Introduction
In the hypercompetitive online travel industry, hotel rates change by the minute. Platforms like Booking.com, Expedia, and Agoda apply dynamic pricing based on availability, demand, time, and geo-location. Hotels and travel tech companies must monitor price movements across OTAs to maintain competitiveness and drive direct bookings.
A global travel distribution partner engaged Actowiz Solutions to create a real-time hotel price intelligence system that tracks pricing patterns, detects anomalies, and powers dynamic rate parity optimization.
Objectives
- Monitor daily and hourly room prices for 500+ hotel properties across OTAs.
- Track changes across multiple room types and rate plans.
- Detect undercutting or price gaps between Booking.com, Expedia, and Agoda.
- Enable a dashboard to assist hotel revenue managers and OTA channel teams.
Challenges
- OTAs frequently personalize rates based on user cookies, IP, and session behavior.
- Rate plans include multiple variables: breakfast, cancellation, taxes.
- Different OTAs show the same hotel under varying IDs and URL patterns.
Actowiz Solutions’ Strategy
1. Smart Hotel Mapping Engine:
- Created a normalized hotel master list to map listings across Booking.com, Expedia, and Agoda.
- Linked based on geo-coordinates, brand, hotel star rating, and amenity match.
2. Dynamic Rate Extraction:
- Used headless browsers and proxy geolocation to simulate search sessions by city/date/occupancy.
- Parsed rate components (base price, taxes, inclusions).
3. Rate Parity Detection:
- Highlighted pricing differences for the same room type between OTAs.
- Flagged undercutting (one OTA cheaper than others >5%) and overpricing.
Sample Output
| Hotel Name |
City |
Date |
Room Type |
Booking.com |
Expedia |
Agoda |
Price Gap |
Undercut Platform |
| Grand Stay Hotel |
New York |
2025-06-15 |
Deluxe King |
$239 |
$229 |
$249 |
$20 |
Expedia |
| Pacific Inn |
Los Angeles |
2025-06-18 |
Standard Twin |
$149 |
$149 |
$139 |
$10 |
Agoda |
Key Results
🔹 Tracked 100,000+ Room Rate Updates in 30 Days
- Across 50 cities and 500+ hotels.
🔹 Detected 5,200 Rate Parity Violations
- Empowered client to correct pricing inconsistencies.
🔹 Increased Direct Booking Conversion by 18%
- Client adjusted direct rates in real time to remain competitive.
🔹 Improved OTA Channel Relations
Dashboards Delivered:
- Rate Parity Matrix by Hotel & OTA
- Price Drop Alerts by Room Type
- Competitive Positioning Map (City Level)
- Room Type Comparison (Inclusions vs. Price)
Technology Stack
- Languages: Python, JavaScript
- Scraping Tools: Puppeteer, Playwright, Selenium
- Database: PostgreSQL, MongoDB
- Scheduler: AWS Lambda (2-hour interval)
- Visualization: Looker Studio, Tableau, Power BI
Why Actowiz Solutions?
- 📈 Proven in travel and OTA scraping architecture
- 🚀 High-frequency rate extraction with geolocation simulation
- 📊 Strategic dashboards for revenue & pricing teams
- ✅ Compliance-oriented data practices for public-facing rates
Client Testimonial
“Actowiz gave us real-time control over pricing across OTAs. We can now protect our margins and steer demand to our most profitable channels.”
— Director of Distribution Strategy, Global Travel Partner
Next Steps
- Add Airbnb and Vrbo rate comparison
- Integrate Google Hotel Ads and Trivago listings
- Predict rate trends using event calendars and occupancy history
Conclusion
Hotel pricing is volatile—but with Actowiz Solutions' OTA rate tracking engine, this client gained unmatched visibility, ensuring price competitiveness, rate parity, and revenue optimization across three of the most critical travel platforms.
