Booking site: online booking beside the website you already have
A booking site is Solidres for a property that already has a website. Your website stays where it is, on WordPress, Wix, Squarespace or with your agency; Solidres runs beside it, on an address of its own such as book.your-hotel.com, and shows the booking pages only: the property page with the search bar, the rooms, extras, checkout, the confirmation and the guest's My bookings. A Book now button or a booking form on your website sends guests there, and every page of the booking site links back to your website.
Nothing else changes. Rooms, rates, extras, payment methods, emails and the back office are exactly the same as on a full Solidres website, and you can switch between the two shapes at any time.
PREREQUISITES:
- Solidres 4.5.0 or later, in any edition, including the free one
- A website elsewhere that the booking site will link back to
- Optional: the Lumina template 1.1.2 or later, which has a header made for the booking site
On this page:
- How it works
- Switching to a booking site
- What changes on the site
- Its own address
- Search engines
- The booking form on your website
- Switching back
- Troubleshooting
How it works
Solidres has two site shapes, set in Solidres Options under the Website tab:
- Website, the default: this site is the property's website, with its pages, menu and footer. It is what every Solidres site has been so far.
- Booking site: the property already has a website elsewhere. This site shows the booking pages only, links back to that website and asks search engines not to list it.
The guest's booking always happens on the booking site, in its own window. The form on your website only sends the guest there with the search made; it never books inside your website's page. That is why it works with every website builder and every browser: there is no cross-site session to keep, no third-party cookie to allow, and a payment gateway returns to the booking site as it always has.
Switching to a booking site
Open Solidres Options (the Solidres menu → System → Options) and go to the Website tab.
- Set Site shape to Booking site.
- Enter the Main website: the address of your own website, such as
https://www.seaview-hotel.com. The booking site's header links back to it. Leave it empty for no link. - Optionally enter a Main website name: how the link back names your website, as in Back to Seaview Hotel. Left empty, the link shows the website's address.
- Leave Let search engines list the booking site off unless you want the booking pages in search results; see Search engines.
- Save.
Switching installs and removes nothing: your menus, modules and pages are still there, and switching back shows them again.
What changes on the site
With the Lumina template
Lumina 1.1.2 knows the shape. On a booking site its header shows your logo, linked to your main website, and a Back to link in place of the menu. The hero and the footer columns are not shown, and the booking bar stays pinned at the top of the property page. The modules in those positions stay published, so switching back to Website brings them back as they were.
With another template
Any Joomla template can run a booking site. Solidres shows the Back to link above the property page; the template's own header, menu and footer are yours to slim down, for example by unpublishing the menu module on the booking site's pages.
On every template
- The link to our home page on the final page, and in the messages shown when a payment fails or a booking awaits approval, goes to your main website rather than to the booking site's own front page.
- If your website already presents the property, switch on Show only reservation form in the property's settings: its page on the booking site then shows the booking form and the rooms only, without repeating the name, description and photos your website has. The page keeps a heading for screen readers and search engines.
- The Getting started checklist on a new booking site replaces its Review your website pages step with Put the booking form on your website, which ticks when the first search arrives through the form.
Its own address
A booking site usually lives on a subdomain of your website's domain: book.your-hotel.com, reservations.your-hotel.com or similar. Guests see your name in the address bar, and the link back to your website is a link to the same domain.
That is a hosting and DNS matter, not a Solidres setting: install Joomla and Solidres on the host of your choice, point the subdomain at it, and give it an HTTPS certificate as you would any site. Solidres needs nothing more; the form you paste into your website takes its addresses from the booking site itself.
NOTE Use HTTPS on the booking site. Your website is almost certainly served over HTTPS, and a browser will not load a script or submit a form from a secure page to an insecure one.
Search engines
By default a booking site asks search engines not to list its pages: every page carries noindex, follow. Your main website then stays the one result for your property's name, and the booking site does not compete with it in search results. Links are still followed, so the booking site keeps passing on the links it carries.
If you do want the booking pages listed, for example because the booking site is the only site you have for a while, switch on Let search engines list the booking site in the Website tab. A Robots setting made in a menu item or in Joomla's Global Configuration still comes first, whichever way the option is set.
The booking form on your website
The booking site is reached from your website through the booking form: a search bar with dates, guests and rooms, or a single Book now button, that opens the booking site's property page with the search made. The Solidres menu → System → Booking form gives the code to paste and the booking page's address for a button your website builder makes itself. How to put the Solidres booking form on your website covers it, including what works on WordPress.com and Wix.
Switching back
Set Site shape back to Website and save. The menu, hero and footer modules show again, the pages are listed by search engines again, and the form on your website keeps working, since it points at the property page either way.
Troubleshooting
There is no link back to my website
Main website in the Website tab is empty, or holds something that is not a web address. Enter the full address, starting with https://.
Google still lists the booking site
Search engines drop a page some time after they next read it and find noindex; days to weeks. Check the page's source for <meta name="robots" content="noindex, follow">. If it reads index, a menu item or Global Configuration sets Robots explicitly and wins over the option.
The header still shows the menu
With Lumina, update it to 1.1.2 or later: older versions do not know the shape. With another template, the header is the template's; unpublish the menu module on the booking site's pages, or leave it, since the Back to link shows above the property page anyway.