- ✓A small business in Latvia reaches tourists when it can be found, understood and booked at the moment a guest decides. That means a clear price per person, free times visible online, an online booking with a direct link and independent reviews. No single channel does this alone: portals, social media, AI agents and the business's own website each do one part of the job.
- ✓Online sales in Latvia: 34.1% of hotels, cafes and restaurants sell online, against 40.7% in the EU (Eurostat 2025, isoc_ec_eseln2, sales in 2024, 10+ employees)
- ✓Outside the count: Spas and saunas are not included in these Eurostat numbers
- ✓Phone and message bookings: Protected from a second booking only once they are entered in the calendar
- ✓AI agents today: Read real free times and send the guest to book on the business's own site; booking and paying inside the chat is coming soon
01What a small business wants from tourists
The owner of a pirts near Riga, a pottery studio in Old Riga or a canoe rental on the Gauja wants a simple thing. When the season comes, the free hours should fill with guests who found the place on their own. Ideally without a long chain of calls and messages.
Those guests are not only foreign visitors. Locals in Riga and its suburbs are changing their habits too. They look for something new in their own city, a weekend close to home, a gift or an evening for two, and they want to find it, see the price and book in a minute.
02Where Latvia stands online
Eurostat figures give a sense of the starting point. In Latvia, 34.1% of hotels, cafes and restaurants sell online, against 40.7% across the EU (Eurostat 2025, dataset isoceceseln2, businesses with 10 or more employees, sales in 2024). Spas and saunas are not counted in these numbers.
So the businesses that guests remember most from a trip, a pirts evening, a tasting, a workshop, often sit outside the online picture. Many still take bookings by phone, WhatsApp or Instagram messages.
03The problem in one line
The guest's plan is made before anyone checks whether the business can take them. A business whose free times and booking cannot be seen online drops out at the exact moment the guest chooses.
04Paths that exist, and what each can do
There is no single channel that brings tourists. Each path does one part of the job, and each has limits.
Tourism portals and city guides. They describe places well and help guests discover them. Booking from them often still means a call or an email. A Book button with real free times on tourism portals is coming soon from BookBaltic, with the same terms for every business.
Experience marketplaces. They reach travellers who book experiences before they arrive. Listing there takes time, and the calendar on each one has to be kept in line with the business's own. Showing a business's free times on these platforms through BookBaltic is coming soon.
Social media and messages. Instagram and WhatsApp bring warmth and trust. But booking through messages is slow for a guest deciding at night, and a booking taken by phone or message is protected from a second booking only once it is entered in the calendar.
The business's own website. This is the base everything else points to. What helps most is concrete: a price per person next to the price for two, free times written out in text, an online booking and a direct link to it. These are the things a guest, or an AI assistant searching on a guest's behalf, needs to confirm before choosing a place.
AI agents. Agents can only send a guest to a place they can confirm. BookBaltic connects a calendar such as Google Calendar, a booking system or a website to a directory that AI agents read. Today agents read real free times and send the guest to book on the business's own site; booking and paying inside the chat is coming soon. A time booked on one connected channel closes on the others.
Independent reviews. It is worth collecting reviews on independent sites, not only on the business's own page. A guest comparing places looks for opinions the business did not write itself.
None of these paths guarantees a place in an AI answer or on any listing. What they do is remove the reasons a guest or an assistant would skip the business.
05A small example
Say a guest asks an assistant for a pirts evening for four near Riga on Saturday. The assistant can suggest places it has heard of. It can only send the guest straight to a booking where it can see a price for four, a free Saturday evening and a page where that time can be chosen. Everything else stays a suggestion that the guest has to check by phone.
06What every business can do before the season
- ✓Write the price per person next to the price for two or for a group.
- ✓Show free times on the website in plain text, not only inside a picture or a message.
- ✓Offer online booking with a choice of time and a direct link to it.
- ✓Enter every phone and message booking in the calendar straight away.
- ✓Ask happy guests to leave a review on an independent site.
- ✓Check the business the way a guest would: ask an AI assistant about it and see where the link leads.
This is what the digitalisation of Baltic tourism looks like at the level of one small place: guests, foreign and local, find it, understand it and book it without a call.
Businesses that want AI agents to see their real free times can connect to BookBaltic.
Questions and answers
Do small businesses need their own website to reach tourists?+
It helps a lot. Portals, social media and AI assistants all point guests somewhere, and a page with prices, free times and an online booking is the place where a guest can actually decide and book.
Are tourists the only guests worth reaching online?+
No. Locals in Riga, Tallinn and Vilnius also look for new experiences close to home and want to book quickly without calling, so the same online steps serve them too.
Does connecting to BookBaltic change how guests pay?+
No. The guest always books and pays on the business's own site, and the business stays the seller. BookBaltic connects to the calendar or booking system the business already uses.