• by Chuck Martin , Staff Writer, June 16, 2015

Mobile hotel booking can involve a lot of timing.

Various studies have shown that many people what until the last minute to book a hotel room, mainly because they can.

Hotel booking apps have come a long way and more and more travelers are finding and using them.

But elements in addition to time can play a role when interacting with hotels.

Hotels can offer deals, promotions and perks at the time of booking, send relevant follow-ups and reminders and include factors such as time of day or weather to capitalize on moments when travelers might be more open to completing a transaction, based on a new report.

As in various other purchasing categories, travelers expect a unified and consistent experience that lets them pick up on one device where they left off with another, based on the Future of Hotel Bookings report by PFSK Labs for Sabre. The report aimed to present hotel execs with insights for the types of retailing technologies to adopt.

Different travelers have different needs and PSFK identified five traveler types: family vacationers, last-minute millennials, solo backpackers, corporate road warriors and loyal entrepreneurs.

One of the more interesting insights in the report involves instant service. These include one-click reservations, booking on the fly or connecting to a concierge.

Thanks to mobile, the new reality is that travelers want to be able to plan a trip, ask for help and book a ticket in the moment they need it.

The report recommends multiple ways to leverage the reality of real-time mobile:

• Live chat
• Video chat
• Allow hotel staff to access guest profiles during interactions
• Leverage hotel staff knowledge of local area
• Connect travelers to in-house managers

The rise of on-demand applications makes last-minute booking a lot easier. This also allows hotels to provide unique discounts based on known traveler preferences. That is, if they have their systems linked together.

The mobile element here is that location can be leveraged to offer the best deal to the travelers based on proximity to a certain hotel property.

If the hotels don’t do this directly, mobile travelers will very quickly turn to the apps that do this for them. And that’s where time really comes into play.