m-Travel.com and Travel Distribution News

Archives for May 2010

« April 2010 | June 2010 »

Facebook tops the 1000 most-visited sites list on the web

Google has released its latest list of the largest 1000 sites worldwide, based on Unique Visitors (users), as measured by Ad Planner. Facebook.com has topped the 1000 most-visited sites list on the web for April.

Facebook had 540,000,000 unique visitors, reach of 35.2% and 570,000,000,000 page views. 

The Ad Planner 1000 list is a list of the top 1,000 global sites on the web by unique users as measured by Ad Planner. Published monthly, this list details the number of unique visitors, page views and reach for each site for the top 1,000 sites globally.

Facebook was followed by Yahoo.com (490,000,000 unique visitors), live.com (370,000,000), wikipedia.org (310,000,000) and msn.com (280,000,000).

TripAdvisor was ranked 138th. It registered 18,000,000 unique visitors, had a reach of 1.2% and witnessed 410,000,000 page views. 

Expedia was ranked 193rd. It registered 14,000,000 unique visitors, had a reach of 0.9% and witnessed 500,000,000 page views.

| Comments (0)

Priceline to back its price guarantee with a $25 bounty

Online travel company Priceline.com says it has launched a ground-breaking Big Deal Hotel Price Guarantee for its Name Your Own Price hotel service.

With the launch of its Big Deal Guarantee, priceline.com is the first major online hotel reservation service to offer a $25 bounty to hotel customers who can find a lower price than what they paid for their reservations on priceline.com. 

If a customer books a Priceline Name Your Own Price hotel room and finds a better price any time up until the day before check-in, priceline.com will match that price, pay a $25 bounty and give the customer a $50 Priceline Vacation Package coupon. The company clarified that the offer covers hotels of at least two stars or higher. The $50 Vacation Package coupon is being offered to customers with a valid U.S. billing address. The $25 bounty will be paid as a refund to the customer’s credit card. 

“We believe that travellers want a hotel price guarantee with teeth,” said priceline.com’s chief marketing officer, Brett Keller. 

He added, “Priceline’s Big Deal Hotel Price Guarantee doesn’t just guarantee the lowest price. It guarantees that you’ll get a great deal, and we're backing that guarantee all the way up to the day before check-in.”

The company shared that in a recent internal study, priceline.com looked at Name Your Own Price hotel bookings for April 2010 in all star levels, and then compared those booked prices with the published rates available on Expedia, Travelocity and Orbitz for the same hotels and dates. The survey found that over 50% of the priceline.com customers saved at least 50% over competitors’ published nightly rates. All rates and prices used in the comparison excluded taxes and fees.

| Comments (0)

Ryanair launches free online travel guides

Ryanair has launched over 100 free online destination guides on www.ryanair.com.

The airline says it is offering passengers with information on “well known and not so well known Ryanair destinations”. Ryanair’s free destination guides are being offered in partnership with digital travel online content specialists Frommer’s Unlimited, the business-to-business division of Frommer’s (a branded imprint of Wiley).

The airline says these guides eliminate the need to waste hours researching a destination online with information on must see activities and tours, nightlife, local attractions, up-to-date events, food and drink, airport information, weather, maps and much more now available directly from www.ryanair.com.

These guides will be regularly updated to allow small local businesses to provide travel offers.

| Comments (0)

Gillian Bowler launches ClickandGo.com, kicks off price war

ClickandGo.com, a new Irish company, based in Dublin, has started its operations.

The company says it is offering a range of holidays across Spain, Portugal, France, the Canaries and Madeira at prices which are on average 33% lower than prices for the same holidays offered by other leading travel companies in Ireland at present. [33% lower per person = €166 average saving per person].

ClickandGo.com would facilitate holidaymakers who plan to book their entire package of flights, hotels and transport or who simply wanted to use the site to book different elements of their holidays.

The people behind the project are Gillian Bowler, Paul Hackett, Bob Haugh and Harry Sydner. All worked together in Budget Travel at some point in their careers. 

Gillian Bowler and Harry Sydner were the original founders of Budget Travel back in 1975. Other key figures in the new business include Haugh, chairman of The Travel Department and Eugene Corcoran, former managing director of Budget Travel. Hackett, former head of marketing at Budget Travel, will be the new company’s chief executive.

Differential factors

Gillian Bowler said that the new company was designed as a “next generation” travel business. 

“The Internet and the rise of self-packaged holidays has altered the face of the travel business forever. Traditional travel companies are still in denial but we want to set up a business which embraces the Internet and which makes it work for us and our customers,” said Bowler. 

Bowler also said that the new company would bring much needed competition to the holiday market in Ireland; “Between them TUI and Thomas Cook now control about 85% of the package holiday market in Ireland [300,000 of 350,000 charter flights expected this year]. The market is very uncompetitive and consumers are paying over the odds as a result. We want to challenge that cosy market and bring back real value and choice to Irish consumers.”

The company emphasised that it would be dealing directly with hotel and apartment operators abroad to book accommodation.

The company stated: “At ClickandGo.com, we have a smaller, much more manageable selection of hotels, aparthotels and apartments and all have been vetted either by Gillian Bowler herself or by members of our highly experienced staff.”

This is accommodation geared towards the Irish market with properties ranging from 2 to 5 star and with prices to suit every pocket. 

“We make our contracts directly with our agents abroad or directly with the relevant property in order to get the very best possible prices. This simply guarantees that any savings made can be passed directly on to you,” stated the company. 

The team says it has local contacts in every destination who can offer representation and assistance, if required.

| Comments (0)

Global GDS revenue in April rises 34.3% over 2009: Pegasus

Pegasus Solutions has reported a +34.3 percent global year-on-year increase in April 2010 revenue for bookings made through the global distribution systems (GDS).

The company says its April’s The Pegasus View further evidences a business travel recovery, citing GDS growth in both booking volumes (+27.4%) and average daily rate (+5.5%) year-on-year.

Combined, GDS and ADS bookings for the month were up +11.1% year to date, with future bookings made through September showing double-digit growth. This ongoing rise in booking volumes for both channels was again accompanied by a +30% jump in ADS availability requests and look-to-book ratios.

Eyjafjallajokull, for the most part, helped the hotel industry enjoy a significant increase in corporate bookings, ADR and revenue for the month; but ADR for leisure travel continues to lag behind last year, said Mike Kistner, chief executive officer of Pegasus Solutions.

He added, “We’re seeing encouraging rises in demand with sustained positive booking and revenue growth for leisure travel. However, the average of approximately +30% increases in availability requests since last year reinforces the importance of advanced hardware, applications and delivery models for hotels of all sizes to manage the onslaught of demand we’re experiencing.”

ADS data for April still indicated a +12.3% average increase in booking volumes, and a +5.3% increase in revenue year to date. Globally, GDS bookings were up +10.7% year to date, which, with an accompanying increase of +3.2% in ADR for the same period, allowed revenue to also increase 12.6% year-to-date.

 
| Comments (0)

eLong launches its mobile phone booking service

After months of testing, online travel company eLong has formally launched its mobile phone booking platform, m.eLong.com.

The company confirmed the same as it announced its first quarter results.

Users can log onto m.elong.com to make queries and book hotels and tickets. According to a report filed by chinahospitalitynews.com, eLong.com has been cooperating with Nokia and China Unicom on the mobile reservation business. The company’s mobile website was put into trial operation last year. According to eLong.com, information on its mobile website m.elong.com and its official website eLong.com are synchronised in real time. 

The development has emerged at a stage when the company has made a solid start to 2010 by expanding its domestic hotel coverage to over 11,200 domestic hotels and 100,000 international hotels, improving its package products to over 50 departure and 28 destination cities in China.

Expedia is reportedly planning to invest at least $50 million in China by the end of 2011 and is also looking for new acquisition targets in the latter half of this year. According to a report filed by People’s Daily Online, Dara Khosrowshahi, chief executive officer of Expedia, said that Expedia plans to gradually increase its investment in the Chinese market and does not rule out the possibility of purchasing other Chinese Internet enterprises.

| Comments (0)

Ovi Maps ties up with Qype

Ovi Maps, the free walk and drive navigation service from Nokia, has taken initiatives to deliver more relevant information on more points of interest making travelling easier than ever.

Ovi Maps now includes Qype, Europe’s biggest portal for local community-based reviews, helping people find new places wherever they are. Initially offering information on more than 20,000 cities, the Qype community enriches Ovi Maps with reviews and recommendations from locals and travelers on many European hotspots like cafes, shops, spas and hotels, giving the inside track before arriving.

In total, Ovi Maps now offers Nokia smartphone users access to more than 25 million points of interest worldwide.

Trips can be personalised and planned with map data from NAVTEQ and city guides from Lonely Planet, WCities and Michelin.

The latest version of Ovi Maps (3.04) is available to download for free from http://www.nokia.com/maps

| Comments (0)

Priceline’s EVP Corporate Development talks innovation, personalisation, acquisitions and growing market share

Online travel company Priceline.com continues to be in the news for the right reasons, be it for its performance in the first quarter or its recent acquisition of Manchester-based TravelJigsaw, a multinational car hire reservation service.

The company recently shared that its first-quarter net income more than doubled to $53.9 million, up from $25.0 million in the same period a year ago. The company’s international operations contributed revenues of $215.8 million, an 88.2 percent increase versus a year ago. Significantly, it believes that all of its brands continued to gain share in hotel reservations during the quarter.

Going by recent trends, top US online travel agencies have referred to the performance of their international business, hotel reservations and also advertising and media revenue as the highlights of their businesses.

Priceline.com’s executive vice president - Corporate Development, Glenn D. Fogel, says the success of the international business demonstrates that Internet penetration and usage is growing in other countries and offers significant opportunity.

In order to know more about the status of the industry, EyeforTravel’s Ritesh Gupta recently spoke to Fogel. Excerpts:

What has been the most striking or potentially path-breaking development from the travel sector in the last six months or so? Would you call it a real innovation at this stage? 

There are many small innovations going on all the time, particularly in the mobile area.  At Priceline, we have worked hard on developing mobile applications that are among the most popular free travel apps available.  The industry has been expecting big things from mobile and while the number of mobile transactions is still a very small portion of total transactions, these numbers have the potential to increase rapidly over the next several years.

What do you make of some of the new travel companies or start-ups which are emerging? Any area which you feel needs to be followed at this stage in the travel sector in terms of its potential or opportunity?  

I think that companies who are somehow connected to the mobile space are the ones I would keep an eye on.

Top US online travel agencies have referred to the performance of their international business, hotel reservations and also advertising and media revenue as the highlights of their business. Can you elaborate on what this says as far as the OTA business is concerned?

I think the success of international demonstrates that Internet penetration and usage is growing in other countries and offers opportunity.  While advertising and media represent ancillary revenue sources, there are still different schools of thought as to whether the presence of these messages helps or hinders travel transactions.

Priceline’s recent acquisition of TravelJigsaw is being described as a move that will strengthen Priceline’s European dominance of online hotel properties to the car rental market. Would it be right to say that online car rental is the last piece in the European online travel puzzle that will place Priceline ahead of its competitors? 

Well, I would start by pointing out that we believe that Priceline’s hotel-only subsidiary Booking.com is already the number one player in total online travel in Europe.  Regarding the TravelJigsaw acquisition, we are pleased to be working with Greg Wills, the CEO, and his team and look forward to working with them as we try to build the best rental car business that we can.

Recently, a Google executive told me: delivering the best available, the most compelling offers exactly at the time of searching continues to be the biggest opportunity that both search engines and providers (suppliers and aggregators) are preoccupied with. The biggest unsolved problem therefore becomes this: how can we reduce the time to perfect fulfilment of the users’ online travel needs? What’s your take on this? 

As a consumer of online travel, I agree wholeheartedly with the Google executive’s belief that the consumer does not want to waste time. 

I, personally, want to spend as little as time as possible to get what I want in terms of travel services. 

Unfortunately, that “holy grail” of the perfect search return has not been found yet and I think that given the tremendous complexity of the problem, the issue won’t be completely solved for a long time.  While there is improvement all the time in this area, many times the consumer’s  search results are not what the consumer wanted.  Thankfully, most of us are beyond presenting deals written in English that have a departure from Manchester to people who are on a site written in Italian and live in Milano.

The travel industry has witnessed a series of initiatives over the past few months resulting in more customisable offerings. How do you think e-commerce in the travel sector has moved towards personalisation? 

It is getting better but I think it can be improved.  No travel service knows me well enough yet to make algorithmically driven suggestions that would be correct a high percentage of the time.  Of course, part of the issue is many people don’t want to have all of their interests, history, etc. accessible by businesses.  The privacy issue is an interesting one as we all want personalised service but are reluctant at times to provide the personal data that is needed to create such a service.

Would it be right to say that the travel industry has always placed adoption of new technology at the bottom of the priority list? In this context, do you think the development of a mobile website is often overlooked as the foundational step of being engaged in the Mobile space? 

I disagree.  I think the fact that travel companies are investing in mobile even though the number of mobile based transactions are relatively low at this time shows that travel companies are not tech laggards.

Facebook reached an important milestone for the week ending March 13, 2010 as it surpassed Google in the US to become the most visited website for the week. Recently, there were indications that easyJet is planning to introduce an e-commerce section on Facebook.  How do you expect the power of social media to nudge ahead of some of the traditional online travel booking and planning channels? 

We and others strive to attract customers in the most cost efficient manner.  If that means interacting on social network or social media sites, then that is what we and others will (and some currently) do.  However, the idea of social media is it is media driven by the masses not by the professional few. 

Social media is simply word of mouth amplified exponentially through a digitized network.  Therefore, it is difficult for a single company to try to direct or influence the conversation through conventional means such as advertising on a social metric site. 

In the end, the most powerful way to enable social media to increase sales is to have a good service.  For example, when I search through Twitter using “Priceline” as the keyword, I see huge numbers of tweets by real customers who are bragging about the 40%, 50% or even more savings they achieved using our Name-Your-Own-Price product.  This is a perfect example of social media driving the message that the service is good.

Glenn Fogel is the opening keynote speaker at EyeforTravel’s flagship event, Travel Distribution Summit Europe 2010. The two-day event will feature 100 speakers, rpresenting leading companies such as Expedia, Priceline, Kuoni, lastminute.com, British Airways, Nokia, Facebook, Google, BA, IHG and many more.

For more information, click here:

Or contact:

Simon Carkeek
Executive Director
+44 (0) 207 375 7181
simon@eyefortravel.com 

| Comments (0)

Why social media won’t “nudge ahead” of travel booking and planning channels?

IN-DEPTH: Interview with Doug Miller, Global VP, Media Solutions, Expedia

Online media owners say travel marketers need to look at online advertising more holistically.

It is strongly believed that combining brand and direct response together online is the key to success. In fact, it is also being highlighted that traditionally, online has been held to a much more stringent metric than offline channels and it is often bought with a very fragmented approach.

EyeforTravel’s Ritesh Gupta recently spoke to Doug Miller, Global VP, Media Solutions, Expedia about the last-click model, the social media vs travel booking and planning channels debate and lot more. Excerpts:  

It is acknowledged that advertisers favoured online channels over the last couple of years. How do you assess the current approach towards online advertising?

Doug Miller: I think the last-touch model favoured by travel marketers is flawed. It disproportionately rewards low-funnel impressions or clicks from search engines and ad networks.  Travel marketers are currently ignoring 80 percent or more of the online touch points that lead to a conversion.  For example, we know that a great number of travelers shop Expedia before booking somewhere else.  If you discover the Fairmont Orchid on Expedia, spend 20 minutes reading reviews and determining that it’s right for you, then bounce to a search engine before booking somewhere else, did Expedia help make the sale?  Of course, but the last-click model ignores the influencers.  Leading travel marketers, ad agencies and technology firms are on a path to overcome the challenge, and deliver more holistic views, but these changes will take time.  As these solutions come online, and multi-touch attribution is increasingly possible, it will bring more travel marketing dollars online, and change the online mix.

According to SEM specialist, Greenlight, search as a standalone channel can be great for delivering high ROIs and tight CPA, due to its ability to target at a very granular and specific level. However, as a branding tool, it is not so efficient and depending on the industry, an advertiser’s ability to convert high core generic activity may actually depend on their brand being recognisable outside of the Search environment. What’s your take on this? 

Doug Miller: Like search engines, Expedia and Hotels.com help travellers discover hotels through search.  Our experience suggests strong travel brands tend to convert better at the point-of-sale.  Moreover, strong travel brands also enjoy improved billboard effects from OTA point-of-sale advertising.  One study for a top global hotel brand showed a 191 percent increase in direct-bookings among travel shoppers exposed to point-of-sale ads.

There are many independent hotels that don’t spend much on brand building beyond Search or OTA point-of-sale marketing.  If these brands execute flawlessly, deliver a great travel experience, the customer will develop positive associations with the brand.   On the other hand, a brand can be hyper-relevant in Search, and fail in execution, and the customer will develop a negative association with the brand.  Consider Search an amplifier, rather than enabler, of both good and bad branding.  If the full experience is positive, Search will help drive more positive brand experiences.  If the experience is negative, Search will just drive more negative experiences.

Facebook reached an important milestone for the week ending March 13, 2010 as it became the most visited website for the week. How do you expect the power of social media to nudge ahead of some of the traditional online travel booking and planning channels especially with integration of real-time feeds from Facebook and Twitter on search engines? 

Doug Miller: It’s funny to think of online travel channels as “traditional.”  That happened fast.  I feel so yesterday.  

My view is that travel booking and planning sites lead in aggregating travel intention data.  What does that mean?  For several years now, Federate Media’s John Battelle has talked about search engines creating a massive “Database of Intentions.”  All our Google searches, aggregated together, can tell us a great deal about what we want.  More recently, John has gone on to suggest that sites like Facebook add who I am and who I know to the database of intentions.  Sites like Expedia, Amazon and eBay add signals about what I buy, and so on.  Travellers browse, search and buy with Expedia sites.  They signal through our channels “here’s the travel I want” and “here’s the travel I will buy” on a global scale.  

Therefore, I don’t believe that social media will “nudge ahead” of travel booking and planning channels.  Rather, search, social and commerce channels will become more and more complementary, and new partnerships will form, as intention signals accelerate to fuel online media and commerce.  The signals of “here’s the travel I want” and “here are the people I know” will find new ways of working together to improve travel planning and booking.  Travelers get more relevant offers and travel marketers will discover new opportunities.  These models are coming around the corner. 

Marketers including ones from hotels admit that many advertisers have actually switched their offline advertising to online, which has resulted in an increase in CPC. In many search terms, they are now competing with twice as many advertisers as they used to. It is becoming much harder to achieve high ROIs and they now have to focus more on long tail terms as generics are just not a viable option anymore. How do you assess the situation?

Doug Miller: Generics haven’t been viable for a lot of players for a long time because of poor conversion, which is sometimes a function of poor or limited supply.  Supplier-direct is going to have a harder time converting a customer on generic terms than a reseller because of breadth of selection.  This doesn’t preclude many from trying, though, for better or worse.  Sometimes, a supplier can make up the conversion gap with better margin and add-on revenue, but not always.

The long tail is just getting longer.  To manage it, you have to have significant ability to scale your programmes and the ability to manage bids through ambiguity and data sparseness.  It’s difficult to set a bid for keywords that get a click every other week or month. It’s even harder to bid millions of keywords like this.

Oversimplifying, suppliers have two choices – spend on salaries & marketing dollars directly against acquiring these more expensive conversions or allow resellers to bear the burden and cost.   It’s a simple break-even analysis for them.  Plus, hotels can now even bid for premium search placement on Expedia and Hotels.com through our TravelAds auction platform.  It’s just a matter of where resellers are most comfortable with yield management – through Google or their partners’ marketplaces.

Video is a growing area, with strengths and weaknesses.  Watching a video takes time and you can’t skim or filter them very easily to find the ones most relevant to you but there’s always that old saying that a picture speaks louder than words.  The ability to share what a hotel actually looks like, what another traveler actually experienced, is incredibly powerful. How do you assess the current investment benchmarks and RoI?

Doug Miller: The next real innovation for online travel selling lies at the intersection of creativity and technology.  We need to invest more here.  We often overlook the emotional drivers of shopping and transactions.  Today, selling travel online is very rational and linear.  By contrast, video and forms of online rich media allow brands to connect emotionally and aesthetically with customers - to tell stories.  Hawaii and San Diego gained material share on Expedia using point of sale sight, sound and motion media, our StorePoint Expandables programme.  Likewise, Bing’s visual search has great potential in travel.

I’m a big fan of Kevin Roberts of Saatchi & Saatchi.  I think he’s right about screens and the power of sight, sound and motion to move us to act.  Roberts suggests that stories – told with sight, sound and motion – are the way through information overload.  When stories are set against information, the story wins.  I agree, and we all have work to do in travel.   

Behaviour analytics help in understanding and predicting customers’ desires and to more effectively serve relevant content and products in real time, ultimately increasing satisfaction and conversion. How do you assess the adoption of behaviour analytics at this stage?

Doug Miller: This is the future of digital travel marketing.  Travel marketers want to connect with known travel shoppers, especially during the window that they’re “in-market” to book.  Remarketing based on recent browsing and shopping behaviors makes this possible, and it works.  Travel marketers can reach travelers in the vacation planning and shopping process with point of sale marketing, and if they don’t book right then, marketers can now extend campaigns across the Internet.  The practice of remarketing is rapidly accelerating in travel.  Moreover, it’s converging with real-time ad buying, dynamic-creative solutions and SEM science.  It’s an exciting time.  

Online Marketing Strategies for Travel USA 2010 Conference 

Doug Miller, Global VP, Media Solutions, Expedia, is scheduled to speak at the Online Marketing Strategies for Travel USA conference which will take place in Miami (2-3 June).

For more information, click here

Or contact:

Gina Baillie
VP Global Marketing & Events
+44 (0) 207 375 7197 (UK)
gina@eyefortravel.com

| Comments (0)

Travelocity offers exclusive $150 promo code via Facebook

Travelocity has come up with an interesting campaign on Facebook. The online travel company, along with Virgin Atlantic Airways, Sol Melia Hotels and American Express, is seeking participation from Facebook users.

As the Travelocity Roaming Gnome gets to fly on Virgin Atlantic’s first flight of the season from Chicago to London on May 27, Travelocity is offering a limited time $150 promo code on vacation packages of four or more nights to London. 

The flight+hotel package includes Virgin Atlantic airfare and hotel accommodations by the Melia White House London. 

Gaining access to the code is simply a matter of “liking” The Travelocity Roaming Gnome on Facebook. Once completed, those who “like” The Roaming Gnome will be able to find the exclusive promo code in the “Travel Insider” tab on his Facebook page. To use the code for one of these packages to London, travel must be booked with any American Express Card by June 30, 2010 and travel to London must be completed by December 31, 2010. 

“Once The Roaming Gnome reaches London, he will have a few days to unwind before heading back to the United States. He plans to tour a host of London sites, both on and off the beaten path, chronicling his adventures on the social Web. He also plans to organise a “TweetUp” at the Melia White House London, his host hotel,” stated a release. 

“Then on Friday, June 4, follow The Roaming Gnome and Virgin Atlantic on Twitter and check out their first “Twitterview,” a conversation between The Roaming Gnome and Virgin Atlantic’s Senior Vice President of North America, Chris Rossi, where the Gnome will discuss his trip, in flight experiences and journeys across the pond.”

| Comments (0)