A resort owner in Coorg calls the agency that built her website. Traffic is up, she says, but bookings aren't. The agency checks, and the only way to book is an enquiry form that emails the front desk. The desk replies the next morning, and by then many of those guests have booked through an OTA app.
This guide is for digital agencies, web designers and hotel consultants. It covers what hotels need from you, how to pitch a booking engine with the owner's own numbers, and three ways to partner with ZimmerStack.
You bring the guests, so the booking gap is yours to close
This is for three kinds of people. Digital marketing agencies run a hotel's Google profile, Instagram and ads. Web designers build and look after hotel websites. Hotel consultants advise owners on openings, revenue and software. All three send guests to a hotel's website.
If that website can't take a booking, the traffic you worked for leaks to the OTAs. The owner pays commission on guests you attracted, and your work looks weaker than it is. The fix is a booking engine on every site you touch.
The traffic you bring is only worth what the website can book.
Hotels need a site that books at a live price
A guest who wants to book tonight won't fill in a form and wait until morning. They go back to the app they trust. The site has to confirm a booking the way an OTA does, at a better price.
- It shows tonight's real price and real availability, from the same inventory the OTAs sell.
- It confirms the booking on the spot, with a confirmation the guest can show at the desk.
- It loads fast on a phone over mobile data.
- It never shows a higher price than the OTAs for the same room and dates.
- It can be reached from the Google profile, the Instagram bio and WhatsApp.
With ZimmerStack, you can build the hotel a free website from six templates, on its own domain. If you already built its site, keep it. Paste two lines of code where you want a book-now bar, and it opens the hotel's booking page. With the channel manager, the website and every OTA sell from one count of rooms, at rates that come from one place.
You can also add your client's own Google Analytics 4 or Meta pixel IDs. The booking pages then report visits and completed bookings, so you can show the owner what your work produced. What a hotel booking engine does covers the guest side in detail.
Pitch with the owner's own OTA invoices
Owners have heard a lot of promises. They trust their own invoices. Build the pitch on commission they have already paid.
- Ask for last month's OTA invoices. OTAs send commission invoices or statements; add them up.
- Find the guests who could have booked direct. Repeat guests, people who searched the hotel's name and WhatsApp enquiries are the usual ones.
- Show what moving a share is worth. Use a modest share, like one booking in five.
- Set it against the cost. Include the plan price, so the owner sees the net figure.
Worked example
The pitch for a 25-room hotel
In this example, a 25-room hotel had ₹6,00,000 of OTA bookings last month at 18% commission.
| Line | Amount |
|---|---|
| Commission paid last month | ₹1,08,000 |
| Bookings moved direct (one in five) | ₹1,20,000 |
| Commission kept each month | ₹21,600 |
| Commission kept over a year | ₹2,59,200 |
| Essential plan for 25 rooms, per month | ₹4,975 |
The hotel keeps about four times the plan price every month, and the booking engine takes 0% commission. These numbers are an illustration. Put the owner's real figures into the OTA commission calculator, and check their rates against our guide to OTA commission in India.
The ZimmerStack hotel website is free. The booking engine comes with every paid plan, from ₹199 per room per month, at 0% commission. A hotel that stays on the free website can switch booking on for a small share of each direct booking instead (5% today), which the hotel sees and accepts before booking is switched on.
Three ways to partner with ZimmerStack
Pick the track that matches how you already work with hotels.
| Track | Who it suits | What you do | How you earn |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agency | Digital agencies and web designers | Put the booking engine on client sites and keep marketing them | A share of what ZimmerStack earns on your clients' bookings |
| Reseller | Consultants and software sellers | Sell ZimmerStack software to hotels | Terms agreed on a call |
| White label | Agencies that want their own brand on it | Offer booking under your name | Agreed case by case, by phone |
We agree shares and margins on a call, so you won't find them printed here. Call +91 90840 51774 to talk them through. Agencies and resellers sign up online at zimmerstack.com/partners, and white label starts with a call.
The partner portal keeps your client list in one place
Once you are in, the partner portal at partner.zimmerstack.com runs your side of the work. It is built for a phone, between client meetings.
- Each client's status, in plain words. Running normally, awaiting setup, payment due or restricted, with trial end and invoice dates. It never shows what a client pays.
- Launch a new client. Add the business, its first location, the contact person and the products it needs. The client is credited to you automatically, and ZimmerStack confirms the plan.
- Send the owner their access message. The portal prepares a message with their usernames, their apps and a link to set a password, ready to copy into WhatsApp or email.
- Send quotations in your own words. Each one is checked before it goes, sent under the ZimmerStack name with your agency named on it. Replies come back to you.
To see what the website side looks like for your clients, read why a hotel's website should take more of its bookings.
Become a ZimmerStack partnerSign up as an agency or a reseller, or ask about white label. Terms are agreed on a call.See the partner programWhat to do this week
- Sort your hotel clients. List them and mark which sites take bookings and which only take enquiries.
- Ask three owners for invoices. Last month's OTA commission invoices are all you need for the first conversation.
- Run their numbers. Put each owner's figures into the calculator and write down the monthly commission kept.
- Pick your track. Sign up as an agency or a reseller, or call +91 90840 51774 about white label.
- Book one pitch. Start with the owner who pays the most commission, and bring their own invoice.