"Managing a smaller number of solutions can streamline operations ... and your bottom line will thank you.”

If direct bookings are so beneficial, why haven’t all independents shifted more business to their own channels? The truth is, it’s easier said than done. Many independent hotels struggle with limited budgets, know-how, and fragmented technology stacks that make it hard to execute a direct strategy. In my research, a recurring theme was the lack of understanding of the total cost of ownership (TCO) when it comes to hotel tech. Hoteliers might add one system for online bookings, another for the property management system, another for channel management, etc., and end up with hundreds of one-way integrations that barely talk to each other. The result is a Frankenstein’s monster of tech: siloed data, manual processes, and lots of inefficiency.

Consider a typical small hotel setup from a few years ago: a basic PMS to handle check-ins and reservations, plus maybe a separate booking engine widget on the website (from a different vendor), an OTA channel manager to sync inventory, perhaps a standalone POS system for the restaurant, and various other tools (one for guest messaging, one for revenue management, etc.). Each of these might be the cheapest or most convenient in its category, but together, they form a disjointed patchwork. Staff have to learn multiple interfaces and do duplicate data entry. Integrations (if they exist) break frequently. It’s easy to see how this undermines any direct booking initiative: for example, if your website booking engine isn’t seamlessly integrated with the PMS and channel manager, you risk overbookings or rate inconsistencies, creating a poor guest experience and more work for your team.

The operational friction caused by a fragmented tech stack has real costs. Hoteliers report it in terms of time and labor: staff spending hours manually reconciling systems or fixing errors, longer training times for new employees on complex systems, and even lost revenue from missed opportunities (e.g., not reacting to a sudden pickup in demand because data lives in five different systems). In fact, a recent lodging tech study found the #1 technology challenge for hotels is the difficulty of integrating new tech with existing legacy systems, cited by 69% of respondents. These integration woes lead directly to data silos and suboptimal guest experiences. Another 54% pointed to a shortage of IT expertise on staff as a significant challenge, which often means small hotels don’t have the in-house know-how to wrangle complex systems. And tellingly, 43% said that demonstrating ROI on tech investments was a challenge, possibly because when systems are siloed, it’s hard to track the full benefits. All this can make a hotel owner hesitant to invest in new technology (“Will it really pay off? Who will manage it? Maybe we’re fine as is.”).

This is where all-in-one platforms and integrated solutions come into play. The new generation of hospitality tech is increasingly focused on delivering a unified, cloud-based solution that covers most (if not all) of a hotel’s needs under one roof, from PMS and CRS (central reservations) to the booking engine, channel management, guest CRM, and even upselling tools. The considerable promise here is simplicity and consistency: one login, one database, and a bunch of modules that talk natively to each other. For independent hotels, moving to an all-in-one PMS platform can be transformative. It “cuts down the number of tech partnerships to navigate and technical integrations to manage,” allowing a small hotel team to focus on guests rather than IT troubleshooting.

Advantages of a unified tech stack: In a contributed piece on Hotel Business, Warren Dehan described how consolidating operations onto an all-in-one PMS improves efficiency across all departments and reduces the headaches of juggling multiple systems. Based on his experience, independent hotels that adopted an integrated system saw benefits like:

• Lower training and onboarding time: Staff learn one interface, so cross-training between, say, front desk and reservations or housekeeping becomes easier. Employees feel more confident and make fewer mistakes when they don’t have to master five different software tools that don’t share data.
• Fewer errors and data inconsistencies: When everything from online bookings to in-house charges to guest profiles lives in one system, there’s a single source of truth. You avoid scenarios of “Guest changed their date on the website, but the PMS didn’t update,” or “The OTA reservation didn’t sync with the CRM.” Fewer integration points mean fewer failure points. Dehan notes that using fewer integrations and systems lets independents “focus their attention away from technology and processes and dedicate themselves fully to the hotel experience.”
• Cost Savings: While an all-in-one platform might have a higher upfront cost than a patchwork of cheap tools, it often saves money in the long run. One reason is the reduction of multiple vendor fees, why pay three or four different subscription fees (PMS, booking engine, channel manager, etc.) when one solution could cover all for a single cost? Moreover, “consolidating technology vendors can lead to substantial cost savings” on maintenance and integration overhead. Think of the expense of custom interfaces or the downtime when an OTA connection fails; those are hidden costs of a fragmented stack. A unified platform generally has seamless internal integrations that are more reliable, resulting in lower IT costs and less revenue lost to system outages. As a bonus, having a consolidated stack can improve your bargaining power with the vendor on pricing (since you’re using more of their product suite).
• Improved data and analytics: Integrated platforms give you all your data in one place, enabling better reporting and insights. You can easily see the whole guest journey, from booking source to on-property spend to post-stay feedback, and make data-driven decisions. For example, you might discover that guests who book the “Romance Package” on your website have a higher spa spend; you could then tailor more offers to them. Or you might see that a specific OTA produces very low ancillary spend guests, supporting a decision to allocate fewer rooms to that channel. With siloed systems, such analysis either doesn’t happen or takes a lot of manual effort to export and combine spreadsheets. A unified system provides real-time dashboards across operations, marketing, and finances, which is crucial for independent hotels that can’t afford dedicated analysts. It creates a “single source of truth” for critical metrics.
• Streamlined workflows: When your PMS, booking engine, and other tools are part of one suite, tasks that used to require multiple steps become automated or much simpler. For instance, if a guest books directly on your website, an all-in-one system can instantly create the reservation in the PMS, reduce the inventory on OTAs, send a confirmation email, and update the housekeeping schedule without any staff intervention. Similarly, if you adjust a room rate or create a new package, you do it once, and it updates everywhere. This streamlining not only saves time but also means your team isn’t spending their day acting as human APIs between systems. As one revenue manager put it, piecing together a fragmented stack is like a monster “refusing to play nicely with others,” causing data inaccuracies and missed revenue opportunities. A well-integrated platform avoids those pitfalls and “leads to more efficient, less error-prone workflows.”
• Better guest experience: Ultimately, the guest sees the benefits too. With an integrated system, the booking process is smoother (no glitches or redirects that could cause drop-offs), and the hotel staff is better informed. Imagine a guest books a room plus spa appointment on your website, with a unified solution, the front desk, spa, and housekeeping all see that information clearly in one system. The guest is less likely to face hiccups like “sorry we didn’t know you booked the spa” or “your upgrade wasn’t communicated to housekeeping.” Moreover, consolidating guest profiles from various touchpoints (booking, check-in, loyalty program, etc.) gives you a richer view of the guest. So your team can recognize a returning guest and personalize their stay (which impresses the guest and encourages direct booking next time). As Dehan noted, sharing guest data across departments is much easier when each tool, from reservations to loyalty, is accessible through one platform. The staff spends less time fighting software and more time with guests, which is the essence of hospitality.

Real-world example: I found a compelling case study from Sweden that illustrates these benefits in action. Dömle Herrgård, a historic luxury estate hotel in Sweden, used to rely on “multiple disconnected systems” that created inefficiencies and slowed operations. They made a switch to an integrated tech stack: adopting VisBook as an all-in-one cloud PMS and BookVisit as their direct booking platform (booking engine + channel manager). The results were dramatic. With everything in one system, the hotel streamlined staff workflows and focused on selling experiences directly to guests. They decided to limit OTA sales to only basic room & breakfast rates, while offering their attractive spa, golf, and weekend packages exclusively on their website. This strategic move paid off big time; within a year, direct bookings were ~12 times higher than OTA bookings for this property! Even the following year, with some normalization, direct bookings remained over 9 times higher than OTA bookings.

The revenue impact is clear: by driving bookings to their own site, Dömle Herrgård not only saved on commissions but was able to sell more personalized packages and upsells (which guests could not get via OTAs). A quote from their reception manager says it all: “If you look at last year’s numbers... The long bars on the report? Those are our direct bookings. The short ones? Those are from OTAs. Our website brings in the most.” In other words, they flipped the script, from OTA-dominated to direct-dominated, by using tech that let them manage offers and inventory intelligently. Moreover, the integrated PMS meant that their whole operation, from reception to restaurant to the adjacent golf course partnership, ran on one platform, reducing workload and errors for staff. This case underscores that with the right tools and strategy, independents can dramatically change their channel mix and profitability.

Booking channel mix for a typical independent hotel vs. one with an optimized direct-booking strategy. In many small hotels, OTA bookings vastly outweigh direct bookings. But with investment in modern tech and marketing, some independents have flipped this ratio, achieving 50–60% or more of bookings direct.

The Swedish example isn’t an isolated incident. A recent Europe-wide analysis of 3.9 million reservations (across 2,000+ independent hotels using a cloud PMS) found that direct bookings now account for over 50% of hotel reservations on average in Europe. In the UK, independents saw direct channel share jump to 60% (from 48% a year prior) according to this 2024 study. Travelers are increasingly opting to book direct when they perceive they’ll get a better rate or a more personalized experience. However, and this is important, that shift happened because those hotels invested in the tools and tactics to capture direct business: they had commission-free booking engines, metasearch connectivity, and conversion-optimized websites to attract and convert guests. In other words, guests will book direct if you give them a reason and make it easy. Simply wishing for more direct bookings, without investing in technology and marketing, is not going to move the needle.

This brings us back to the idea of TCO and ROI for technology. Yes, upgrading to a modern all-in-one platform or enhancing your direct booking capabilities costs money (implementation fees, subscription costs, staff training time, etc.). Independent owners need to evaluate these costs carefully, but crucially, view them as an investment, not just an expense. The return comes in multiple forms: lower distribution costs (less commission), higher revenue (upsells, packages, better pricing), and lower operational costs (saving staff hours, potentially even reducing headcount needs or allowing you to repurpose staff into guest-facing roles). Not to mention the less tangible returns of improved guest satisfaction and loyalty, which translate to repeat business and positive word-of-mouth.

One hospitality CFO analogy I’ve heard is that paying OTA commissions is like paying interest on a loan; it’s money out the door every month, whereas investing in your own tech and direct channel is like paying down a mortgage, an upfront cost that builds equity (your customer base and brand) and pays dividends long term. To illustrate ROI, consider this simplified scenario: If your hotel grosses $1 million a year in room revenue and currently 50% comes via OTAs at ~20% commission, you’re losing about $100,000 in commission fees. What could you do with that $100k? Perhaps you spend $30k on a new all-in-one tech stack and another $20k on digital marketing campaigns. If those tools help you swing an extra 20% of bookings to direct (an achievable target, according to industry data), you might save $40k in commissions in the first year alone. Plus, gain all the upsell and loyalty benefits on those additional direct guests. The business case tends to get stronger over time – in years 2 and 3, the tech costs might stabilize or even drop (some costs are one-time), yet the direct share gains and cost savings continue to accrue. This is why 78% of hoteliers polled by one vendor planned to increase their tech investment, seeing it as key to competing in the digital marketplace.

To summarize this: fragmented, outdated tech is a hidden drag on independent hotels, contributing to higher TCO in the form of inefficiency and missed revenue. On the flip side, integrated, modern tech platforms can reduce total costs and boost ROI by simplifying operations and empowering your direct booking strategy. Or as one article neatly put it, “Managing a smaller number of solutions can streamline operations ... and your bottom line will thank you.”  The independent hotels that recognize this, like many in Scandinavia, are pulling ahead of those that don’t. Which leads us to the next aspect of competing with the big boys: embracing new distribution and marketing channels smartly.