3rd Party Distribution

1. When should a hotel use 3rd party distribution?


With the continuous growth of ecommerce 3rd party distribution allows managing rates, avaibility, cut MLOS restrictions, etc from one screen for all distributors simultaneously. It interfaces to over 110 different 3rd party websites and tour operators.

- The hotellers should use to increase the e-commerce business and save time for market analysis, strategy, and sales coordination. They have come to the decision as it has really been a strong demand made by the Revenue Management Team.

2. What resellers are available?
Resellers are these organizations, also known within some industries as intermediaries, distributors or dealers, generally purchase or take ownership of products from the marketing company with the intention of selling to others. If a marketer utilizes multiple resellers within its distribution channel strategy the collection of resellers is termed a reseller network. These organizations can be classified into several sub-categories including:
· Retailers – Organizations that sell products directly to final consumers.
· Wholesalers – Organizations that purchase products from suppliers, such as manufacturers or other wholesalers, and in turn sell these to other resellers, such as retailers or other wholesalers.
· Industrial Distributors – Firms that work mainly in the business-to-business market selling products obtained from industrial suppliers

RateTiger, by eRevMax technologies, is a Revenue and Distribution Management solution, which is servicing over 1200 hotels worldwide. RTAllocator, the extranet of extranets, is a state of the art channel management system. RTShopper is a real-time rate shopping tool, allowing hotels to see what prices competition is selling at across a wide selection of distributions channels like IDS’s and GDS. With RateTiger you save time and make money on your ecommerce distribution strategies.

Somes examples of others resellers:

- Microsoft Navision ERP -Business ERP Software
- Akamai Business Performance Management Services
- TTS - Time and Attendance Management

3. How to select the right channels:

When choosing a distribution channel a marketer must determine what value a channel member adds to the firm’s products. Product Decisions, customers assess a product’s value by looking at many factors including those that surround the product (augmented product). Several surrounding features can be directly influenced by channel members, such as customer service, delivery, and availability. Consequently, for the marketer selecting a channel partner involves a value analysis in the same way customers make purchase decisions. That is, the marketer must assess the benefits received from utilizing a channel partner versus the cost incurred for using the services.

4. How does a hotelier manage all this?
In order to achieve this goal, executives should evaluate three approaches: 1) expand the product line; 2) build new distribution channels; or 3) optimize the current distribution channels. There has been a significant focus on "speed to market" programs to reduce the cycle time in bringing new products to market, but more attention should be paid to building new distribution channels and optimizing existing channels. The goal of this discussion is to assist you in evaluating your organization's performance against the four principal challenges of distribution management affecting carriers today:
1. The ability to attract and retain good producers.
2. Determining the best strategy for distribution.
3. Reducing the cost of distribution.
4. Channel rationalization.