Astonishment report from ITB PhoCusWright Bloggers Summit. Part 1
March 14, 2008
I want to share with you some sentences that resonate to me during the PhoCusWright conference in ITB Berlin 2008.
It’s a little bit “telegraphic post” but I think a way to make a synthesis and digesting the information overload.
Feel free to share you thoughts in the comments section.
C.Wolf - CEO PhoCusWright
Unlimited choice online
PPC and PPA are the trend
Social Media have shift the power to consumers
Lastminute
Where do you seat, in mass market or niche market, because in the middle your death !
The brand is the key
Expedia
Monetize traffic as search engine do
From OTA model to media model
How suppliers appear in the result
How they have their presentation
Charge for listing
Charge for placement
Daniel Mancini - Costa Criosière
Second Life it’s an other social media, could be a new contact center
The problem is to have manage Web 2.0 (answers questions, following conversations, human resources, time)
Tom Klein - Sabre
Online behaviours changes : meteroric rise in social media & media sharing sites
Launches www.cubeless.com (a travel social media for travel corporate users) in partnership with American Express and integrated with VirtuallyThere tool and GetThere multi GDS Booking engine
Introduce & interact with people
People + Tools + Process = the futur
Tina Fitch - EzRez
Global Reservation Systems Tomorrow: An intelligent universal network that can map the convergence of supply and demand patterns.
Attention profiling, leading to data portability
More efficient spend, more focus, more results
Issues :
data portability
Data privacy
Acceptation by users
Acceptation by keys players in the industry
My thoughts:
Privacy Controls as the Key to Data Portability
Data portability - taking your archives and friends from one site to another. Nice idea with great maketing potential. We already see something happen in other industry (Open ID, Dataportability project), why not in the travel industry?
Do you like to see a universal identity? Do you trust this vision?
Trivago: interview with Ulrike Pithan (P&R manager)
March 13, 2008
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During my trip to ITB Berlin and the PhoCusWright Bloggers Summit, I meet Ulrike Pithan (P&R manager for Trivago).
She give us some informations about Trivago and their new service for hoteliers: trivago hotelier
>Ulrike, can you tell some information about you and Trivago?
Trivago was founded in 2005 by Rolf Schrömgens, Malte Siewert and Peter Vinnemeier. Their concept was to create a site where travellers can find all the information they need to plan their trips and share their travel experiences with others. Over the years trivago has developed a 45,000 strong European-wide community. Apart from travel reports, guides, tips and reviews trivago offers an extensive hotel price search engine which enables travelers to find ideal accommodation at the lowest available rate in 265,000 hotels worldwide. I joined the trivago team about a year ago and am very happy and excited to work in an international young team of 21 employees where new ideas are always welcome.
>Can you give us some highlights and stats about Trivago and the Trivago travel community!
The site currently stores 150,000 hotel reviews, 1.6 million photos and information on 50,000 tourist attractions, generating 2.5 million visits and over 10 million page views a month. The trivago community is involved in the content management of the site: it takes over administrative functions, sets up criteria for the content gathered on trivago and it engages in its own projects, like the collection of geographical data on trivago. As a member on trivago your level of responsibility rises with your amount of activivity and your level of experience.
> Tourism is a people business and a destination experience with personal encounters. Do you think the community can leverage a destination or a product thanks a web site and tools like Trivago?
Absolutely. trivago offers independent travel information and first-hand experience to travellers which will, of course, influence their travel decisions. You get the whole range of information about a hotel or destination on trivago: reviews, travel guides, pictures, the hotel’s catalogue text and reviews of external sources, all gathered by the community. Interestingly tourist offices have realised the influence of travel portals like trivago on regional tourism and have started recommending trivago to their customers.
>For community travel and hotel user reviews, do you feel something is different between the european customers and countries.
The trivago community regards itself as international. Members of trivago communicate cross-nationally with each other and discuss ideas on trivago. It’s rather the concept of trivago that unites them than their nationality. In our regular international online surveys we are always suprised though about the divergent results. These reviews often show how national tastes for travel can differ. Our most recent survey on holiday sicknesses revealed that only a third of British and French travellers feel fine while on holidays and that the French suffer most from depressions on holiday.
> Some news about Trivago for France market?
Trivago France recently launched our new service for hoteliers: trivago hotelier (www.hotelier.trivago.fr or www.hotelier.trivago.com). With this service we want to give hoteliers the possibility to react to hotel reviews, to state their own point of view and get into contact with guests. Hoteliers can write about news and offers in their hotel blog, upload as many pictures as they like and manage the information about their hotel on trivago.
Thanks Ulrike.
My thoughts: very intelligent move this service for hoteliers.
I guess they will love it compare the TripAdvisor process 
If you want to dowload the Trivago french presentation for hotelier, Download file“>it’s here (sorry in french)
Here or There - Are we there yet?
March 12, 2008
The PhoCusWright@ITB Bloggers summit gave bloggers exclusive press time with a number of travel industry executives. Hugo Burge, Vice-Chairman & Head of International at CheapFlights was one of the presenters at the bloggers briefings. He was talking about a new ‘experience inspiration’ tool that he is working on as a side project, Here or There.
This new site is focused on travel experience sharing as opposed to travel transportation and accommodation selling. This reminds me of the 4 steps that Joe Buhler identified (Dream, Learn, Plan, Go) in my Expert Interview, and it is good to see more focus on the dream stage in travel preparation.
His site monetizes itself with ‘targeted’ Google ads, and currently does not send any referrals to travel suppliers. Hugo believes that “Pay per click is the new commission.” It is hard to argue with his success, but with many sites starting to combine all of the steps in the travel planning process (Isango sort of comes to mind) and with the never ending increase in niche and fragmented communities, it seems like a challenge to force people to utilize even more sites and tools, when there is the potential to facilitate the entire booking process in one site.
If Hugo was to add some top level tabs that isolate the various steps in the booking process, giving each a distinctive look and feel, I am sure that customers would be receptive to take all of their dreaming into the next step towards booking their trip. What do you think?
Originally posted at: http://tourismtide.blogspot.com/2008/03/here-or-there-are-we-there-yet.html
A big thank you to the T List organisers and PhoCusWright
March 12, 2008
I wanted to say thanks very much for all the effort that went into organising the bloggers summit and to the sponsors. It was a wonderful opportunity to meet up with fellow bloggers and discuss a variety of topics. It was fascinating for me to attend the Success in Travel E-Business and listen the speakers ranging from CEOs in high profile companies to new start ups.
More Photos
March 11, 2008
Keep on uploading your photos to our Flickr Account, there are some great ones already!
| www.flickr.com |
Will easyJetHolidays be a hit with customers?
March 10, 2008
After listening to the presentation by John Kohlsaat from easyJet I wondered if easyJet’s foray into selling holidays will be a success with customers. I try to look at things from the consumer perspective. I’d done some research in October 2007 for my blog and found that prices for accommodation and car hire booked on the easyJet site were considerably higher, compared to shopping around.
On my return flight from Berlin with Easyjet, I glanced through the in flight magazine and was dismayed by the easyJetHoliday three page spread advert. One page described the tale of woe of a couple who’d put together their own holiday, spending all evening looking for hotels which caused the computer to crash twice, then discovered that the flight price they’d seen earlier had increased and to cover this increase had to book accommodation in a cheaper, less desirable locale. However the second couple who booked it all on easyJet saved time and money.
I’m not convinced the second couple saved money booking with easyJet. That couple may have been the ones comprising on location as easyJet has an exclusive accommodation partner Hotelopia., so is unlikely to offer the full range of available hotels. As for price, a price comparison site such as HotelsCombined searches more than 30 suppliers so is far more likely to find the lowest price. As for the time factor, yes it would be quicker just to book everything with easyJet. However using a price comparison site doesn’t take long.
But it states in the easyJet ad that they guarantee the lowest price. Cast your eyes to line 4 where it states that the guarantee doesn’t cover flights and hotels booked separately. So why are easyJet bothering to mention the guarantee in the context of an advert where the first couple book the elements separately, so they wouldn’t even be covered by the guarantee?
Are easyJet relying on customer inertia i.e. customers can’t be bothered to look at other sites and believe that a low cost airline must also offer low price accommodation? Are customers reassured by the lowest price guarantee?
It seems to me that easyJet should consider some type of accommodation price comparison tool on their site to reassure customers that they are getting the best deal and widest choice of accommodation, rather than a list of hotel options from their exclusive partner. Although easyJet might not make such a high commission per booking by ditching the exclusive partner they could end up with higher overall revenue if a higher percentage of customers book their accommodation through the easyJet site, which is more likely to occur if customers are reassured that they are getting the lowest price and widest choice of accommodation on the easyJet site.
My slippery late start at the ITB
March 9, 2008
When I arrived in Berlin the day before the start of the Travel Bloggers Summit at the Berlin Travel Fair, I discovered that there was a public transport strike starting the next day. The S Bahn, city trains. were still running but there were no buses, trams or underground. Fortunately my hostel was right next to an S Bahn station. I had visions of a nightmare crowded journey to the fairground but I had a seat and the train wasn’t that busy. So far so good.
My admission pass to the Fair had not arrived in the mail, so I’d been told to pick it up at Hall 7. There was a Fair entrance a few minutes walk from the S Bahn station but they wouldn’t let me in there as I’d no pass. I was advised to walk round the perimeter of the fair ground to reach Hall 7. It had snowed earlier that morning and this snow had been compacted into ice on the pavements by this stage. Luckily I had on sensible boots but I can’t imagine that half mile walk in high heels.
I arrived at Hall 7 already late for the first session and there was no pass waiting for me, so I’d to wait another 15 minutes until this was sorted out. Then I couldn’t find the room in which the meeting was being held. I arrived one hour late feeling pretty harassed which must explain the expression on my face at the session. Thanks to Vicky of Highland Business Research for capturing that moment! Vicky, you could have chosen a more flattering picture of me. Prize for best caption of why I look so hacked off, it’s been suggested that I was gutted because I’d just heard that Darren of Travel Rants missed his flight.
Passions stirred at the CEO briefing
I was one of the lucky ones, two attendees had experienced a bumpy landing on the Air Berlin flight from London that morning, others had booked accommodation a distance from a S Bahn station.
However a prize for the Happy Hotelier who was the first to arrive and locate the meeting room.
Thoughts on the PhoCusWright Bloggers Summit and Conference @ ITB
March 8, 2008
As I’m getting ready to go back home tomorrow, I have had some time to look back and try to summarize the experience of attending the Bloggers Summit and the PhoCusWright Conference @ ITB (as well as ITB itself). The Bloggers Summit brought together several eTourism bloggers from various parts of the world. Unfortunately, the sessions were so busy and bloggers’ schedules in some cases were so tight that I did not have time to meet all the bloggers who attended. However, I did have time to chat at various times with Stephen Joyce of (T4 Tourism Technology Trends) and Phil Caines (Tourism Tide) from Rezgo and get their opinion on my social network Canadamigos (they both liked the potential). I also met Guido Van Den Elshout (Happy Hotelier) in person for the first time and enjoyed our conversations very much. Guido is avery likable guy and very active industry blogger. His blog Happy Hotelier is a very interesting and eclectic collection of post on various eTourism and Tourism topics. Check out his list of Unusual Hotels. I did have a chance to say hello to Jens Thraenhart who has been very busy since leaving his post at the Canadian Tourism Commission (Tourism Internet Marketing) and I also met, for the first time in person, Kevin May from the UK the editor of the excellent eTourism and tourism technology mag Travolution and blogger of the blog by the same name. I highly recommend the magazine to any tourism business interested in maximizing eTourism opportunities. During the couple of days of the event I also chatted a bit with Yeoh Siew Hoon (The Transit Cafe) from Singapore, Claude Benard (Les Explorers) from France, Vicky Brock and Stephen Budd (Tracking Tourism) from Scotland. I barely said hello to Joe Buhler (Travel Marketing in the Age of WEB 2.0 & Beyond) and I met a young blogger Abbas Nokhasteh ( Openvizor) from the UK.
To summarize the conference is a challenge, but I can try. Most of the presentations and talks focused on the technology that drives the revolution that has been taking place in the travel industry worldwide. However, questions arise as to whether companies are making use of the right technologies for the right purpose and whether they are using available technologies correctly. On the user side, as Philip Wolf, CEO of PhoCusWright, mentioned on his remarks to the bloggers during the Bloggers Summit: “consumers took control and went from looking for the cheapest trip (Web 1.0) to looking for the perfect trip (Web 2.0).” This phenomenon disrupted the industry with the advent of social media. February’s Travolution Magazine (Issue 14.0) is dedicated to the User Experience asserting that content is not king anymore, but rather User Experience is. This makes a lot of sense from the travellers’ pont of view. The User Experience is King may summarize the subtext of all the presentations, whether it was about the Reservation System of Tomorrow Today, the Hotelier’s Perspective, Journalists or Bloggers, the OTA’s perspective or about the new eTravel startups (five minutes of fame). Having said all this and listened to all the presentations one must not forget that there is still some ways to go in the space to achieve the perfect user experience. In closing, a key thing for companies to remember, to paraphrase Philip Wolfe, is that “winners will focus on customer preservation rather than on business model preservation.”
See you in Hollywood
Jaime
Second Life - Life for Tourism?
March 6, 2008
Marketing Travel In Second Life
Daniele Mancini, corporate E-Business Director, Costa Crociere S.p.A. had a great presentation at PhoCusWright. He opened my eyes to the level of large corporate web 2.0 marketing.
Costa is a massive cruise supplier, they have 18 ships and 11 more being built. They are pioneers (for a large company anyways) in utilizing online marketing to connect with their consumers. Their b2c marketing efforts included blogs, Youtube contests, online community interaction, and a Second Life presence including owning property and cruise ships.
This post focuses on their Second Life efforts. Costa utilized this new world in an innovative way, they reproduced a press conference and ship launch within Second Life and paired it with a real world launch, fireworks and all.
Their Second Life developments included:
B2C
- Offer a virtual experience for residents
- evnets
- contests
B2B
- Training for travel agents
- Lesson for 15 minutes
- Guided tour of the shop
Kevin May, editor of Travolution had the insight to ask “So ow many people attended the launch?” There was not a quantitative answer, but Daniele claimed that Second Life “offers good value for advertising” when compared to traditional media. Daniele then stated that he has changed his Secondlife marketing efforts from B2C to strictly B2B. This hardly seems like there was a good ROI if they have canceled their B2C campaign all together.
Gregory Turley, CEO of CarTrawler.com was discussing this online marketing phenomenon with me; we both agreed that the people who invest much time in Secondlife, are probably not likely to be interested in the Travel Industry. I pointed out that most of the people that are integrated in a Second Life may be more interested in technology and have less of an interest in real world experiences, but maybe I am wrong. What do you think? Have you found that Second Life offers a good return on your marketing investment?
Overview of Global Reservation Systems Tomorrow - Today
March 6, 2008
This is a subject that really interests me, primarily because it takes some of the new paradigms of web 2.0, social media, and user generated content and combines it with the underlying reservations model. Tina Fitch, CEO of EzRez even mentioned that bloggers were the pioneers in the space of aggregating information and providing user specific knowledge for their readers by digesting and re-interpreting information in a way that is attractive for their readers. The same holds true for the next generation of reservations systems. Ms. Fitch describes a system that aggregates data from a variety of systems and combines it with customer behaviour. This allows suppliers to better anticipate future market patterns by analyzing buying behaviour across the entire network. In order for this to be viable, the GRS would need have the following attributes:
Size - it must have a large amount of inventory.
Diversity - it must have a variety of inventory.
One area of opportunity is in the unified online profile that allows the same customer to use the same profile on a variety of supplier and OTA websites. The other opportunity is in collaboration between companies in order to allow data sharing across different areas. Is this realistic? Ms. Fitch suggests that some of this is happening now but is not yet broad enough to be all encompassing.
Will customers be intimidated by the “Big Brother” concept of having their profiles available in such an open manner? Ms. Fitch seems to think that travel is actually behind the ball on this concept. Many other e-commerce and social networking tools already utilize open profile technologies in order to support profile data. I think this is an issue of allowing customers to maintain and manage their own profile data. Like Facebook, for example, there are options for maintaining privacy, the issue is whether or not customers will adopt a profile sharing mechanism like the one being suggested. Travel, in general, however is not regarded as a particularly high trust industry. If it were, credit card processing companies would not regard it as a restricted business in the same category as gambling and adult entertainment. So consumer adoption of open profile sharing between travel companies even with opt out tools may see significant resistance.
It is a very nice notion but is it realistic to expect consumers to tell you all their preferences in order to help them make purchasing decisions. Perhaps if there is some integration and interaction with existing social networking tools, there may be some ways of getting that profile data in a way that is less intrusive and provides immediate value to the customer.
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