Direct Booking Africa, powered by Guerilla Marketing, will be hosting a Direct Booking Indaba 2017 in Cape Town on October 25 at the Protea Fire & Ice Hotel.

Industry stakeholders who will speak at the event include South African Tourism, Cape Town Tourism, and the Department of Tourism. The Federated Hospitality Association of Southern Africa, a Direct Africa Bookings partner, will also be in attendance.

The Direct Booking Indaba 2017 is the first event of its kind in SA. It seeks to enable hoteliers increase their direct bookings via their websites and, in the process, lower distribution costs.

Joseph Neusu, Business Unit Manager, told Tourism Update that hotel running costs were continually increasing but, unfortunately, they did not have control over many of them. The control they did have, he said, was over their distribution costs, which included marketing and guest acquisition.

“Many hotels rely on online travel agents like TripAdvisor, Expedia, Agoda and more to whom they pay huge commissions of up to 25%.”

Neusu added: “The tour operator will remain relevant. All we are advocating is creating a right balance between the middleman and direct booking initiatives.” He said the event would empower hoteliers, as they had carefully curated content, and put together a strong panel of speakers who would unpack trends, insights, best practices and tactics to maximise direct revenue.

Speakers include, Velly Bosega, CEO of AdClick Africa Group, Marcus Zandhuis, Founder and Managing Director of CapeTownMagazine.com, Derek Martin, Total Revenue Specialist at TrevPAR, Chris Fanner, Hotel Marketing Specialist at Guerilla Marketing, Zilé de Kock, Marketing Manager at Dyer Island Cruises, Marine Dynamics,andJoseph Neusu, Business Unit Manager at Guerilla Marketing, as well as various industry stakeholders.

The event is expecting over 80 C-Suite Executives (CEOs; CMOs; CFOs etc), according to Neusu.