Domaine Château-Bromont increases direct bookings and improves customer experience
Domaine Château-Bromont has teamed up with HOTELUS Digital for its digital transformation, aimed at optimizing operations and enriching the customer experience. This partnership has resulted in the integration of advanced technologies, significantly improving direct bookings and guest satisfaction. Discover the many impacts of this modernization on the hotel’s efficiency and ability to innovate in hospitality and stay management.
Domaine Château-Bromont
Located in the Eastern Townships, Domaine Château-Bromont is renowned for its elegance, comfort and exceptional location close to numerous attractions. With 166 rooms and suites, the hotel welcomes vacationers and business travelers alike. Domaine Château-Bromont also offers 40 spacious condos and operates a prestigious golf course as well as a gourmet restaurant and bar. The property is part of the Ôrigine hotels network.
Despite its undeniable charm and high-quality customer service, the hotel was facing operational challenges due to outdated systems, impacting the efficiency of its operations and the guest experience.
The Challenge
Prior to its digital transformation, Domaine Château-Bromont used two different property management systems (PMS) for its condos and hotel. What’s more, these systems were archaic and communicated poorly with each other, resulting in a number of issues such as :
- Inefficient pre-authorization process.
- Duplicate data entry.
- Complicated package management.
- Numerous unnecessary manual tasks.
- Inability to offer group rates online. Every member of a group wishing to obtain the group rate had to book over the phone.
In short, all these issues meant a considerable loss of time for the reception and reservations teams. Greeting visitors could be time-consuming, and the logistics of receiving groups were complex. The numerous manual tasks made the training process for new employees complicated and increased the likelihood of errors.
The solution: an ecosystem of integrated applications
Aware of the need for modernization, Domaine Château-Bromont turned to HOTELUS Digital to carry out a complete diagnostic to identify precisely the hotel’s needs and select the most appropriate technological solutions. With the support of HOTELUS Digital, several software applications were implemented and configured to optimize the hotel’s operations.
For the new PMS, Oracle’s OPERA Cloud was selected, enabling efficient centralization of hotel operations and seamless integration with other key applications. This cloud-integrated system is more robust than the previous one, and requires less maintenance. A new customized booking engine (P3 Hotel Software) has been implemented to boost direct bookings and facilitate the sale of numerous packages.
At the same time, the adoption of LoungeUp CRM has made it possible to automate and improve guests communications, as well as gaining a better understanding of their behavior. LoungeUp has also made it possible to add up-sell and cross-sell options, with the aim of increasing revenue per stay. A new application for managing groups and events, Oracle’s OSEM module, has also been integrated. This solution will be used to host the PGA Golf tournament in summer 2024.
Finally, the Duetto revenue management system was integrated to maximize occupancy and average daily rate (ADR) by automating the pricing strategy. Previously, revenue management was done manually with Excel macros and a lot of price changes, which was a much less agile solution.
Impressive Results
This digital transformation has led to significant improvements:
- Significant increase in direct bookings thanks to the new booking engine.
- The number of telephone calls for reservations has been reduced by 20%.
- The abandonment rate for telephone reservations has also been halved.
- Impressive reduction in reception tasks and smoother check-in/check-out processes.
- Improved guest service and experience.
- Easier group management, with group members able to book online at preferential rates.
- Increased sales team efficiency.
- Automated operational processes, reducing manual errors and improving overall efficiency.
- Increased average daily rate (ADR) and occupancy rate.
Success Factors
When asked how they managed to integrate many new software and processes in less than a year, Julien Roy Pilote, Director of Rooms at Domaine Château-Bromont, shares the following advice:
- The importance of being well surrounded: For a hotelier, it’s not always easy to keep up with technological developments, to understand which functionalities are needed and to differentiate between the various softwares available. That’s why it’s crucial to get support of software experts such as HOTELUS Digital.
- Gain momentum: Although it may seem daunting, there are advantages of adopting several new systems simultaneously, rather than trying to adjust and repair different programs gradually.
- Have a clear vision: Clearly understanding your objectives and remembering the reasons for your actions makes it easier to involve employees in the project and stay focused during difficult times.
“Since our digital transformation, we have the time to take the time with each guest and deliver an experience beyond their expectations.”
Julien Roy Pilote, Director of Rooms
Domaine Château-Bromont
The future and growth potential
Thanks to this transformation, Domaine Château-Bromont now has a solid base to integrate new technologies and continually improve the guest experience. One of the benefits of cloud-based solutions is that they are constantly updated with new functionalities without impacting operations.
The future looks bright, with opportunities to further exploiting business intelligence, artificial intelligence and personalized customer stays. Thanks to new systems, it will be possible to implement autonomous arrivals or digital keys on mobile devices.
“With new technologies, guest expectations are rising, and it’s imperative to constantly optimize their experiences in order to stay competitive.”
Julien Roy Pilote, Director of Rooms
Domaine Château-Bromont
In Conclusion
Domaine Château-Bromont’s digital transformation is a perfect example of how the adoption of advanced technological solutions can revolutionize the guest experience while optimizing internal operations. HOTELUS Digital is always available to accompany other properties in their own digital transformation journey to innovate and stay ahead of hotel industry trends!