Latest News

Do read this page in conjunction with our about us page.

Our new blueprint for the future:

1. to provide better, more reliable and informative review information to assist travel decisions by a holistic approach.
   
2. to widen the net of HRS beyond a traditional review based only service and structure, to

• On the consumer side - make it possible to make travel decisions and book our member hotels (both hotel room and package based products) on line at one visit
• On the hotelier side – allow the hotelier to derive direct revenues from the site, thereby adding value to their membership – and also allowing them wider distribution of data and hence promotional opportunities on the site – e.g. short breaks, themed break and seasonal promotional opportunities &c

In other words to put the reviews into a travel decision making context – and indeed to allow site visitors to start – and complete – a travel decision – without leaving the site. Hence our new motto to our users – ‘browse, enjoy, decide – AND BOOK WITH CONFIDENCE’.

Propelling HRS into the ‘on line travel agent’ arena where we need to be to grow and prosper, and to guarantee real business benefits and incremental revenues for our members. And with many key advantages over the classic internet intermediary/OTA model so prevalent and increasingly used these days (such as lateRooms, Booking.com), because:

• We are dedicated only to the Scottish travel experience, and promoting the very best of Scottish hotel and travel experiences
• We are not reliant on commission cheques for survival and development
• We have access to, and links to huge destination knowledge, and hotel products (e.g. packages and breaks) which the big monolith OTA’s haven’t the systems or the flexibility to deliver.
• We can profile and present your property correctly – you are not on a fragmented list of hotels of all shapes and sizes
• We add reliable value to sensible travel decisions through our open approach to hotel reviews
• We allow you to have a say at every stage of the process
• You are clear about your channel management, as you know where your product is distributed, and that it is not at the mercy of affiliate marketers.

How we’ll do this:

We propose to publish in future, for all hotel members’ site entries

• Our ‘professional review’ – as before
• Travellers’ reviews, which we will encourage on line – and which we will moderate where appropriate – publishing will be subject to verification that the traveller has stayed at the property
• ‘Hotelier review’ – we will ask all members –in a few sentences, to sum up their proposition in their own words – the strengths, benefits (even weaknesses – or ‘what you are not’) of the hotel as they see it
• All nationally recognised QA awards

Then, on profiling and marketing/promotion – three main thrusts

• to promote the visibility and awareness of the HRS site and its value to relevant travel audiences, we are immediately engaging in a number of initiatives, including SEO, email marketing campaigns, adwords campaigns as needed, strengthening existing and building new on and off line relationships, building links popularity, convergence with the Destination Scotland network, performance tracking, and social media initiatives.
• in one step, more than double the specialised traffic in front of our hotel membership by converging the HRS and Destination Scotland network models, with relevant links and huge information sharing, especially of destination and consumer market segmentation data
• increasing and enhancing the user experience and travel decision process – and the synergy between the networks, by introducing highly accessible market segmentation within the HRS site itself, by building easily accessible dedicated pages for e.g. spa hotels and breaks, romantic hotels and breaks, city hotel breaks, seasonal breaks, family and pet friendly etc

Then – we will monetise the whole network, in a number of ways:

• We’ll offer pay for key placement and banner ad opportunities on all pages for members choosing to increase their exposure/visibility/bookability
• We’ll introduce, tastefully and unobtrusively, Google Adsense throughout the site to grow development resource which will ultimately benefit you, the members.
• We will endeavour, over a period of time, to make all member hotels on line bookable from the site. We’ll accelerate this immediately by creating a link to Booking.com to those who are currently represented on that channel. Do note that this is a direct solution per hotel – we are not using any white label or affiliate solutions which might risk promoting hotels with are not HRS members.

So - exciting times ahead. And especially in the current recession, we are more determined than ever to demonstrate a clear HRS added value proposition to members.

• Read our 12 point plan for the new development programme for HotelReview Scotland