderful time!!
Worth every cent
Amazing!!! Spectacular!!!!
Absolutely fantastic
AMAZING
A definite highlight
Loved every minute
Amazing, wonderful, exciting and fun!

To all the operators out there, working hard to deliver these fantastic experiences, give yourselves a pat on the back. You deserve it!

Outcome one of The New Zealand Tourism Strategy 2015 is that New Zealand delivers a world-class visitor experience. From these traveller reviews I'm reading, I'd say we're well on track with this. I find myself asking, are we at BookIt doing our part in terms of other objectives in The New Zealand Tourism Strategy? Objectives such as, "The New Zealand tourism industry offers booking services that are easy to use". Again, I'll let the travellers do the talking on this one. Click here to read what they're saying!

The Hermitage Hotel are now using BookIt to take online bookings of their iconic Mt Cook property. The system has had an immediate and significant impact on the Hotel's online booking and occupancy rates. The BookIt system also allows the Hermitage to cross-sell other related and complementary products such as the Glacier Explorers and Sir Edmund Hillary Alpine Centre, all in one easy process for their customers to book online with real-time confirmation.

Michelle McCormack from the Hermitage Hotel had this to add:

"If you're considering BookIt as your booking engine - a word of warning, expect immediate results! We underestimated the power of this system and were slightly unprepared for the massive volume of bookings which occurred as a result. I'm highly impressed by their level of customisation, professionalism and eagerness to learn more and continue to develop their software. I predict an exciting future for Bookit customers as they continue to grow and build even more innovative capabilities. I especially want to thank Andrew and the rest of the BookIt team for helping us establish effective sales channels for all our products easily and minus the stress!".

Why not sign-up today and start getting immediate results from the BookIt system? Visit our supplier information page for more information.

What a fantastic winter!

The Ministry of Tourism's most recent Regional Visitor Monitor shows that, while growth in accommodation bookings online is remaining steady, there is a sharp and marked increase in the number of visitors booking attractions and activities online. It is great to see the many activity, tour and attraction operators that we work with, taking real advantage of the online booking space using BookIt.

Talk to the team today about cross-selling complementary products via your own website and earning commissions with zero administration.

As we see out the rest of this extended ski season and look forward to summer, make sure you have your rates and product info all up to date.

Read the rest of the September newsletter