Venice Tours

Venice Tours offers local experiences in Venice and is one of Bókun’s key accounts. Their main goal when they contacted us was to increase the sales of their tours significantly. 

They took advantage of Bókun’s features to connect to a vast network of resellers and Online Travel Agencies (OTAs). In this case study, we review how their sales success was achieved through Bókun’s Channel Manager API. 

We will detail how with the help of Technology Partner, Datagest, the tour operator was able to connect via API without any cost to resources on their side. 

Key results:

• 400% revenue increase from January 2022 to January 2023 through the Bókun Marketplace
• Bókun’s Channel Manager allowed the operator to stay with their current system as one source of truth and add the distribution on top of that
• Connecting to 36 Online Travel Agencies (OTAs) and reseller partners
• 98% Year-over-Year (YoY) increase in bookings, comparing April 2022 and April 2023

The team had historically been very proactive in finding new sales channels. When they contacted us, their goal was to grow their distribution network, seeing significantly more distribution opportunities through Bókun‘s connectivity partners. 

They already had their own booking system acting as their source of truth, so they chose to connect to Bókun through an API (application programming interface), known as Bókun’s Channel Manager feature.

The tour company introduced Datagest to Bókun as their third-party technology partner, which helped connect them to Bókun via an existing API. Using a third-party provider like Datagest is a good option for companies that don’t have the resources to build the connection themselves.

Next, Venice Tours worked closely with Datagest and Bókun’s dedicated Account Manager to make connections to 36 OTAs and resellers through the Bókun Marketplace.

As the operator offers a diverse range of products, tours, and services, Datagest created a unique code and connection for each product. The unique codes allowed the company, a complex business with over 100 experiences, to offer several options for each tour or experience.

Through Bókun’s Marketplace, Venice Tours connected with resellers and OTAs, where any bookings made through the Bókun Marketplace get fed back through the API to their own system. 

Although the technical aspects were quite complex working with Bókun simplified their processes as they could see all their bookings in one place on their own system. 

The API connection with Bókun synced availability across all connected channels, which updated all experiences simultaneously and prevented double bookings.

Due to the complex nature of Venice Tours’ diverse range of product and technical requirements, Bókun has proven invaluable in facilitating these connections. 

“The development took a couple of months of work, but we saw the benefits from the connection almost right away. I don’t remember any difficulties because we received really good support from Bókun on the technical side. So it was easy, and when it was done, all our products were connected directly to the tour operators through the Bókun platform. Now when we get a new supplier, the first thing we request is that they must connect to Bókun.” – Giuseppe Mattiazzo, Venice Tours

They shared that it was really important for them to have a system that can connect everything and every kind of customer.

Working with Bókun, Venice Tours was able to effortlessly connect to top travel agents, synchronize bookings, avoid overbookings, and also offer several products and add-ons. 

“We made 36 connections with other tour operators. We connected with Expedia, Hellotickets, Klook, and several others, and they are working well as they are all key connections.” –Giuseppe Mattiazzo, Venice Tours 

If they had to do this alone, without the technical abilities, this would have been a challenge. Thanks to the help and assistance they received from Datagest and Bókun’s dedicated Account Manager, their revenue has increased fivefold and they can now focus on offering top tours and services that their clients love. 

Venice Tours shared that the Account Management team at Bókun knew the business well which was a key point for success. They were working with several different ResTech companies in 2022, but now they just work with Bókun. 

The main reason the tour company chose us as a long-term partner was the better service they received and an all-in-one platform that is more usable and user-friendly than any other solution they’ve tried.

Other Key Operational Improvements: 

• Bókun’s Channel Manager allowed them to stay with their current system as one source of truth and add the distribution on top of that
• Synced distribution networks make availability management simpler and prevent overbookings
• Can bundle products, and add upsell and cross-sells using unique codes that identify the ticket option

Although Bókun’s distribution network was a huge draw for the tour company, there were several other features they took advantage of, like building an easy and quick website for their tours. 

“We had the possibility to have different websites built in less than one hour using the Bókun web builder.” – Giuseppe Mattiazzo, Venice Tours 

In addition to the website, a widget that translated the website into several languages also helped boost sales. Since they wanted to grow the B2C market, offering a website in five languages helped scale their booking capacity as they could cater to several markets.

“Our idea was to have websites in several languages, and for us, the French, German and Spanish markets were very important. We also created the website blog and activated the Buy Now, Pay Later option. Bókun helped us cater to these European markets.” – Giuseppe Mattiazzo, Venice Tours

Bókun’s features, like calendar booking widgets for some products on their website and Google Things To Do, along with Channel Manager, availability checks, reservations, and bookings, including booking amendments and cancellations, they have been able to grow their business.

They wanted to use the website that was created with Bókun’s CMS as one of the main platforms, where they sold directly to their clients. Their goal was to use Bókun to increase the share of their B2C sales.

Website Building

The team used Bókun’s free domain and bookable website builder to get online direct bookings and integrate with Bókun.

Channel Manager

Connected their existing system to Bókun via Datagest’s API, allowing them to find more reselling opportunities and OTA connections. 

Calendar Booking Widgets 

With calendar booking widgets on their website, their customers can now book tours more easily. 

Multilingual Widgets

Clients from other markets can access the website and book tours in their language, opening up opportunities for the operator to make more bookings across several markets. 

Venice Tours learned about the impact of connecting with several suppliers while consolidating everything into one system. 

The Marketplace provided a huge opportunity and so they needed to better understand how they could leverage this opportunity. The tour company learned new ways to reach thousands of potential customers to sell their products to, for which the partnership with Bókun played a key role.

Venice Tours overcame the challenge of increasing the company’s sales, linking services to 36 OTAs and resellers. By taking advantage of Bókun’s Channel Manager, where they could set up an API with technical support from Datagest, they could achieve a 98% YoY growth, increase their revenue by 400%, and prevent overbookings. 

Bókun’s mission is to help your tour and activity business generate more bookings with less work. Start your free 14-day trial today to explore our software can help you save time and grow your business.