When a destination proudly hosts giant vegetable contests and bog snorkelling championships, you know you’re not dealing with a boring tourism brief.

In this episode of Destination Unknown: A Destination Website Podcast by DestinationCore, host Neil Prentice is joined by Will Wright and Jay Pratt to tackle one of the most common - and most misunderstood - requests in destination marketing: “We need our website to be more bookable.”

After a return visit to Malvern’s giant vegetable competitions and a detour into the wonderfully odd World Bog Snorkelling Championships in Llanwrtyd Wells, the team get practical about what bookability really means for a destination website, why payments are such a sticking point, and the different technical and strategic routes DMOs, BIDs and place partnerships can take.

Drawing on years of working with destinations of all sizes, they break “bookability” down into clear, usable concepts - from simple embedded widgets through to full availability search across multiple providers.

In this episode, we explore:

• What “bookability” actually means for a destination website: checking price and availability for specific dates, even if payment happens elsewhere

• Why most destination organisations can’t (and usually shouldn’t) become full tour operators - including package travel regulations, insurance and PCI compliance

• The difference between truly bookable OTAs (like Expedia or Booking.com) and destination sites that act as smart facilitators and signposts

• Two main approaches to bookability:

  • Embeddable booking widgets (e.g. GetYourGuide, FareHarbor, Viator, rail and ticketing partners) that let users search, select and pay without visually leaving your site

  • Aggregated availability search, where your site queries multiple booking systems to show what’s available for chosen dates, then passes users through to providers to complete the transaction

• How embedded widgets can keep users on your site, support better visitor journeys and even generate affiliate revenue for the destination

• How aggregated search can support direct bookings for members, strengthen the value of partnership schemes and reduce reliance on online travel agencies

• The operational realities destinations need to plan for: managing provider sign-up, keeping data accurate, and deciding how far down the booking journey you realistically want to go

• Why booking technology providers need to modernise, and what destinations should be asking for from their partners

• How bookability connects back to your core objective: moving people from browsing to visiting, with as little friction and distraction as possible

If you’re being asked to “make the site more bookable” - whether you’re planning a new platform or evolving an existing one - this episode will help you define what that really means, choose the right level of ambition for your destination, and design booking journeys that genuinely support both your visitors and your local businesses.