Winning the heart, not the booking

Hotels and OTAs move beyond the direct-vs-indirect debate to focus on trust, experience, and emotion

At WiT Singapore 2025, industry leaders from COMO Hotels, Booking.com, and Trip.com set aside the long-running “direct vs. indirect” debate to focus on what truly matters: guest experience. The new consensus is clear — travelers don’t care how they book; they care how they feel.

Key takeaways

• From channels to orchestration: The discussion reframed hospitality from a battle for ownership to a collaboration around experience — co-creating seamless journeys from inspiration to loyalty.
• Trip.com’s empowerment model: Rather than owning customers, Trip.com aims to empower them with tools like its AI assistant Trip Genie and global 24/7 human service, with more than half of traveler interactions happening before booking.
• Booking.com’s human tech philosophy: Booking.com emphasized that technology must enhance, not replace, empathy. With 350 million peer reviews, it sees trust and inspiration as its new differentiators in an AI-driven era.
• COMO’s focus on trust and data flow: COMO Hotels highlighted that the biggest challenge isn’t distribution but data disconnection. Its goal: true “experience orchestration” — integrating every guest touchpoint to build emotional loyalty.
• Friction as the real enemy: Whether OTAs or hotels, all agreed that friction — not competition — erodes trust. Technology should remove barriers, not add them, and service must stay human when things go wrong.
• From acquisition to retention: The industry’s next frontier is not lowering distribution costs but deepening relationships during the stay itself. Retention, not reach, defines long-term success.
• The new metric: In the words of COMO’s Puneet Mahindroo, it’s time to measure “return on emotional investment,” not just RevPAR. Whoever makes guests feel seen, valued, and connected — that’s who they’ll book with again.

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