A boutique hotel in Musanze pays Booking.com roughly 18% commission on every reservation. On a room going for RWF 120,000/night, that’s RWF 21,600 per booking going to a platform in Amsterdam. Over a year with decent occupancy, they’re sending tens of millions of francs to OTAs.
A direct booking through their own website? Zero commission. Same guest. Same room. All the revenue stays.
Why guests book on Booking.com instead
It’s not loyalty. It’s friction. OTAs win because they make booking effortless. They show availability, pricing, reviews, and a book button — all on one page, all optimised for mobile.
Most hotel websites fail because they make the guest work. Tiny text, no prices, a “Contact us to check availability” form instead of a booking engine, photos from 2018. The guest gives up and goes back to the OTA.
What a high-converting hotel website needs
- Professional photography — rooms, views, restaurant, pool, common areas. Updated annually. This is the single most important element
- Clear room categories and pricing — guests want to compare options. Show what each room includes
- Availability and booking — ideally a booking engine. At minimum, a WhatsApp button with pre-filled message for availability enquiries
- Location and getting there — especially important for properties outside Kigali. Include driving directions, nearest landmarks, transfer options
- Reviews or testimonials — TripAdvisor widget or hand-picked guest quotes
- Mobile-first design — most travel searches happen on phones. If your site doesn’t work perfectly on mobile, you’re invisible
The “best rate guarantee” strategy
Want to shift bookings from OTAs to direct? Offer a better rate on your website. Even 5–10% off the OTA price changes behaviour. The guest gets a discount. You lose 5% instead of 18%. Everyone wins except the OTA.
Promote this on your website: “Book direct for the best rate — guaranteed.”
Google presence matters enormously
When someone searches “hotels in Kigali”, Google shows a hotel pack with prices and links. Hotels with their own websites appear in organic results too. Without a website, you only exist on OTA listings where you’re competing with every other property on the same page.
With a website, you can rank for specific terms: “boutique hotel Nyarutarama,” “budget hotel near Kigali airport,” “lake Kivu resort.” Each search term is an opportunity for a commission-free booking.
A properly built hotel website through providers like Kisimenti pays for itself if it captures even two direct bookings per month that would otherwise go through an OTA. The maths is simple: your website cost is a fraction of the commissions you’re currently paying.