Last Saturday, an interesting new application launched for planners looking to book hotels in a hurry. Zentila, reports Sue Hatch of MeetingsNet, serves planners whose meeting is occurring within ninety days. Users create an RFP and choose a destination, and the system returns a list of hotels, allowing users to filter based on such factors as room size, amenities, and travel time to the meeting place. Users then select three to eight hotels that will receive the RFP.
Here’s where Zentila shows its strength: participating hotels will respond to the RFPs with their offers in no more than three hours. However, users do not get to see which hotel is making which offer. According to Mike Mason, the “ZEO” of Zentila, this anonymity is desirable; it lets hotels “offer some deals that they might not be able to do publicly.” And hotels do seem to notice Zentila’s potential– Mason thinks his program will incorporate over 1,000 properties into its system by the end of summer.
Another cool feature is the ability to connect with other planners: the site shows users who has booked which properties and even lets them talk to each other in case they have any doubts. Though the final selection is “blind”, options like these help users research their original choices pretty thoroughly.
Strategic Results plans its meetings too far in advance to make use of this application, but we recognize how it could be handy. Not to mention, it’s free for planners—if you’re willing to let go of some control in hotel selection, it could be worth it.
i like their branding and the concept is spot on and in many ways mirrors our approach to handling leads and conversions.