The Importance of Simple Booking Software For Tour Guides

You have more important things to worry about than teaching yourself how to use a new system to manage your tour guiding or outfitting business. You have reservations to book, calendars to manage, and accounting to control. You’re likely also leading some of these tours yourself. This is why it’s imperative to have simple booking software. With it, you can set it up easily, learn quickly, and access it online, anywhere, at any time.

Here are four reasons why it’s important to have simple online booking software for your tour guiding business:

1. Simple booking software makes it easy for people to book online

The number one reason why you should have a straightforward booking software is to make it easy for people to book your offerings online. As we mentioned previously, consumers research online for tours before they book. It’s less pressure. They can research at their own pace and book on their own time.

Typically, when consumers are ready to book, they want to commit at that moment. If they cannot book on your site right away, they may navigate to a different company’s website that allows for easy online bookings. Also, offering direct and easy payment options guarantees your business is paid prior to the tour and the consumer does not have to go through several steps to submit their payment.

If you offer online booking, it needs to be intuitive. Buttons, calendars, payment options, and contact information should be clear and visible, and where a consumer assumes they will be.

2. It makes it simple to stay organized

Having an easy-to-use tour guide booking software online keeps tour operators organized. With information located in one system, your inventory and staff availability is always up-to-date. With an online system, everything is kept in-sync when you process bookings.

Your guides and staff can update their calendars themselves so you can quickly and easily see their daily, weekly, and monthly availability. With the right software, the system will schedule them accordingly.

When you’re organized, you don’t have to worry about overbooking tours. You’ll see reservations and availability in real-time. You also have the capability to control bookings from wherever you are at any given time. 

3. The software makes it easy for customers to learn and research

When you use online booking software, it makes it convenient for customers to read reviews, compare pricing, and learn more about your services without any pressure. When it’s easy to learn what tour guides and operators are best for them, they will have more confidence in booking and paying immediately.

With high competition in the travel and tourism industry, it’s important to provide a fast and secure way for potential customers to book a tour with your company. Differentiating yourself from those who do not have straightforward booking software will give you an advantage over competitors.

4. The booking software makes reserving readily available

Finally, the importance of easy tour guide online booking software means that the system is readily available. Tour operators who do not implement streamlined online booking face the difficulties of accepting reservations outside of business hours.

When your business is available online, 24/7, 365 days a year, you can accept online bookings throughout the night, while you’re leading tours, and any other times the office is closed. Making your reservations readily available through simple booking software also means you can accept more bookings in advance and last-minute bookings. This ensures you have enough staff and resources to accommodate the number of guests.

When your booking software is easy to use, it makes it easier for people to research and book online at any time and place and keeps you organized. This leads to more bookings and less stress of managing a tour guide company.

We’d love to help you streamline your booking process. Reach out to us here.