Every booking that lands through Pitchup, the Caravan and Motorhome Club, or one of the big listing sites costs you something before the guest has even pulled onto the pitch. Commission on portal bookings typically runs somewhere between 10% and 20% of the booking value, and it comes off the top whether the stay was three nights or three weeks. Multiply that across a season and it's not a rounding error, it's real money that never reaches your bank account. Getting more direct bookings for your campsite is one of the few changes you can make that improves your margin without raising your prices or adding a single extra pitch.

None of this means you should drop the portals. They're brilliant for getting new guests to discover you in the first place. The trick is making sure that once someone has stayed with you, or once someone finds you through a plain Google search, booking direct is the obvious, easy choice rather than something only the most determined guests bother to figure out.

Why Direct Bookings Matter More Than People Think

It's easy to treat portal commission as the cost of doing business and move on. But think about what that percentage actually buys you. Early on, when nobody knows your site exists, it's paying for visibility you couldn't get any other way. Once you've got a base of guests who already know and like your site, that same commission is being paid on bookings you'd probably have got anyway, just for the convenience of a search box the guest didn't strictly need.

A useful habit is checking what proportion of your bookings come through each channel. If you're already using CampSuite, your reports and insights break this down automatically, so you can see at a glance whether direct bookings are creeping up or portal reliance is creeping up instead. Sites that track this number tend to shift the mix over a season or two, not overnight, but the direction matters more than the speed.

Make Booking Direct the Easy Option, Not the Hidden One

Ask most campsite owners if guests can book direct and the answer is usually yes, technically. There's a phone number on the website, or an email address, or a form that sends an enquiry rather than actually confirming a pitch. That's not a direct booking system, it's an obstacle course, and most guests will take the path of least resistance back to whichever portal brought them to you in the first place.

A proper online booking system on your own website changes that completely. Guests see real-time availability, pick their pitch, pay a deposit or in full, and get a confirmation, all without you lifting a finger or picking up the phone. If your site runs on WordPress, CampSuite's WordPress plugin drops a live booking calendar straight into your existing pages, and if you don't have a website at all yet, the website builder gets you a bookable site without needing to hire a developer. Either way, the goal is the same: someone who's already decided to stay with you shouldn't have to wait for a reply to an email to make it official.

Give Guests a Reason to Choose Direct Over the Portal

Price parity clauses on some portals stop you undercutting them openly, but there's still plenty you can offer a direct booker that a portal booking can't match. A small discount for booking direct is common and usually within the rules, but it's not the only lever. Being able to pick an exact pitch rather than just a pitch type, adding an early check-in or a welcome pack, or simply replying to a direct enquiry faster than a portal message thread ever moves, all give a guest a reason to come to you first next time.

The guests most worth winning over are the ones who've already stayed. If someone booked their first visit through a portal and had a great time, that's exactly the moment to make sure they know they can book straight through you next time, at no disadvantage and often with a small perk for doing so. It costs you nothing to mention it on their departure, and it's the single easiest direct booking you'll ever win.

Turn One-Time Portal Guests Into Repeat Direct Bookers

This is where most of the real opportunity sits. A guest who found you through a portal is still, from that point on, your guest. What happens after they leave decides whether they book direct next year or go back to searching portals from scratch. Automated guest communications that follow up after a stay, remind returning guests when it's worth booking early for peak weeks, or simply say thank you and invite them back, keep your site front of mind without you having to remember to do it manually for every guest who's ever stayed.

We've written more on turning first time visitors into repeat guests if you want the fuller picture, but the short version is this: repeat guests almost always book direct if you make it easy, because they already trust you and they've got no reason to wade through a portal listing again.

Get Found on Google Without Paying a Portal for the Introduction

A good chunk of the guests currently booking through portals would happily book direct if they'd found you first through a plain Google search instead. That means your own visibility matters just as much as your booking system. Keeping your Google Business Profile accurate, having a website that actually answers the questions a searching guest has, pitch types, pricing, what's nearby, and making sure your site is fast and easy to use on a phone all move you up the results guests actually click on. We've covered this in more depth in our guide to getting your campsite found on Google, and in tips for a website that actually converts visits into bookings.

None of this replaces a listing on the big portals, and it shouldn't. It just means fewer guests need to go through one to find you in the first place.

Keep the Portals, Just Make Them Work Harder For You

Dropping portal listings altogether is rarely the right call, especially for a smaller CL or CS site still building up its own following. What's worth avoiding is the double booking risk that comes from running several channels alongside your own site by hand. A channel manager that keeps availability synced across Pitchup, the clubs, and your own booking page automatically means you can lean into every channel without the admin nightmare of updating five calendars every time a pitch gets booked. Our channel manager guide covers how that works in more detail if you're weighing it up.

The Bottom Line

You don't need to choose between portals and direct bookings, and you shouldn't try to force guests off channels they're comfortable with. What actually moves the needle is making direct booking effortless for anyone who's already decided to stay with you, and giving repeat guests a genuine reason to skip the portal next time. Do that consistently over a season or two and the proportion of bookings you keep the full value of climbs on its own.

If you're still taking direct bookings by phone and email while paying full commission everywhere else, sign up for CampSuite's free plan and get a proper booking system on your own site in about 15 minutes. It's free for up to 100 pitches, and there's no card required to get started.