Investing in an online booking system offers a plethora of benefits for both your tour business and the travellers who book with you.

For tourists, these tools simplify the booking experience and make trip planning effortless. They can:

  • Browse and book anytime: Check your tour times, view real-time availability, and complete the entire booking process without picking up the phone or waiting for email responses. This convenience is especially valuable when they’re planning vacations from different time zones or booking last-minute activities.
  • Manage reservations independently: Self-service portals let them handle their own bookings. They can view upcoming reservations, reschedule tours, or cancel bookings without going through your team.
  • Speed through check-in: Mobile tickets stored right on their phones mean they can breeze through check-in without fumbling for printed confirmations.

But the benefits don’t stop with your customers.

Online booking platforms completely transform how you run your tour businesses — from capturing more bookings to streamlining operations to scaling without hiring additional staff.

Let’s explore the ways booking systems can keep your calendars full, boost revenue, and give you back hours in your day.

Stay open for business 24/7

With an online booking system, your tour business never closes. Customers can browse your offerings, check availability, and complete their bookings at any hour — whether it’s 2 a.m. on a Tuesday or during a holiday weekend when your office is closed.

This means you’re no longer tied to your desk waiting for phone calls or scrambling to respond to booking inquiries before someone books with a competitor instead. Your system handles the entire process automatically: customers select their preferred tour time, complete checkout, and receive instant confirmation, all without you lifting a finger.

This 24/7 availability is especially valuable for attracting international travellers booking from different time zones or making last-minute plans outside of business hours. You’re capturing bookings you’d otherwise miss, and customers appreciate the convenience of booking on their own schedule.

It’s a win-win that keeps your calendar full without requiring you to work around the clock.

Read more: 8 ways to increase direct bookings from your website

Sell tours across a variety of online channels

Your booking system shouldn’t limit you to just selling on your own website. The best systems help you expand your reach by connecting with the sites travellers use to research and plan trips.

Most booking systems integrate with major OTAs such as Viator, GetYourGuide, Expedia, and others. These sites see millions of visitors every single day — so you want to promote your tours here to get in front of global audiences and earn bookings from new customers.

Many booking systems also include reseller marketplaces that connect you with other travel industry businesses. You can partner with hotels, travel agents, destination management companies (DMCs), accommodation providers, transportation services, other tour operators, and more to get your experiences in front of their customers.

The real advantage is that all bookings — whether they come from your website, an OTA, or a partner — feed back to your central booking system. You can manage everything in one hub instead of juggling multiple platforms and trying to keep all calendars up to date.

Read more: 10+ travel distribution channels for tour operators

Accept simple online payments & get paid faster

Online booking software integrates with payment processors to let customers pay for their tours at checkout. This offers a variety of benefits for you and your customers:

  • Secures reservations and reduces no-shows: When customers pay upfront, they’re far less likely to no-show. Last-minute cancelling or ghosting you means they lose out on what they paid for your tour.
  • Offers flexible payment options customers expect: You can connect multiple payment processors — Google Pay, Apple Pay, Stripe, PayPal, Klarna, and more — so customers can pay however they prefer. This flexibility also helps you accommodate international travellers, as they can easily find a payment option that supports their region.
  • Eliminates payment hassles at check-in: You’re not fumbling with credit cards, making change, or dealing with payment issues when you should be getting your tour started. Everyone’s already paid, so check-in moves quickly, and you can start tours on schedule.
  • Gets money in your account faster: Most payment processors offer quick payouts, depositing funds directly to your bank account within a few business days. No more waiting weeks for checks to clear or chasing down payments.
  • Creates a clear payment record: Every transaction is automatically documented, simplifying your bookkeeping and virtually eliminating payment disputes. If a customer claims they paid or didn’t receive what they booked, you have the digital receipts for reference.

Create stunning product listings & packages

A bookable website gives you complete control over how you present your tours to potential customers. You can design detailed product listings with high-quality photos and videos from past experiences, write compelling descriptions that highlight what makes each tour special, and showcase customer reviews so new bookers can see authentic feedback from travellers who’ve already visited you.

This is a massive upgrade from relying on walk-up traffic (where your operation might look chaotic on a busy day) or handing out dated brochures that end up in the trash. Your online listings let you put your best foot forward every single time, showing off your tours exactly how you want them seen.

Most booking systems also let you create combo packages by bundling multiple tours together. You can offer all-day adventures, multi-day experiences, or themed packages that group complementary activities. This makes it easy for travellers to fill their vacation calendars with things to do — and it increases your average booking value by encouraging customers to book more with you rather than shopping around for their next activity.

Read more: How to create and market five-star tour packages

Upsell customers with add-ons

Booking systems make it easy to offer add-ons during checkout — things like photo packages, meal options, transportation, extended experiences, and even merchandise. These extras let customers personalise their tour experiences, and they boost your revenue per booking without having to sell anything face-to-face.

The beauty of add-ons is that customers are already in buying mode when they’re checking out. A few extra clicks to add a souvenir photo package or a post-tour lunch, and you’ve increased your booking value. And since these options are presented clearly during booking, customers can make informed decisions without feeling pressured.

Many booking systems also let you sell gift cards and vouchers, creating another revenue stream and attracting new customers to your business. Recipients can redeem these for any of your tours, giving them flexibility while guaranteeing you future bookings.

Ditch manual administrative work & free up time for more value-adding activities

Booking systems improve operational efficiencies by automating countless tasks that would otherwise suck up hours every day. With a booking system, you get:

  • A centralised, up-to-date booking calendar: Your booking system maintains one organised calendar that aggregates bookings across all channels (your website, OTAs, partner sites, affiliates). You don’t have to check a dozen and one calendars and manually consolidate everything — it’s all in one place automatically.
  • Real-time availability updates: When someone books a tour, your calendar instantly updates and sends real-time availability back to all connected channels. Many booking systems also offer resource management to keep an inventory of your tour supplies, equipment, and staff members. Resource and availability management work together to automatically block bookings when you don’t have the time or resources to support them. This saves you from manually tracking inventory and availability across multiple sites every time a booking comes in, and it eliminates the risk of double-bookings or accepting reservations you can’t fulfil.
  • Automated customer communications: Your system can automatically send booking confirmations, reminders before tours, follow-ups, review requests, and other marketing emails. You can draft these emails once and schedule them to send when customers take specific actions (like book with you) or at certain times (when you’re running a promotion). This way, you don’t have to send every email yourself, and you’ll never forget to follow up with a customer.

Your booking system essentially serves as your back-office admin, so you don’t need to hire extra staff to handle this behind-the-scenes work. You can cut operational costs while actually improving your customer experience.

More importantly, this frees up your time for work that actually grows your business. You can use these hours to open additional tour times, invest in marketing strategies such as SEO, revamp your social media pages, or build partnerships with other businesses.

Ultimately, this automation and time savings let you work ON your business instead of IN the business.

Prevent overbookings & manage capacity effectively

As we touched on earlier, booking systems update your availability across all your sales channels in real-time — but this benefit deserves more emphasis. Preventing overbookings isn’t just convenient; it preserves your reputation and protects your bottom line.

When you accidentally overbook, you’re forced into an impossible position: reschedule customers, cancel on them entirely, or scramble to accommodate more people than you can realistically handle.

Any of these options risks seriously annoying customers, earning negative reviews, and losing their business altogether.

And preventing overbookings becomes even more critical as you expand to OTAs.

OTAs like Viator and GetYourGuide want to recommend the highest-quality travel experiences to their users, so they often highlight “preferred” or “premium” tours and list those at the top of results. Travellers see those most often, and as a result, those experiences tend to receive more bookings than others.

OTAs determine who to showcase by enforcing “quality standards,” and one of those standards is keeping a low cancellation rate. For example, Viator’s Badge of Excellence requires you to maintain a cancellation rate below 2%. So, a few overbookings that force you to cancel on customers can knock you out of premium placement, directly impacting your visibility and bookings.

Simplify check-ins & offer better customer experiences

Booking systems generate mobile tickets that customers can save directly to their smartphones. When customers arrive for their tour, they simply pull up their ticket, and your guides are ready to check them in within seconds.

This is a massive improvement over fumbling with printed confirmations, checking names against a clipboard list, or verifying payment status on the spot. Mobile tickets let you instantly scan customers in and confirm their arrival.

For larger tours, you can set up multiple check-in points to avoid bottlenecks where everyone’s waiting in one long line. This obviously makes guests happy (who likes waiting in lines?) and prevents tour delays.

Your customers get a smoother, more professional experience from the moment they arrive, so you can always start tours on the right foot.

Report on business performance & gather data to make more informed growth decisions

Booking systems provide detailed analytics dashboards that show you exactly what’s driving your business. You can measure your bookings and revenue in various ways to understand:

  • Which sales channels or partner sites send you the most bookings
  • Which tours are your best sellers
  • When you typically hit capacity vs. when you’re slow
  • What types of customers typically book with you and their preferences

With this data, you can make smarter decisions about where to focus your efforts. For example, you can:

  • Open up more availability to the OTAs and partners who bring you the most bookings.
  • Offer more of your tours that consistently sell out, create packages with popular offerings, and retire experiences that are rarely booked.
  • Increase staff and inventory before busy periods, and brainstorm ways to boost bookings during slow seasons.

This data also helps you build more effective marketing and retargeting campaigns. You know which types of customers you usually convert — families, solo travellers, couples, or corporate groups — so you can create targeted ads that speak directly to them.

And you can retarget past customers with promotions for tours similar to those they’ve booked. Or reach out with special offers during the months when they historically book (like targeting last year’s summer customers in early spring when they’re planning this year’s trips).

Having this data at your fingertips lets you make more strategic growth decisions vs. taking blind bets and hoping they work out.

Read more: 10 free & paid strategies to market your tour company

Choosing the right online booking system for your business

If you’re considering an online booking system for your business, you should look out for a few key things when comparing your options:

  • Complete toolkit: Any high-quality booking system includes more than just a central calendar and availability management. You should also look for tools to create a bookable website, support online payments, track inventory, manage customer experiences, and report on business performance. Ideally, your system will include website builders, payment processor integrations, resource management, an in-built CRM, automated communications, and reporting dashboards.
  • Avenues for growth: Beyond allowing you to sell tours on your website, your booking system should help expand your reach. Look for OTA integrations (ideally partnerships with major OTAs), reseller networks, and tools to earn bookings through affiliates.
  • User-friendly features: If the system requires extensive training or feels clunky to navigate, it’s more than likely going to slow you down. And if it’s especially cumbersome, you and your staff may not enjoy using it in your day-to-day. Look for intuitive features that are easy to learn and use.
  • Reliable customer support: When something goes wrong or you have questions, you need real help. Look for customer service teams that offer phone or email support, plus helpful resources for troubleshooting on your own.
  • Straightforward, affordable pricing: It can be hard to compare pricing across booking solutions because they use slightly different structures. Brands can charge a combination of subscription, booking, and transaction fees. Be sure to read all pricing details before signing up for a system so you understand exactly what you’ll be paying for.

Read more: Best tour operator software comparison guide

Bókun’s online booking system

Our online booking system, Bókun, is one of the most highly rated industry solutions — 4.7 stars — with an all-in-one toolkit built specifically for tour operators.

Bókun supports all areas of your operations with features to keep you organised, save you time, and help you run a more successful, profitable business. It has some of the most impressive growth drivers with 50+ global OTA integrations, our in-built reseller Marketplace with thousands of travel industry partners, and affiliate support. And we strive to make our solution accessible for all teams: it’s super easy to use and affordable for everyone.

Users love Bókun because we’re part of the Tripadvisor family (along with Viator) — two of the most long-standing, popular brands in the travel industry. All three systems work together, so you can leverage Tripadvisor and Viator’s massive audiences to promote your tours in front of new customers, and lean on Bókun to support all back-office operations. We even waive Bókun booking fees on Viator reservations so you can see more revenue from those reservations.

Our system also provides tour operators with premium integrations with major OTAs like GetYourGuide, Google Things to do, and Airbnb Experiences — helping to capture more bookings from travellers actively searching for tours across those platforms.

We have over 10 years of experience working with tour operators at all growth stages, from mom-and-pop shops just bringing their businesses online to enterprises looking for new avenues to fuel growth.

Our robust toolkit and support team can offer the guidance you need to drive long-term sustainable growth. And Bókun is built to scale — it’s equipped to support your evolving needs, no matter how many tours you run, channels you sell on, or customers you serve.

We offer a 14-day free trial (no credit card required!) for all tour operators to test our system and see if it’s the right fit — start your trial here!

Our complete toolkit

Our all-in-one toolkit includes:

  • Online booking engine widgets (compatible with all website builders)
  • One-click website builder with professional templates
  • Booking management with a central calendar & real-time availability updates
  • Channel management & 50+ OTA connections
  • The Bókun Marketplace with thousands of international travel partners
  • Partner & contract management tools
  • Referral Tracking to partner with affiliates
  • Product management with intuitive listing builders, dynamic pricing, upselling tools like add-ons, features to create combo packages, & Tripadvisor sync to feed reviews between platforms
  • Resource management with real-time tracking & a variety of allocation rules to optimise utilisation
  • Customer self-service portals
  • Check-in tools like mobile tickets & ticket scanning to streamline arrivals
  • Native CRM to capture customer information, build an organised database, & power retargeting
  • Automated communications with a gallery of email templates (to dispatch booking confirmations, mobile tickets, follow-ups, abandoned cart emails, & more)
  • Business intelligence reporting to measure bookings and revenue over various categories
  • Integrations with over a dozen online payment processing tools (Stripe, Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, Worldpay, Braintree, Klarna, etc.)
  • Mobile apps for iOS & Android

And all of these features are available in our START plan, so all tour operators have everything they need to run a well-oiled operation.

Bókun’s growth drivers

Bókun’s website builder and online booking engine widgets let you sell tours directly on your website — helping customers who already know about you or discover you on social media easily book their time slots.

In addition, we’ve also packed our system with growth drivers to help you get in front of new audiences and earn bookings from travellers around the world.

  • Our system connects with 50+ global OTAs — Viator, GetYourGuide, Google Things to do, Airbnb Experiences, Expedia, Trip.com, TourRadar, Hotelbeds, Headout, Tiqets, Civitatis, Klook, Manawa, Tourdesk, and more — so you can sell your tours on the sites travellers use to find and book travel experiences.

Online Travel Agencies GIF

  • Our in-built distribution network, Marketplace, includes thousands of travel and leisure businesses and is one of the largest reseller networks in the industry. Here, you can connect with travel agents, destination management companies, accommodation providers like hotels, resorts, and B&Bs, transportation services, rental companies, attractions, educational institutions, and other tour and activity providers like yourself to establish partnerships. You can work with resellers who will win bookings for you, resell others’ services to earn commissions, or create packages with partners. We provide all of the partner and contract management tools to facilitate these connections.
  • We’ve recently released Referral Tracking to give you more flexibility with partnerships. This tool lets you work with any business or professional of your choosing — social media influencers, travel bloggers, tourism boards, or other businesses in your local area — and earn bookings through affiliates. You can provide affiliates with their own dedicated booking hub or trackable booking links, so you can see who’s driving the most business for you.

Read more: 10 ways to get more tour reservations

Bókun’s ease of use

Bókun is designed for ease of use, so it requires zero training to get started.

  • Our website builder includes drag-and-drop templates so you can design a professional bookable site by choosing a template and customising each section to match your brand. You can rearrange sections however you like, and every template comes with pre-installed booking engine widgets. You can easily customise these widgets or add more wherever you like.
  • Adding payment processors takes seconds. Just head to Settings, select “Payment Providers,” and you’ll see all the tools we integrate with. Click the ones you want to use, log in or create an account, and you’re connected.
  • Our product builder walks you through creating tour listings step-by-step, guiding you through adding descriptions, itineraries, and photos; adding availability; setting pricing; creating combo packages; and offering add-ons.
  • The Sales Tools tab displays all OTAs we connect with, so you can select the platforms you want to integrate and follow the simple login steps to start selling on those channels.
  • Our Marketplace displays thousands of potential partners with search and filter options so you can quickly find businesses that complement your tours. All contract and partner management tools are built right in, so you can handle outreach and negotiations within Bókun. The system stores all your contracts and even sends renewal notifications to help you stay on top of your partner network.

If you ever need help, our Help dashboard provides guides and resources to help you find answers 24/7. And our customer service team is always available to assist if you get stuck.

Our reliable customer service

Our support team is available via chat, email, and phone to help any time you have issues or questions.

For enterprise customers on our PLUS and PREMIUM plans, we offer guided onboarding to help you get set up quickly and annual strategy calls to ensure you’re maximising Bókun’s features as your business grows.

We also provide a comprehensive Help Centre with guides, tutorials, and troubleshooting resources so you can find answers to common questions anytime you need them.

Bókun’s packages & pricing

We offer a 14-day free trial for all new customers to explore our platform and feel confident we’re the right choice.

After the trial period, you can upgrade to the START plan, which includes all the core features discussed above. This plan is available at $49/month with 1.5% online booking fees (the lowest in the category!). We waive Bókun booking fees on Viator reservations, and managing offline bookings in our system is always free.

We also offer two enterprise plans for those who need more advanced tools or customisation options. As mentioned, these packages include guided onboarding and a dedicated account manager who will provide annual strategy calls.

  • PLUS ($149/month with 1.25% online booking fees) expands upon the START plan with agent portals and Zapier.
  • PREMIUM ($499/month with 1% online booking fees) is our most comprehensive package, including subvendor management. This plan also comes with priority support.

Get started with an online booking system today!

Between helping you earn new customers and saving you countless hours on back-office admin work, booking systems quickly pay for themselves. They’re one of the most effective solutions you can invest in to drive continued growth — giving you the tools to scale operations, expand to new sales channels, and keep customers happy from booking through check-in.

Bókun is one of the best online booking systems for tour operators because we offer everything you need in one platform: a complete toolkit to manage your business, powerful growth drivers, user-friendly features that require zero training, and affordable pricing that works for teams at any stage.

Ready to see what Bókun can do for your business? Start your 14-day free trial today (no credit card required!) to see how the right booking system can be an absolute game-changer for your operations.

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