Google Enhances Hotel Search Services

Travelers-to-be seeking accommodation choices, complete with availability, prices, and reviews, can now rely on Google to bring in the much wanted results after the company announced this week that it had revamped its “hotel finder”.

In the meantime, hoteliers across the globe can now generate more qualified leads thanks to a broader availability for the “Google Hotel Ads Commission” program, an expansion of the “Book on Google” feature to more partners, and the inclusion of more amenity information within Google search.

Under the Google Hotel Ads program, smaller chains and independent hotels are charged on the industry-standard commission basis rather than cost-per-click.

As for the company’s popular “Book on Google”, initially catering to mobile device holders, now they can also book hotel rooms directly from their desktop and tablet devices and it also makes it easier for more hotels to participate, with the hotel partner “owning” the guest relationship, including sending the confirmation email, answering post-booking questions, and handling changes to the reservation or cancellations.

Book on Google is available to all Hotel Ads partners and works for users in the US, who can find information like availability, prices, and reviews right in the search results and in Google Maps.

The company said that this month, they had added information about hotel amenities — everything from free WiFi availability, free breakfast, parking availability, a pool, or a business center — for US locations and we’re aiming to add this information for 24 more countries through next year.