Suggestions and opinions on online travel agencies

After all, the accommodation industry is a skin, and if the skin does not exist, the hair will be attached. The role of social average profit rate is to complain about unfairness, and winning in the accommodation industry and online travel agencies is the basis for long-term sustainable and healthy development.

First, the emergence of online travel agencies is the product of social division of labor and technological progress.

Social division of labor and specialization are the inevitability of the scale effect of economic development, and the emergence of the Internet provides an unprecedented opportunity for this trend.

There used to be a sales department in the accommodation industry, which was responsible for key account management and customer marketing. Under the principle of social division of labor, it can be outsourced to an intermediary. The original intermediary had nothing to do with the internet, and a physical intermediary bought out the room before selling it.

The popularity of the Internet makes the intermediary in the accommodation industry move from offline to online. 1May 1999, Ctrip.com was established; 1September 1999, Alibaba was established; On 20 16 12 1, Meituanping reached a cooperation agreement with InterContinental Hotels Group.

Second, some problems in the online development of China's accommodation industry

1, the original sin of the early online development of China accommodation industry.

Its practice of exchanging huge costs and huge losses for the market violates China's current laws, namely the Price Law and the Anti-Unfair Competition Law. OTA spends hundreds of millions of yuan to give a price lower than the hotel room cost, and does not hesitate to launch a price war to compete for customers at a loss. OTA will return the amount beyond the commission to OTA's member account as "cash back" after booking the hotel, thus breaking the price system of the hotel itself, actually bringing the hotel into the price competition object, cultivating consumers' dependence on OTA, transforming hotel members into OTA members, realizing channel monopoly, and making the hotel price decline a trend.

Zhao Huanyan calculated that the net profit of the four online travel agencies in 2065,438+2004 was 2,336.4 million yuan, including 243 million yuan for Ctrip, 269 million yuan for E Long, 65.438+84.69 million yuan for Qunar and 463.5 million yuan for Tuniu.

When the online travel agency started a price war, Zhao Huanyan had a debate with the official who supported the online travel agency in Sina Weibo, citing the laws of China as follows:

September 2 1993, decree No. Decree of the President of the People's Republic of China 10 was promulgated. On September 2, 1993, the Third Session of the Standing Committee of the Eighth NPC passed the Law of People's Republic of China (PRC) on Anti-Unfair Competition, from June 5,438+to February 6,5438+. Among them, Article 11 of Chapter II "Unfair Competition" stipulates that an operator shall not sell goods at a price lower than the cost for the purpose of crowding out competitors.

On February 29th, 1997, 1998, President People's Republic of China (PRC) issued (No.92 of the Eighth National People's Congress), and the People's Republic of China (PRC) Price Law came into effect on May 29th. Chapter II Price Behavior of Operators Article 14 In addition to handling fresh commodities, seasonal commodities and overstocked commodities at reduced prices according to law, operators shall not commit the following unfair price behaviors: (2) Dumping at a price lower than the cost, crowding out competitors or monopolizing the market, disrupting the normal production and operation order, and harming the national interests or the legitimate rights and interests of other operators.

2. In the long run, the essence of the Internet is to cancel the intermediary.

The essence of the Internet is to promote the minimum distance between production and sales and the minimum cost. OTA, as an intermediary, can't reflect the superiority of the Internet. The platform type that does not charge agency fees and only charges a small amount of usage fees is a win-win model.

3. More than 70% of online intermediary business in China accommodation industry comes from offline.

Strictly speaking, it is not an internet company. Comparatively speaking, Expedia mainly relies on the Internet to complete transactions.

4. Online intermediary in China accommodation industry relies on the tactics of thousands of people.

The advantage is that it helps offline services, and the disadvantage is that it is contrary to the characteristics of Internet companies relying on technological progress.

Expedia Las Vegas Telephone Reservation Center has only 200 people.

The following is the data comparison of 20 12:

Trip Advisor*** 1575 employees, with an annual income of 763 million dollars and a per capita income of 484,400 dollars;

Ctrip has10.2 million employees, with an annual income of 668 million US dollars and a per capita income of 55,700 US dollars.

Where to go 1 100 employees, with an annual income of 75 million US dollars and a per capita income of 68,200 US dollars.

Third, the damage of China hotels far exceeds that of North America.

1, North America

HAMA White Paper analyzes the financial reports of 65,438+004 boutique and luxury hotels with national brands in the United States and Canada from 2009 to 2065,438+02. Among the 65,438+004 hotels studied in the report, the third-party distributors control 56% of the marketing expenses. The acquisition cost of high-end hotels accounts for 15%-20% of room income. From 2009 to 20 12, the brand promotion expenses of hotels in North America increased by 37%, and the commission of third-party dealers increased by 34%, while the marketing expenses of local hotels (including online marketing and paid search) only increased by 6%, with an average annual increase of less than 2%. From 2009 to 20 12, the room revenue of franchised hotels only increased by 22%, but its customer acquisition cost increased by nearly 27%, of which commission accounted for 48%, brand promotion expenses accounted for 36%, and hotel internal costs only accounted for 15%. The customer acquisition cost of new and old customers of the hotel is defined as: "Hotel brand promotion expenses (marketing, advertising, large-scale promotion activities, domestic and foreign sales centers and loyalty programs) and commissions of third-party dealers (group reservations and individual reservations), as well as internal marketing expenses and sales plans, including local marketing and sales personnel, such as employees who make reservations."

Cindy Estis Green of Kalibri Labs, a consulting firm, has collected 500 hotels owned by 25 hotel groups in North America. From 2009 to 20 12, the commission of a hotel group in the United States increased by 38%, while the total hotel revenue only increased by 20%. Among the top ten luxury hotels, the lowest increase in retail commission is 10% and the highest is 72%.

2. The situation in China is two worlds apart.

In 20 13, the loss of star-rated hotels nationwide was 2.088 billion yuan, and the commission income of three online travel agencies was 3.2303 billion yuan, including 2.2 billion yuan for Ctrip, 858 million yuan for E Long and 654.38+723 billion yuan for Qunar.

In 20 14, the loss of national star-rated hotels was 59.2/kloc-0.00 million yuan, and the commission income of three online travel agencies was 4.4803 billion yuan, including Ctrip 3 194 million yuan, E Long 939 million yuan and Qunar 347.3 million yuan.

In 20 15, the loss of national star-rated hotels was 65.438+42.6 million yuan, and the commission income of three online travel agencies was 7.043 billion yuan, including 4.6 billion yuan for Ctrip, 970 million yuan for E Long and 65.438+47.2 million yuan for Qunar.

Four, channel monopoly, market monopoly, price monopoly

1.Mainland China's anti-monopoly law.

According to the provisions of China's Anti-Monopoly Law, if the concentration of business operators meets the reporting standards set by the State Council, the business operators shall report to the Ministry of Commerce in advance, and concentration shall not be implemented without reporting. The Anti-monopoly Law of the People's Republic of China stipulates that "the turnover of all operators involved in concentration in China in the last fiscal year exceeded 2 billion yuan, and at least two of them in China in the last fiscal year exceeded 400 million yuan. However, the following circumstances may not be declared: one operator participating in the concentration owns shares or assets with more than 50% voting rights of each other operator; More than 50% of the voting shares or assets of the operators who participated in the concentration are owned by the same operator who did not participate in the concentration ... "

Determining the establishment of monopoly includes: "abuse of market dominance"; Operators may reach a "monopoly agreement" or "concentration of operators that have or may have the effect of eliminating or restricting competition".

2. The anti-monopoly law in Hong Kong is stricter.

Hong Kong's Anti-monopoly Competition Ordinance came into effect on 20 15 12 14. Acts regulated by the Competition Ordinance can be divided into two categories: the first category is that enterprises enter into or engage in agreements or coordination that harm competition, and the second category is that large enterprises abuse their dominant market position (if the market share exceeds 25%, they will be regarded as having a dominant market position) to harm competition. The competition court has the right to take a series of sanctions against the enterprises concerned for violations of competition laws and regulations, including fines, disqualification orders to directors, damages or other orders. The maximum fine can reach 65,438+00% of the annual turnover of the illegal enterprise, which can last for three years.

3. The actual situation of online travel agencies

In 20 14, Ctrip's market share accounted for 46.2%, Qunar.com's 16.6%, E Long's 13.5%, Ctrip and E Long's 59.7% and the three companies' 76.3%.

In 20 14, Ctrip's total operating income was 7.8 billion yuan, and Crocodile's total revenue (excluding business tax and additional tax) was 1 1.64 1 billion yuan.

20 15 China online travel agency acquisition and merger.

According to "China Chain Hotel Market Evaluation and Future Development Trend Research Report 20 15-2022" published by China Industrial Information Network, in 20 15 years, Ctrip, its three OTA platforms Qunar and E Long together accounted for more than 70% of the online hotel trading market share.

4. The development trend of bidding ranking is worthy of attention.

In the case of oversupply in the accommodation industry, some hotels sacrifice the overall long-term interests for their own temporary interests and fall into a prisoner's dilemma, and gain market share by reducing prices on OTA websites. For hotels exclusively promoted by online travel agencies, the commission per room is more than 100 yuan.

The US government has strict regulations on Google's business model, and the China government also has clear regulations on Baidu's bidding ranking. The specific principles should be applied to online travel agencies.

Five, the hotel industry and online travel agencies * * * winning suggestions

1. Industry organizations should determine a reasonable reference range of commission rate for online travel agencies.

Such as 6% to 10%. At present, the commission rate charged by OTA is 15% to 20%, and its gross profit margin is above 75%.

Opinions of the General Office of the State Council on Accelerating the Reform and Development of Trade Associations (No.36 [2007] of the State Council) put forward clear requirements for expanding the functions of trade associations, promoting the reform of management system of trade associations, strengthening the self-construction of trade associations and improving supporting policies. "the State Council's Opinions on Accelerating Tourism Development" clarifies the timetable for the reform of tourism industry associations: "Within five years, the personnel and financial relations of various tourism industry associations at all levels should be decoupled from tourism administration departments."

In the early years of the Republic of China, a few inns in Shanghai spontaneously organized the Shanghai Pavilion in response to various environments, becoming the earliest trade organization. 1925, in the French Concession, some inns organized and established the Federation of Law Stacks, which was registered in the French Consulate.

At present, there are already trade associations in Shanghai banking industry. The ultimate goal of hotel industry organization is industry association. China hotel industry needs trade associations to safeguard the overall interests and formulate the rules of the game.

Industry organizations can initiate the establishment of an industry-wide website platform based on the principle of fair competition.

Trade organizations are the bridge between enterprises and the government, and they can also be entrusted by government management departments to draft laws and regulations. At present, legal disputes in China's accommodation industry are mostly handled according to civil laws such as General Principles of Civil Law, Contract Law, Company Law and Consumer Protection Law. Japan, Singapore, France and other countries have enacted special laws, Hong Kong has also promulgated the Hong Kong Hotel Law and the Hotel Owners Ordinance, and Taiwan Province Province has promulgated the Detailed Rules for the Management of Tourist Hotels.

2. The hotel must guarantee the leading position of direct selling.

Ensure the lowest price in official website, and continuously develop the proportion of hotel direct sales in official website, with platform-based media as allies and multi-channel distribution.

When the hotel occupancy rate reaches 60%, consider reducing the number of online travel agency ports; To reach 70%, consider closing the online travel agency port; When it reaches 80%, you can consider closing the distribution system port.

Comparing the booking cost of each room, the hotels are 5 yuan, official website, GDS 20 yuan and OTA 60 yuan.

Comparison of the proportion of hotel direct sales: the overall proportion of hotel direct sales in the United States is 35%, and that of China Traditional Hotel Group is 6%; The proportion of Shangri-La hotels booked through intermediaries is no more than 7%, and the proportion of Intercontinental and Starwood hotels is controlled at around 10%, and Hilton hotels pass.