The complete guide to a smart hotel metasearch strategy in 2025

Though metasearch engines are the way forward in our ever-evolving hotel industry, they do come with a catch. In fact, it is estimated that metasearch advertising has more than doubled from $0.21 to $0.48 per click as well as the average Google Ads CPC rising by 62.5%. These numbers are only to get higher the more OTAs infiltrate the online hotel market, so how can you stay ahead?   

During our LinkedIn Live with Steve Collins, VP Digital, and Danielle Rybicki, Digital Account Director, we unpacked the ins and outs of hotel metasearch and what the best strategies are to tackle the rise of OTA rates, how to survive in the competitive market and why smart hotel tech integrations can be your savior. Building on that discussion, in this article we will look at the main points covered by Steve and Danielle on how to stay consistent with metasearch engines as well as some of our own data insights to help you take control of your metasearch strategy.  

What is hotel metasearch and why does it matter?  

In a nutshell, hotel metasearch is a platform that aggregates hotel rates and availability from multiple sources in once place that allows users to compare prices and book hotels directly. For guests, it simplifies the process whilst giving hotels the best opportunity to drive direct bookings. It primarily imitates a search engine to collate information across the internet, from hotel rates to specific information that is housed in one place.  

So, are hotel metasearch platforms something to worry about? As much as they are there to help online lookers see what their best options are, they can have a knock-on effect on your hotel business. With the hotel industry becoming more competitive than ever, hotel metasearch will not be an option but a standardized practice, so you need to think smarter about the way your hotel is showing up compared to your OTA competitors. Staying consistent with your rates, messaging and strategy is what will make travelers click your site first without hesitation, and as Steve points out, ‘consistency is the key takeaway.’  

The true cost of rate undercutting vs rate integrity  

Having OTAs may seem like a great idea on paper, but the repercussions for your costs and hotel business as a whole are not as they may seem. Shockingly, Danielle shared SHR data from over 100 hotels that properties which allowed OTAs to undercut their website rates ended up paying an additional $3500 for every 10,000 clicks compared to those that maintained their own rate integrity. This in turn creates higher CPCs on Google, Microsoft, and metasearch ads, as well as lower conversion rates and increased media fees to try and compete with OTAs that bid aggressively.  

On the other hand, hotels that kept their rate integrity saw a multitude of benefits to keep their direct bookings higher and acquisition costs lower. These hotels that ensured their websites had the lowest rates were paying significantly less on CPCs, around 75 cents per click, and receiving much stronger conversion rates that fell below 5%.  
 
Take a look at our infographic to see for yourself the impact of your hotel rate strategy.

What is the bandit OTA problem and why they are causing a revenue headache? 

Trying to keep your rates steady and at their lowest is proving to be more challenging than ever with, as Steve describes, ‘bandit OTAs cutting corners and undercutting your rates massively.’  From a competitive price point of view, it is becoming clear that hotels which usually have the best rates are now seen to be 15-30% more expensive compared to these ‘bandit OTAs.’ For revenue managers, this is causing a bigger headache for real-time tracking as it is nearly impossible to keep up with their erratic rates.  

To help you keep the bandit OTAs locked up, here are some of the warning signs to look out for so you can protect your rate integrity.  

• If your direct rates are consistently shown to be higher than your competitors, then you are at risk of having OTAs undercut you with unauthorized rates.  
• Watch out for sudden increases in CPCs and declining conversion rates as guests could be abandoning bookings due to cheaper rates on other OTA sites.  
• If there are new OTA names appearing in your metasearch results or booking links, check where they have originated and if they are authorized.  
• Hearing that guests found better prices or seeing booking pattern changes from unknown sites.  
• Your RMS shows unrecognizable rates, or you have difficulties finding the booking source’s credibility.  

Get smarter with your OTA competitors and take back control of your hotel offerings 

The best thing to do when dealing with OTA competitors is to get even and outsmart them. Trying to outbid them is not beneficial for your revenue, rates or profits as you could be spending all your budget just trying to keep up with their rates.  

Instead, be smart about your strategy and find ways to boost direct bookings with incentives that OTAs cannot offer. As Danielle highlights, ‘we have to start investing in brand awareness, building that recognition with new audiences, expanding reach.’  

So, what does that consist of?  

Focus on offers that actually add value to your bookers and what they would want to receive if they visited your website instead of an OTA. Include incentives such as:  

• Free breakfast  
• Free parking  
• Room upgrades  
• Exclusive loyalty perks 
• Complimentary amenities 

Think about being more aware of your brand rather than spending your budget with a defensive mindset that will only get more expensive. Having the upper hand on these OTA sites is not always about how much you spend, but how you deliver the guest journey.  

Maximize hotel direct bookings through Google’s AI-powered metasearch platform 

Simply booking a hotel stay has come a long way from going to travel agents to scouring the internet for the best comparative prices. Google booking links have transformed how metasearch engines work, especially with Google Ads now dominating the metasearch landscape. As Steve explains, Google booking links have evolved massively and have now integrated into the wider Google ecosystem which feeds your rates and inventory into Performance Max campaigns. They now infiltrate into carousel ads and property promotional ads in Google Maps that pop up when lookers are searching for hotels in the area.  

But what about the development of AI? It is not a surprise that AI is taking the future of hotel discovery into the next stage, so it is important for hotels of any size to embrace the change and use AI integrations. As a collective, we are moving into an AI mode which is slowly fading traditional typed searches and instead using LLMs such as Google Gemini to provide conversational queries about the best hotel offers. As Steve discusses, ‘your query is no longer going to be going through Google.com. It's going to be going through Google Gemini’, which could cause some setbacks for smaller hotels that are already struggling with traditional Google discovery.  

In fact, metasearch is now showing in AI with hotel listings now having the opportunity to appear when your hotel matches the location or date filters from the specific query. By using clear and concise content, maintaining ratings and reviews and keeping your hotel ads relevant with AI-assessed query content, your listings will start to feed into LLMs to drive users and their search queries directly to your hotel website.  

The main way to get on board with the new AI revolution is to ensure your hotel tech systems are all connected to feed the correct data into LLMs, like Google Gemini, and be in the best position to stay competitive. Take a look at your hotel tech stacks and see where you can use AI to your advantage to help optimize your revenue, booking, and management across evolving hotel metasearch platforms.  

Transform and boost your profitability with the Official Website First (OWS) strategy  

Getting direct bookings and making that profit is proving to be harder as OTAs evolve and costs are starting to rise. That’s where the OWS (Official Website Strategy) comes in. In simple terms, this strategy is about leaning more towards profitability through the official hotel website getting the bookings directly. For example, Steve suggests that if your rate is $200 per night on your own website, you should put your rates on larger OTAs at $250, as you will be charged a hefty commission rate for them to acquire the booking.

Think of it like this:  

• Rates on your official website will give you your base profitable rate.  
• Rates on OTA channels will give you your base rate but with a large commission charge.  
• Rates on your metasearch will always show the lowest rates to drive traffic directly to your website.  

The OWS strategy puts your direct bookings first to drive profitability and maximize your revenue. It also provided hoteliers with guest data to build customer loyalty, upsell and cross sell opportunities and lifetime value. As Steve suggests, ‘if you have metasearch, you've got the same visibility [and] opportunity to reach that customer as any other OTA.’ So, where does the math come in? Essentially, if you are able to transform 90% of your OTA bookings into 10%, then you will have 90% of your bookings coming to you directly. This could give you maximum profit retention and lower your costs on OTA commissions to keep your bookings and revenue high.  

Keep your metasearch connected and enhance your guest experiences with smart hotel tech integrations 

To avoid being behind the evolving metasearch landscape and to keep up with OTA rates requires you to stay consistent with your hotel tech. The world of technology is always bringing new software solutions to help with the demand of OTA bandits, revenue challenges and rate integrity and it does need a level of consistency attached to it.  

In the hotel industry, there are a plethora of touchpoints that need to be considered during the guests’ journey from securing the booking to confirmation to their actual stay. As Steve highlights, a hotel business ‘does need a really good marketing team working very closely with an operations team and a revenue team to make sure there's consistency around the messaging to every single guest.’  

So, what makes a good hotel software ecosystem for the best metasearch journey? The main way to look at this is to see what is already working and what needs to be improved. For example, your PMS needs to communicate with your channel manager to provide real-time rate updates, your CRM system with your booking engine to have member pricing reflected, and your email marketing with your website to ensure promotions and offerings are consistent. These smart integrations are important to keep your hotel running smoothly without the risk of inconsistency leaking through. Remember to think of this as your foundation that drives your profitability and booking strategies to overcome the complexity of the new digital landscape.  

Join the metasearch revolution and stay consistent in the new age of hotel software 

The hotel metasearch revolution has come a long way since the days of Google type search engines and traditional travel agencies. Now, we are looking at the evolution of AI, LLMs and Google ecosystems to try and drive direct bookings to official hotel websites.  

At Access Hospitality, we have been working with our clients for over 25 years and in that time, a lot has changed within the digital landscape significantly shifting into a new era of AI-powered technology that is here to stay. However, we help our customers tackle the OTA bandits, optimize their website strategies and increase profitability with smart RMS, CRM and digital marketing solutions.