Meritus Hotels & Resorts Gets Results Using SynXis

Meritus Hotels & Resorts has seen an increase in online bookings of over 30 percent since switching to SynXis and its Guest Connect as its online merchandising partner, Sabre reports. The Singapore-based group, comprising of six luxury properties across Asia Pacific, is using SynXis’ Guest Connect booking engine to power its website and increase conversion rates from online shoppers. SynXis, a Sabre Holdings company, provides distribution and Internet marketing services and technology for hotels around the world.

Meritus needed a booking engine that could help it increase its online business. Kelvin Seah, vice president of sales and marketing for Meritus Hotels & Resorts commented, “We are very focused on driving visitors to our website so we had to be sure that our booking engine could convert shoppers to guests. Guest Connect had a proven track record of high conversions and the local support that SynXis provides in Asia Pacific has given us a real advantage. We are very pleased with the early success we have seen since switching and very encouraged by the increase in bookings,” said Kelvin Seah, vice president of sales and marketing for Meritus Hotels & Resorts.

The Guest Connect booking engine, launched last year, includes many easy-to-use features that enable direct to the consumer merchandising including: promotional pricing, dynamic packaging, an image gallery, flexible shopping paths, filtered searches and multiple language and currency functionality. Guest Connect is available in 25 languages including Japanese, Chinese and Korean, Sabre said.

“Guest Connect enables us to deploy our ‘Best Rate’ revenue strategy quickly and effectively,” said William Chua, vice president, revenue management and distribution for Meritus Hotels & Resorts. “We now have the ability to easily upsell guests to different room types or to a package rate; both add incremental revenue per booking. It’s also important for us to cross-promote our properties and Guest Connect gives us the tools to do that.”

Asia Pacific continues to be the fastest growing region for SynXis – increasing its business there by over 500 percent from 2007 to 2008. To accommodate this growth SynXis has expanded its presence in the area by increasing its sales, account management and support teams and has opened offices in Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore. In 2009, SynXis plans to establish a direct presence in Australia and India.

Visit www.synxis.com or www.sabre-holdings.com.