Asian last minute mobile only booking service, HotelQuickly, has launched in New Zealand.
One million users have downloaded the app, and by the end of 2015 HotelQuickly hopes to grow the NZ userbase to 100,000. There are 407 three to five star participating hotels across 17 New Zealand cities, with targets to grow this to more than 600 by close of 2015.Services such as travel account for the largest category of expenditure via mobile devices in New Zealand, with an estimated $2.2 billion spent on services in 2014 and the mobile commerce market is seeing no signs of slowing.
As 83 per cent of New Zealanders have smartphones and tourism is NZ’s largest earning industry, HotelQuickly is expected to have a rapid take up.
“The increased use of smartphones is changing the way consumers make purchase decisions, the immediacy of mobile encourages impulse purchasing, especially when large discounts are offered,” says CMO and co-founder Christian Mischler..
“Our application acts like a private sales channel for hotels to sell off distressed inventory and bring up their occupancy. Hotels are happy to grant big discounts for these rooms that would otherwise go unsold. This creates a win-win situation for hotels and guests: hotels get additional revenue, guests get fantastic deals at great hotels.”
HotelQuickly launched in March 2013. In its first year of operation, it partnered with more than 2000 hotels across 12 operating countries in APAC, including Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, Thailand, Indonesia, and Vietnam.
