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How Booking.com manipulates users

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Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#61

Post by eh78ssxv2f »

Osmium wrote: post #22

To anyone from Booking.com reading this: I'll go elsewhere next time I need to book a room. Dark patterns may help profits in the short-term, but they're terrible for your brand. Just ask TicketMaster. It isn't just tech-savvy users that will catch on to this either. If an everyday user uses Booking.com, reads reviews and thinks their room will be great, but then has a bad experience, they're going to stop trusting B…

> Just ask TicketMaster.

TM has been doing pretty well in terms of stock price (not the user happiness) -- probably the metric that they care about. So, I am not sure if that's the best example.

Source: https://finance.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chd...

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#62

Post by briandear »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #37
zpr wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes the direct prices are actually more. Your best bet for sticking it to them might be to use an alternative booking service.

Booking.com takes an 18% commission. Only a severely incompetent business would refuse to give you a lower price in exchange for them not having to pay that 18%. All the big franchises (Marriott, Hilton, IHG, Hyatt, Choice, Wyndham) will give you a cheaper “member” price at their direct website. Being a member is free, it’s just like airline miles and you even earn points.

Commissions vary depending on a lot of factors. My property in the south of France, we pay 10% and it’s well worth it. It’s incredible lead generation and saves us a ton on marketing and advertising. I’m happy to pay the commission because for small hotel owners, it’s much easier than having to spend continuously on marketing.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#63

Post by [deleted] »

beefsack wrote: post #59

Some airline ticket booking sites still track you and increase the ticket price on return visits, optimised to certain intervals. Many in the industry call it "dynamic pricing." It made the news a few years back[1] but you can still see it sometimes in a few different industries. You can get into arguments with people about whether marketing as a whole is an enterprise built on manipulation, but this is quite clearly…

[deleted]

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#64

Post by manicdee »

aianus wrote: post #55
sturgill wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Frankly, I don’t think I am going to stop using Booking.com. I am not aware of any other service with a comparable number of properties and reviews." It's hard to quantify negative impact of future dealings, but it's even harder to say Booking.com should change their methods when the people aware enough to be annoyed continue to give them money. It's like complaining about Google following you around the web and usi…

> I am not aware of any other service with a comparable number of properties and reviews. Why do you need so many properties and reviews? You're staying in one room, presumably. You just need at least one room with a few good reviews in your price range and you're good to go.

I avoid good reviews and look at what people complain about.

This also helps avoid hotels full of snooty elitists.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#66

Post by hervature »

kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #23
Osmium wrote: post #22

To anyone from Booking.com reading this: I'll go elsewhere next time I need to book a room. Dark patterns may help profits in the short-term, but they're terrible for your brand. Just ask TicketMaster. It isn't just tech-savvy users that will catch on to this either. If an everyday user uses Booking.com, reads reviews and thinks their room will be great, but then has a bad experience, they're going to stop trusting B…

Unfortunately for us (and fortunately for TicketMaster), there usually is no alternative to them. That doesn't hold true for Booking.com

Do people not Google for alternatives? I can think of at least 5 competitors to Ticket Master. There's even one that only charges 5% seller fee and no buyer fee.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#67

Post by plinkplonk »

bkohlmann wrote: post #32

One of the most useful business school classes I took was entitled "Consumer Behavior" which was a deep dive into behavioral psychology and all the techniques used by marketers / websites to grab our attention. Booking.com rather overtly hits on all the techniques we discussed in detail. I used to think these techniques were "dirty." But humanity evolved to be responsive to this type of manipulation. It seems the web…

Can you suggest any good books on this? (or perhaps just the textbook your class used?)

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#68

Post by bogomipz »

kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #7
bogomipz wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Using Amazon as an example of an e-commerce company - when buying an item on Amazon neither the gaming of ratings and reviews or the annoying and manufactured "sense of urgency" as stated in the post, seem to be part of the experience. The booking.com experience feels like doing business with a sleazy used car salesman.

Yes, Amazon may get flak for other reasons but I have found the experience of shopping on them to be very clean and pleasant. To be clear, I am talking about the experience of finding a product and proceeding to checkout and payment, not about any potential issues about fake products and such.

Agreed, that's pretty much what I meant.

Although even the few times when I received questionable products the issue was resolved pretty quickly and painlessly with either the merchant or Amazon.com

Contrast that with booking.com where all communications between you and the merchant(hotel) have to filter through booking.com and take 24 hours at a minimum to get a response.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#69

Post by nonsequ »

arkitaip wrote: post #34
bkohlmann wrote: post #32

One of the most useful business school classes I took was entitled "Consumer Behavior" which was a deep dive into behavioral psychology and all the techniques used by marketers / websites to grab our attention. Booking.com rather overtly hits on all the techniques we discussed in detail. I used to think these techniques were "dirty." But humanity evolved to be responsive to this type of manipulation. It seems the web…

Not sure I understand your logic. Are you saying that these tactics aren't "dirty" because as human beings we are very susceptible to them? One would argue they are unethical precisely because of this. Or do you mean it's ok because everyone else does it?

Well he’s calling for more education and awareness. It’s like Big Food. The entire CPG industry has been stuffing people with sugar, salt, and fat for decades, exploiting human nature. We are finally seeing society resist this as we have become educated about the dangers of sugar and salt consumption. Meantime, putting ethics aside, all the major food and beverage companies made hay for a long time until recently. What is ethical and what is money-making can be at odds for a long time before they converge (if ever).

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#70

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

aianus wrote: post #55
sturgill wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Frankly, I don’t think I am going to stop using Booking.com. I am not aware of any other service with a comparable number of properties and reviews." It's hard to quantify negative impact of future dealings, but it's even harder to say Booking.com should change their methods when the people aware enough to be annoyed continue to give them money. It's like complaining about Google following you around the web and usi…

> I am not aware of any other service with a comparable number of properties and reviews. Why do you need so many properties and reviews? You're staying in one room, presumably. You just need at least one room with a few good reviews in your price range and you're good to go.

Because since people's tastes differ, if a site has a small inventory, it's very likely they will have nothing at least some of the time you want to book. If some small site has nothing that's a fit for you even, say, 10% of the time, the vast majority of people would choose a site they know will have something all of the time.
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