Digital for hotels: more direct bookings and less commission paid to OTAs.
A guest finds you on Booking or 2GIS, then searches your name on Google and asks on WhatsApp whether a room is free this weekend. We build a path where they book directly: a website with a booking engine and prepayment, seasonal advertising, and a CRM for groups and corporate clients.
Six areas for hotels and resorts.
Rooms, seasonal rates, booking engine with Kaspi prepayment, PMS connection, three languages.
from ₸300,000Mobile appFor chains and resorts: booking, online check-in, service orders, spa and dining, loyalty, Kaspi.
from ₸2,500,000CRM & automationWhatsApp, Instagram and the website in one pipeline, groups, corporate clients, banquets, repeat guests.
from ₸350,000SEOBrand and location searches, Google and 2GIS maps, reviews, resort pages, three languages.
from ₸200,000/moTargeted adsInstagram and TikTok in guests' home cities, early bookings, packages, retargeting, WhatsApp and CRM.
from ₸150,000/moSearch adsGoogle Ads and Yandex Direct: brand, location queries, resorts, Google Hotels, paid booking tracking.
from ₸150,000/moA hotel sells nights that expire: an empty room tonight cannot be sold tomorrow. That is why most hotels in Kazakhstan keep occupancy up through Booking.com, Ostrovok and Yandex Travel and pay them 15–20% of every booking. An OTA brings a new guest, but the same guest will come back through the OTA next time unless the hotel has a convenient direct channel.
Direct booking means a website with a booking engine that shows real availability and rates from the PMS, takes prepayment via Kaspi Pay or card and confirms the booking instantly. Around it sit ads for brand and location searches, review management on 2GIS and Google, and a CRM for group requests, corporate clients and banquets.
Resorts on Alakol, in Burabay and at Kapshagay work differently: a short season, bookings via WhatsApp, prepayment and ads aimed at the cities guests travel from. Below is what we do in each area, with features, integrations and prices.
What hotels and resorts come to us with.
- More than half of bookings come through Booking and Ostrovok, commission eats the margin, and the guest database belongs to the OTA, not the hotel.
- The website exists but has no booking: a «Call us» button and a form answered half a day later, when the guest has already booked elsewhere.
- Rates and availability are updated by hand in several extranets, leading to overbookings and sales at outdated prices.
- The resort runs on WhatsApp: hundreds of chats in season, prepayment by card transfer, confusion over dates and cabins.
- Ads are switched on in June, when competitors already own the search results and the early bookings are gone.
- Nobody replies to reviews on 2GIS, Google and Booking, and the rating drops because of a couple of complaints about Wi-Fi or breakfast.
What matters specifically in Kazakhstan.
- Booking.com and Ostrovok are the main OTAs for hotels in Kazakhstan; the goal is not to leave them but to reduce their share by moving repeat and brand-search guests to direct booking.
- Kaspi — prepayment and full payment for stays via Kaspi Pay on the website and by link in WhatsApp, Kaspi QR at reception; for domestic travellers this is more familiar than entering a card.
- 2GIS — guests look for hotels and resorts on the map: room photos, prices, check-in times and replies to reviews in the listing drive calls as much as the website does.
- WhatsApp is the main channel for questions and bookings at resorts and small hotels; the WhatsApp Business API sends booking confirmations and check-in instructions automatically.
- Three languages — Russian and Kazakh for domestic tourism, English for foreign guests in Almaty and Astana; for business hotels in Astana an English version is essential.
- eQonaq and PMS — hotels register foreign guests through the eQonaq system, while rooms and rates live in the PMS and channel manager (Bnovo, TravelLine, Shelter); the website and CRM must work with them rather than keep a second room grid.
What a guest costs through an OTA versus direct.
In our experience and according to market data, OTA commission for Kazakhstani hotels is 15–20% of the room revenue. With a ₸35,000 room and an average two-night stay, that is ₸10,000–14,000 per guest. A 40-room hotel at 60% occupancy with 70% of bookings from OTAs pays tens of millions of tenge a year.
Direct booking also costs money: ads, a website, a booking engine. But a guest who books directly stays in your database, and their repeat visit is almost free. A realistic goal is to shift the share of direct bookings by 10–20 percentage points in a year, not to drop Booking.
When to sell: the hotel and resort calendar.
- Summer resorts (Alakol, Kapshagay, Balkhash): early bookings from March to May, peak demand and ad spend in May–July, last dates filled in August.
- Burabay and the Almaty mountains: two seasons, summer and winter with holidays; New Year and Nauryz sell 1–2 months ahead.
- City hotels: in Astana demand is driven by weekdays, business travel and events; in Almaty by weekends, tourists and transit.
- Off-season is covered by corporate events, offsite training and weekend packages, sold through the CRM and mailings to past guests.
Questions from hotels and resorts.
How much does a hotel website cost?
A landing page for a resort or small hotel is ₸250,000–400,000, a hotel website with rooms, a booking engine and two or three languages is ₸600,000–1,200,000, a website for a chain or complex with guest accounts starts at ₸1,500,000. Details: website for hotels.
Can we leave Booking completely?
Usually not, and there is no need: OTAs bring new and foreign guests. The goal is for repeat guests and people searching for you by name to book directly, so the share of commission goes down.
Does a hotel need a booking engine if it has WhatsApp?
For a resort with 10 cabins, WhatsApp with a CRM and Kaspi payment links is often enough. For a hotel with 15–20 rooms or more, a booking engine connected to the PMS and channel manager removes overbookings and takes bookings at night while staff are asleep.
Which ads work for hotels?
Search ads for brand and location queries («hotel in central Almaty», «Alakol resort») catch people already choosing; Instagram ads aimed at guests' home cities create demand for resorts and packages. Management starts at ₸150,000 per month per platform plus the ad budget.
Does a hotel need a mobile app?
A single hotel does not. A resort complex or chain with a spa, restaurants and a loyalty programme may benefit from an app or a guest web app opened by QR code in the room. Details: app for hotels.
Other industries
Run a hotel or resort? Describe the task and we will tell you where to start and what it costs.
Tell us how many rooms or cabins you have, what share of bookings comes through OTAs and which PMS or channel manager you use. We will reply with a plan and estimate within 1–2 business days.