How Group Kickbacks Can Lead To More Travel Bookings

As a hospitality business, how do you motivate customers to choose your business over the other hotels, restaurants, or tourist excursions in your area? One way to encourage more travel bookings is through group kickbacks. 

Group kickbacks reward customers for purchasing your services in bulk — such as for an entire group. Bulk buys present several benefits for your company, and the best way to encourage them is by offering discounts and customer rewards they actually want and use!

What are group kickbacks? 

Group kickbacks are customer rewards programs that incentivize people to buy in bulk. These programs offer rewards and other perks that make buying group tickets worthwhile for customers while building a connection to your brand and driving customer loyalty. 

For instance, you may structure your group kickback program as follows:

• Clients who book flight tickets as a group (6 or more, for example) get a dollar amount kickback such as a $200 Visa Gift Card.
• Customers who book a certain number of hotel rooms at a time get a reward (gift card to a restaurant, for example)
• A person who signs up a number of people for an event or activity is likewise rewarded.

You can tailor the incentives based on your specific customer base, but be sure that the rewards are motivating enough to encourage multiple bookings. 

Why should you incentivize group bookings? 

In a nutshell, group bookings give you the financial benefits of multiple customers with the marketing and distribution costs of a single booking. When a group of 10 books a block of rooms in your hotel, for example, you'll gain the same profitability as you would from 10 individuals booking rooms, but you'll benefit from simplified logistics, lower no-show rates, and less time spent checking in guests. 

Tips to enhance your kickback program

1. Provide better rewards for bigger groups: The larger the group booking, the lower your cost-per-lead. As a result, you should also be offering better rewards for larger bookings. 
   

   You can structure your group kickbacks in tiers that allow customers to earn bigger rewards for bigger bookings. For example, groups of two may get a $5 gift card, while groups of 10 may get a $50 gift card.
   
   Of course, make sure you place a cap on this tier-based system. Your restaurant may not be able to accommodate parties larger than 15, and at some point, large parties may create more work for your employees than individual bookings in the same quantities. 

2. Offer travel-related rewards: Discounts are the most straightforward incentives for group kickbacks, but if you're looking to motivate the broadest customer base, we recommend travel-related gift cards instead. Your customers can use these rewards to save money on other aspects of their vacations. 

   For instance, with Giftbit, you can send customers digital gift cards for the following brands:

   • Airbnb
   • Delta Airlines
   • American Airlines
   • Hotels.com

   Alternatively, you can let customers choose from a list of gift card options, including classic favorites like Starbucks and Visa. 

3. Target corporate groups: The summer months bring in copious vacationers to the hospitality industry, but you shouldn't overlook corporate groups during the summer as well as off-season. These groups typically travel on weekdays when hotel and airline rates are lower. Offering special group kickbacks during the week — or programs targeted directly at corporations — can encourage corporate groups to choose your hospitality business over others. 

Streamline group kickbacks with Giftbit

Implementing a digital-rewards-based kickback program doesn't need to be a headache. With Giftbit, you can automate digital rewards through your existing CRM platform — no coding experience required. Customers can receive gift card short links in their emails and redeem their codes for a range of gift cards. 

Sign up for free today to begin ramping up your group bookings.