Extensible Markup Language; commonly used as the language to exchange information between different computer systems.

A collection of web pages, often on a similar subject.

A single file made up of HTML. Many web pages linked together are considered to make up a website.

An application residing on a hotel’s website, which allows prospective guests to shop for rooms and complete reservations. TravelCLICK’s iStay Web Booking Engine is an award winning single screen booking engine.

The process of analyzing visitor activity on a website. Web analytics also includes the measurement of metrics to determine site effectiveness.

Each request for a particular web page which displays an ad.  Also referred to as an impression.

A browser accessing a Website. One user may be responsible for many impression, visits or sessions. For example, if multiple people use one machine, they are still counted as one user.

Uniform Resource Locator; an address that a browser uses to find and display Web content, also know as website address.

The true demand for a for a hotel regardless of any capacity limitations.

The number of page views reported by a site from its log files, generally on a monthly basis. Traffic can be reported for the entire site or for sections, channels or most requested pages. Site traffic can be audited by third-party companies to authenticate numbers. See Audit.

Calculated by taking the total revenue (not just room revenue) and dividing by the total number of rooms available.

Ads that rotate at timed intervals while a user is on a particular page. Commonly used to refresh ads in chat or discussion areas of a site, where the users are viewing a single chat window for an extended period of time and not making multiple page requests.

A piece of HTML code that defines the text that appears at the top of the browser window whilst a page is being displayed. The contents of the title tag also appears as the link to the page in search results.

Websites from external companies such as Expedia or Orbitz that offer hotel, flights, rental cars and other services through a targeted search function.

The ability to deliver the most appropriate ad to a user primarily through content, demographic profiling or browser targeting. Advanced targeting techniques consider users’ behavior and predict behavior based on user affinities and similarities to other users.

A metric that refers to the capacity of a site to maintain a visitor’s presence.

Charging one price for a product regardless of the time of year or the demand in the marketplace.

A fixed ad unit that remains on a page and does not rotate throughout the site.

The term for a page that acts as an introduction to a site. Splash pages often include a flash movie introduction or a country selection screen.

A common name for the process that a search engine robot goes through when it moves around the Internet. This is also known as crawling.

Many techniques that are used to try to artificially increase the relevancy of a website to certain searches. Many of these spam techniques are recognized and checked for by search engines and we strongly discourage their use.

Provides a hotel with a breakdown of how the business arrived at the hotel or through which channel the business arrived.

The strategy that consumers should be able to find the same rates at the same time for the same accommodations, regardless of the booking channel they choose; technology capability that supports/enables this strategy.

Situation where a Website is hosted on a server along with other sites, using the same hosting provider.

A series of page requests made by a single user at a Website. If there has been no activity for a period of time, followed by the resumption of activity by the same user, a new session is considered started. Twenty minutes is a common time period used to measure a session. See Visit.

The position of a Website in the search engine results pages (SERPs) for certain keyword phrases.

SearchVIEW™ is a powerful online business intelligence tool that allows you to understand how today's consumer sees your hotel from search rank and third party sites to consumer reviews on your hotel and your competition.
Learn more.

The process of increasing the amount of visitors to website or page by ranking high in the search results of a search engine.  The higher a Website ranks in the results of a search, the greater the chance that that site will be visited by a user. SEO helps to ensure that a site is accessible to a search engine and improves the chances that the site will be found by the search engine users.

A site that supports general searches of the Internet.  Search word(s) are typed in and the search engine site returns results with the “most significant” at the top.  The methods for ranking sites are not disclosed in detail, however, content relevance and inbound link strength are generally thought to play major roles.  The traffic that goes to a site from a search engine from a “natural listing” is referred to a “natural search traffic.”It must be noted that many search engines have paid advertisements; these are often on the right hand column and sometimes above the natural search results. Traffic from these paid ads is generally referred to as “paid search” or “pay per click” (PPC) traffic.

Sabre preferred display product for hotels. See Travel Agent Media Preferred Placement at link.

An ad delivery and pricing option that allows advertisers to run their ads throughout a site without any targeting, usually at a lower CPM than they would pay to run ads within a specific section of a site or network of sites. See CPM.

Technologies that enhance interaction, multimedia and transaction activity between users and the ad or Web content. Some rich media can require a plug-in to run the rich media content. See Streaming Media.

A new kind of web experience that is engaging, interactive, lightweight, and flexible. RIAs offer the flexibility and ease of use of an intelligent desktop application, and add the broad reach of traditional web applications. The tools that enterprises use to build and deploy RIAs include Flash, Ajax, Flex, etc., RIAs in hotel website and booking platforms enable hotels to present personalized, multimedia-rich applications that dramatically enhance user experience, increasing customer satisfaction and making users more productive.

Calculated by taking the total daily revenue (including ancillary revenues) and dividing it by the total number of occupied rooms at the hotel.

Calculated by taking the daily room revenue of a hotel and dividing it by the total rooms available at that hotel.

The software application hotels to control the supply and price of their inventory in order to achieve maximum revenue or profit, by managing availability, room types, stay patterns (future and historical), etc.

The measure of a site’s relevance to search terms. This is determined by search algorithms, which determine the contents of search engine results pages (SERPs).

A term used in web analytics. The referrer is the Website from which a visitor came to arrive at your Website. Sometimes there is no referrer, because the visitor may have typed the Website address in or used a bookmark to get to a site. The referrer is used in web analytics to determine visitor’s paths through the site.

A lightweight XML format designed for sharing and/or distributing content.

The number of unique visitors, or percent of specified target audience, to a site or group of sites within a specified session or other period of time.

The strategy that all distribution channels of a hotel should reflect the same rate for the same conditions for a particular room type.  Rate parity strengthens customer loyalty and encourages guests to book directly with the hotel where terms/policies may be more flexible, given the same pricing as in other channels.

RateVIEW provides an accurate, comprehensive, and forward-looking snapshot of rates and availability from more than 130 major travel websites, brand sites, and the GDS. Reports are based on user-defined criteria.
Click here for more information on RateVIEW.

RateADVISOR is a rate recommendation tool offered by TravelCLICK. As an option to RateVIEW, RateADVISOR is designed for any hotel that wants to improve manual pricing processes and increase profitability.
Click here for more information about RateADVISOR.

Published by sites that accept advertising. Included prices of banners, sponsorships and other types of ad products.

A question, or in the case of a search engine, it is the combination of words and numbers that make up a search phrase.

All Emails pushed including cc’s.

The delivery (“pushing of”) of information that is initiated by the server rather than being requested (“pulled”) by a user.

The application used by the hotel to control onsite property activities such as check in/out, folios, guest profiles, room status, requests, etc. PMSs can have interfaces between other applications such as the hotel point-of-sale (POS) or central reservations system (CRS).

Promospots, available in text or graphic format, deliver your hotel’s message to Sabre travel agents at the point of sale during the shopping and booking process.  Available through TravelCLICK.
Click here for more information on Sabre PromoSpots.

Rate rules that may include restrictions such as advance booking cutoffs or non-refundable payments.

Providing enhanced visibility for hotels on travel agent terminals through the GDS.

A site that acts as a gateway to the Internet. These portals are often provided by ISPs and offer many services in one place such as search, shopping and communications. For example, Yahoo is a portal.

An ad that appears in a separate window on top of content, similar to an interstitial. Also similar to a daughter window, but pop-ups are not associated with a displayed banner. See Daughter Window, Interstitial.

Internet strategy for search-related advertising. With pay per click campaigns, you create your ad creative, select a budget or Cost Per Click (CPC) and then specify the searches for which you would like that ad to appear. Your ad is then displayed each time someone enters those search terms into a search engine that uses the results of the pay per click engine you created the ads on. Typically each click through to your hotel Website costs a fixed amount.  And example of PPC would a Google ad campaign.  Methods for arriving at the fixed amount varies but is commonly arrived at by bidding, where the higher bids get better placement.
Click here for more information on Pay-Per-Click.

Search results that have been included on the search engine results pages (SERPs) as part of a Pay Per Click (PPC) campaign. These listings have been created by and are paid for by site owners (or their account managers). They are essentially adverts that are tailored to the search.

The number of times a sites web pages have been viewed (excludes images and other non-HTML files) over a given period.

The request by a user’s browser for an HTML document. The page request is recorded by the Web server’s log file. Pages requested are not always fully downloaded or seen by the user (e.g., the user may stop before the page download is complete), so a page request is not equal to a page view. See Page Views.

Websites are collections of electronic pages or HTML documents that may contain images and media objects (graphics, java applets, etc.), as well as text. A page can contain one or more ads.

A marketing strategy that involves offering several products for sale together. For hotels this could be effectively implemented through the booking engine for upsells, services, event tickets, or other amenitities suchs as Internet access, meal plans, partking, etc. The price of the pricing may be bundled together so there is opacity to the individual prices of the products.

Practice by hotels of confirming reservations beyond their capacity in expectation of cancellations, no-shows or in error.

Organic search listings are those sites that appear on search results pages (SERPs) that have not been paid for as part of a pay per click or pay for position campaign.

The practice of analyzing and making changes to various factors to do with a website to try to increase the sites relevance to certain keyword phrases.

The practice of optimizing all of the factors on a web page, such as titles and code structure.

A trade group developing a common standard for the exchange of information in the travel industry.

Websites offering comprehensive travel shopping and Reservations Solutions to consumers.  Examples include Expedia, Orbitz, Travelocity, Priceline, and many local and regional sites.

"Fill" measure of a hotel calculated by dividing the total number of rooms occupied by the total number of rooms available times 100, e.g. 75% occupancy.

The actual number of total users who visited the site once during the month.

A room inventory control function that requires a reservation to meet or exceed a certain length of stay (2 or more) in order to complete the reservation.

Pieces of HTML code that can be added to any web page, but that are not displayed to the visitor. They offer additional information about the page. Two of these are keywords and description, which are used by search engines to help rank a web page and are an important factor in search engine optimization.

A search engine that queries other search engines and then combines the results that are received from all. In effect, the user is not using just one search engine but a combination of many search engines at once to optimize Web searching. For example, mobissimo.com and kayak.com are hospitality metasearch engines.

The processing of arranging the right products at the right price presented where the consumer is buying. It involves promoting your hotel in all channels where consumers shop, presenting graphical and informative information, and packaging your hotel and its amenities to satisfy a unique guest experience.

A room inventory control function that limits the number of nights a reservation can stay when arriving on a certain date.

The difference between the hotel’s selling and the merchant’s price offered to the consumer.

A measure of the number of incoming links to a website. This can vary from search engine to search engine, as they will not index all the same pages. Link popularity is one of the many factors search engines will take into account when ranking pages, which is why it is essential to carry out an effective link building campaign.

An interface or connection between a CRS system and the four major GDS channels. The term “Next Generation Seamless” is used to illustrate the tight, reliable integration between a CRS and a GDS.

A well-known spam technique design to artificially inflate link popularity through a program of reciprocal link building. This often creates clusters of interlinking sites with certain characteristics, which search engines will pick up on and punish accordingly. These link farms will also often generate links to completely irrelevant sites, giving no actual value. We strongly recommend that you avoid link farms.

A program of seeking out and building up the link popularity of a site from relevant sites. It also includes finding relevant sites to offer as a resource to visitors to your site. This can be a very time-consuming process as it involves many hours of research.

Refers to the conversion of online shoppers to actual buyers; often communicated in a ratio.

Text or graphic, which can be selected (clicked) by a user and which causes another page, document or section of a document to be displayed.

Usually used in conjunction with negotiated or consortia rates.  It allows agents to book the last room a hotel has available at the contracted rate.

A bad practice spam technique of placing many keywords and keyword phrases into a single page. Some methods of carrying out this technique include using multiple title and meta tags. This is a known spam technique however and using it can lead to penalties being issued by search engines.

A keyword phrase is common phrase used on search engines. A search phrase is a combination of a number of individual keywords, which together make the search more specific.

The measure of the number of occurrences of a specific keyword, or keyword phrase, on a web page.

A keyword is any word that is a word that could be used by someone in a search engine to help them find what they are looking for. Multiple keywords make up keyword phrases, which are used in search queries.

A special page set up for visitors who clicked on a link in an ad, also known as splash page. For example, by clicking on an ad for Site X, visitors go to a page in Site X that continues the message used in the advertising creative. Jump pages can be used to promote special offers or to measure the response to an ad.

A programming language that allows site owners to enhance web pages. Whole chunks of web pages are often created using Javascript and some sites also use Javascript in hyperlinks. Search engines cannot process Javascript, so they ignore it and therefore it should be used with caution.

The rooms available that the hotel has to distribute/sell across all channels.

The number of ad impressions available for sale on a Website. Ad inventory is determined by the number of ads on a page, the number of pages containing ad space and the number of page requests.

Distribution using the Internet, World Wide Web, Intranets, extranets and on-line services.

A connection between two networks without intermediary.  Most often refers to a connection between a PMS/CRS and an OTA. Also known as Integration, Direct Connect and Interfaced Connections.

Same as Interface

Same as Web Booking Engine (WBE)

The metric a site uses for measuring inventory. Different definitions exist for this term. See Ad Impression, Ad View.1. The viewing of a page or viewing of an ad. This assumes that the page or ad images completely download and the user views the page or ads on the page.2. The request for a page or ad. See Ad Request, Page Request.

An index is the database of sites built up by search engine spiders. It is these indices that search engines combine with their ranking algorithms to deliver search results.

iHotelier is an Internet-based, state-of-the-art central reservations system. From TravelCLICK, the iHotelier platform is a total reservations and marketing management solution in one. iHotelier improves conversion and revenue per stay, drives incremental revenues from the sale of value-added products, captures important client information, manages email communications with your guests and helps you manage relationships with your most important customers.
Click here for more information about iHotelier.

Language that web designers and developers use when they create web pages.

Hotelligence FuturePace provides a forward-looking snapshot of room nights, revenues, average daily rates and market penetrations for future dates within the current month and next two months.
Click here for more information about Hotelligence FuturePace.

Hotelligence reports provide historical electronic booking data from the Global Distribution Systems (GDS), including information on business sources, rates and length-of-stay patterns, for both individual subscriber properties and their local competitive sets.
Click here for more information about Hotelligence.

Hotel Yield Management is the process of understanding, anticipating and reacting to consumer behavior to maximize revenue.  Yield Management is also referred to as Revenue Management.  Consumers purchase hotel room nights via numerous channels. TravelCLICK’s Revenue Strategy Services apply these revenue management bet practices to maximize your hotel performance.

Hotel Market Intelligence is the gathering, analysis and dissemination of information relevant to hotel markets. This information's purpose is to help you make effective decisions concerning the distribution of your hotel's room nights. Is your hotel's pricing competitive Is your hotel performing well across channels? How are you doing head-to-head versus your nearby competitors?
Click here for more information about Hotel Market Intelligence.

Hotelligence360™ is an integrated suite of business intelligence applications providing hoteliers with new levels of actionable information and insight to optimize all aspects of business performance and competitive position for their property or portfolio of properties. This revolutionary business intelligence application is based on the popular Hotelligence® report.
Learn more.

The page designated as the main point of entry of a Website (or main page), or the starting point when a browser first connects to the Internet.

An action on the website, such as when a user views a page or downloads a file.

Headlines deliver your message to Galileo travel agents at the point of sale during the shopping and booking process.
Click here for more information on Galileo Headlines.

Calculated as room revenue minus expenses divided by total rooms available.  It is the new RevPAR for owners.

Newly introduced lower cost, more user friendly travel agent inventory distribution systems.

Sabre, Galileo, Amadeus and Worldspan offer a comprehensive travel shopping and reservation platform to travel agents worldwide.  Agents use one of these systems to book airline, car, hotel and other travel arrangements for their customers.  OTAs also use one or more GDS to power some or all of their content on their site.

A GIF animation tool that creates sequences of images to simulate animation and allows for transparent background colors. Animated GIFs can generate higher response rates than static banners.

Graphic Interchange Format; a common compression format used for transferring graphics files between different computers. GIF images are the most common form of banner creatives and Web graphics.

The number of times an ad is delivered to the same browser in a single session or time period. Assumed to be exposure to an ad. Frequency caps can be established and managed by the ad server using cookies to ensure a browser only gets the same ad delivered “X” times.

Flash is a technology developed by Macromedia to enhance web pages with rich digital content. Flash is often used to highlight special offers or to deliver presentations.

A hotels individual percentage of the market they should reasonably expect to capture all things being equal based upon their competitive set.  Calculated by dividing the number of rooms at the hotel by the total number of rooms in the competitive set (inclusive of the subject hotel).

Encompasses all the electronic channels of distribution, which includes GDS, Online Travel Agencies and Web Booking Engines. These distribution channels can be accessed through the Internet, an intranet or through an interfaced connection.

The ability to create packages based upon the components the customer selects.

Doorway pages are a method of providing web pages that are highly targeted toward popular searches. This helps to offer searches more relevant pages, and increase the relevancy of the website.

A domain name is simply a website address, e.g. www.mycompany.com is a domain name. This is also sometimes called a URL.

Analyzing business (primarily group) based upon the total value of the business versus what transient business would be displaced if the business were accepted.  The group value includes all food and beverage spending, meeting room rental and any additional outlet spending minus any costs involved.

Determining when and through what channels to sell rooms based upon the cost of acquisition of the individual channel. By driving business to lower cost acquisition channels during high demand periods, hotels can maximize their profitability.

A directory is a listing of sites, usually in a categorical format. The largest directories on the web are the Open Directory Project (DMOZ) and the Yahoo Directory.

Same as Interface

Specific strategies or programs that attract or drive demand to the area or a specific hotel.

Applying revenue management principles to move rate based upon demand within the marketplace and what the market will bear.

A separate window associated with a displayed banner. Maybe rendered after the banner appears or after a user clicks on the banner.

The actual number of total users who visited the site once during the day.

OKs minus demos and daily uniques; these are the “duplicates” mentioned in the OKs definition below.

A strategy used to learn more about customers’ needs and behaviors in order to develop stronger relationships with them and create a value exchange on both sides. Software used to capture preferences and implement customer loyalty strategies.

Cross-linking is the practice of developing a network of interlinked sites and/or domains which then link back to a main website. This is recognized as a spam technique, used to artificially inflate link popularity.

The concept, design and artwork of an ad. Includes the technology used to create or develop the ad.  The most common creative technology for banners is GIF, JPEG images or animated GIFs. Other creative technologies include Java, HTML or streaming audio or video. These are commonly referred to as rich media banners. See Rich Media.

In traditional media, the cost per thousand homes or individuals delivered by a medium or media schedule as it relates to the relative cost of one medium or schedule to another. In Internet media, the CPM is a measure or relative cost efficiency between sites where the cost per thousand refers to ad impressions delivered.

The economic value of each click on the ad unit. Advertisers looking to pay on a direct response model will request CPC pricing and typically want to pay Websites for the total clicks during the campaign.
Click here for more information on Cost Per Click.

The economic value of each click on the ad unit which results in a completed sale.  Advertisers pay only for successful impressions rather than all impressions.  CPA pricing is typically commission based and ranges in percentage based upon the underlying value of the product sold.

A factor in search engine marketing.  Site content is compared to the search phrase being used, resulting in a relative measure of how closely the content of the site and the search phrase are related.  This and many other factors are used to determine order in which a site is displayed in the search engine results.

Marketing organizations that link together small to medium sized independent travel agencies to leverage purchasing power and marketing opportunities.

That payment that a travel agent receives from a supplier for selling transportation, accommodation or other services.

A room inventory control function that prevents reservations from arriving on that date.  Reservations can stay through the date.

A technique of delivering different content to search engines when they visit a site, than real visitors will see. This is a well-known Spam technique that is recognized, and checked for by search engines.

Calculated by dividing the click-through number by the number of ad requests or ad impressions and expressed as a percentage. CTR has become a major measure for Internet ad-campaign effectiveness and provides a basis for comparison of sites and/or creative. However, click rates are not a complete measure of campaign effectiveness (they do not measure user activity past the initial click or conversions). Click rates should be combined with other measures to determine the real value of a campaign.

The action of clicking on an ad unit. The ad server records the counting of these clicks either before or after the transfer takes place.

The opportunity for a visitor to be transferred to a location by clicking on an advertisement, as recorded by the server.  A click does not guarantee that a visitor actually arrives at the requested target URL, it only measures the opportunity for the visitor to be transferred to the target URL.  This means that a click will be considered valid even if the visitor hits “stop” or otherwise aborts before arriving at the target URL.

Controlling the allocation of hotel inventory and rates across all distribution channels including website, third parties, and the GDS. Effective channel management solutions should reduce labor costs and improve efficiency by providing a centralize way to control multiple channels.

ChannelDirect is a TravelCLICK channel management solution that allows hotels to update rates, inventory and restrictions across multiple third-party sites from a single, web-based platform.
Click here for more information on ChannelDirect.

The application used to manage a hotel’s distribution and hotel room bookings.  Typically will be used to reach guests via multiple distribution channels such as travel agencies (via GDS), online travel agencies (such as Expedia, Orbitz, Travelocity, Priceline and others), direct to the hotel website, and telephone (either via call center, direct to property or both).

Short for Web Logs.  Community, forums, postings, etc. from individuals on a formal/informal basis that cover any topic, typically feedback on a hotel, tour operator, airline, destination.

Tracking a user’s path through a site or network of sites, and compiling a profile based on what pages and ads were delivered to the user, then using this information to specify or target content or ads to the user.

The lowest non-restricted rate bookable by all guests. This rate can change several times a week up to several times a day.

An ad unit on a Web page that is usually linked to an advertiser’s site. Banners are the dominant form, or unit, of advertising on the Web. The Internet Advertising Bureau ( IAB) has recommended eight standard sizes, as well as interactive banner ads, which couple banners with daughter window ads. See Daughter Window.

Figure derived by dividing the number of room nights by the number of bookings.

Figure derived by dividing actual daily revenue by the total number of rooms sold.

An application service provider (ASP) is a business that provides computer-based services to customers over a network.

An application programming interface (API) is the interface that a computer system or application provides in order to allow requests for service to be made of it by other computer programs, and/or to allow data to be exchanged between them.

Amadeus Instant Preference offers preferred placement to hotel clients.
See Travel Agent Media Preferred Placement page.

An Amadeus travel agent media product.  Amadeus Instant Marketing has the following products: Sign In Messages, Display Messages, Weather Messages and Broadcast Messages. This extensive line of media products provides travel suppliers with a wide range of options to get the right message, to the right audience, at the right time.
Click here for more information on Amadeus Instant Marketing.

A means of classifying ad types. For example, Internet ad units can include banners, buttons, daughter windows, pop-ups, interstitials, tag lines, etc.

The request of an advertising element as a direct result of a visitor’s action, as recorded by the advertisement server software.  An ad request does not guarantee that a visitor actually viewed an ad; it only measures the opportunity for an ad to have been delivered to the visitor.  This means that an ad request will be considered valid regardless of the visitor'’ ability to view graphics, and whether or not the HTML document containing the ad loads to completion.

The actual percentage of the room nights or revenue (based upon competitive set) that a hotel captures during a particular time frame.  Calculated by dividing the total room nights or revenue sold at the hotel by the total room nights or revenue sold within the competitive set inclusive of the subject hotel.

Worldspan Accents delivers your message to Worldspan travel agents during the shopping and booking process.
Click here for more information on Worldspan Accents.