America's Best Begins Extensive Internet Enhancement

• 
  SAVE
• 
  SHARE
• 
  TEXT SIZE
• 
  PRINT
• 
  COMMENT
• 
  PDF

. October 14, 2008

JANUARY 14, 2007. One of the hospitality industry's most ambitious internet makeovers is being launched by America's Best Franchising Incorporated, which will completely re-design the home pages for its America's Best and Country Hearth brands plus create a separate multi-page web site for each of nearly 200 properties which operate under these flags.

"We become the first hotel franchise to have a multi-page web site for each property plus to provide and to maintain those pages at no charge to our franchisees," said Doug Collins, chairman and CEO of Atlanta-based America's Best Franchising Incorporated.

According to Collins, the internet is increasingly the preferred method for consumers to research and to make travel arrangements. For example, reservations at America's Best and Country Hearth properties through the brand internet sites increased by 45% in 2007 over 2006.

"Most importantly, reservations through our brand internet sites are the most profitable for our franchisees because they pay no commissions," explained Collins. "During 2007, the average daily rate (ADR) from the brand websites was $74, which is an increase of $5 or about 8% over 2006. It's for these solid business reasons that we must use the web as effectively as possible to drive greater occupancy and profitability."

Added Collins, "This project will significantly enhance the look and the ease-of-use of our websites for consumers - and in a crowded hotel market, we will dramatically increase our exposure on the internet. Our franchisees will further benefit because we will be better able to tie together our reservations system and to analyze the traffic, or hits, on our sites."

Working with L.E.T. Group, Inc. based in Hobe Sound, Florida - one of the leading providers of website design and internet marketing services to the hotel industry - America's Best will conduct activities that include:

o redesign and content optimization of four websites -- www.americasbestinn.com, www.countryhearth.com, www.abestfranchising.com and www.abesthotelservices.com - so they look like part of the same "family" of hotels

o design of a multi-page site for each property that follows the theme and look of the brand site

o optimized content in order to facilitate search engine indexing

o a unique brand e-mail address for each property in order to facilitate communications with guests and with the corporate franchise office

o tie-in by each property to a centralized reservation system

o detailed traffic analysis for each website available on demand

o specialized marketing services for each property, such as campaign development and tracking plus multi-media content creation.

"We will achieve wonderful cosmetic improvements, but more importantly we will make dramatic improvement in the visibility of our brands and our properties on computer search engines," added Collins.

According to Collins, the internet re-design and enhancement is scheduled to be complete by April of this year.