Pictures from Travolution Autumn Conference 2007

Pictures from our recent conference. Apologies for the delay...


More on our Flickr showreel.

Kevin May, editor, Travolution

Agents: Don’t be intimidated by the online world

Our latest column in Travel Weekly:

It is easy to see why some travel agents are intimidated when faced with the prospect of competing with something as powerful as the Internet.

While we at Travolution have a tendency to witter on about social networking, user-generated content and the like, retail travel agents are trying to ensure they can convert those walking through the door into buyers of products.

At last week’s Travolution Conference, Global Travel Group’s product development and e-commerce director ­Jason Edwards put it well when he said elements of ­online travel, such as social networking and digital marketing, are difficult to achieve due to resources.

He also commented that understanding the issues was a key factor.

Now, of course, we would urge all Travel Weekly readers to nose through a copy of Travolution now and again to learn more about what the online world is talking about.

But, equally, when it comes to knowing more about how to reach consumers through search engine marketing or social networking, we would urge agents to try things out for themselves.

It takes no time at all to create a travel agent Facebook group and, for example, using it as a springboard for discussion and the chance to share photos from trips.

Better still, why not create a page on a photo-sharing service such as Flickr.com and ask customers if you can upload pictures from their holiday.

Sound easy so far?

Meanwhile, even on the simplest website it is possible to add destination information or even post reviews from customers.

The beauty of search engines such as Google is that they like valuable, unusual, exclusive content (such as reviews and pictures associated with destinations).

This, already, is a crude form of digital marketing – and it probably hasn’t cost a penny.

Kevin May, editor, Travolution

EasyJet and the API

Piers Ford, one of regular writers at Travolution, adds his thoughts to yesterday's news from EasyJet about its new (and let's face it, long awaited) API:

So EasyJet will dip its toe in multi-channel distribution early in 2008 with the launch of an API that will allow it to formalise its business with selected third parties, mainly in the corporate travel sector.

Distribution development manager Jerry Dunn says that while easyJet’s roots are steeped in direct distribution, the time has come for the airline to consider other channels without compromising its low-cost message.

“We prefer to take direct control,” he said. “Between 6 and 10% of our sales are made by third parties without our permission, usually using inefficient and unreliable screen-scraping technology. We want to take more control of that, and an API licensed to selected third parties, tying them into our terms and conditions, will allow us to do that.”

Dunn says the API would also allow easyJet to manage a more robust fare structure with third parties. However, it will not be engaging with the leisure sector.

“We need to engage and understand the opportunities that are there, casting our net wider, for example, on comparison sites where we can offer our Stansted and Luton flights in direct competition with Heathrow,” he reckons.

“But we will only deal with additional channels that we feel are going to be effective.”

Contrast the thoughts of Dunn with Kristie Goshow, group director of e-business and customer development at luxury supplier Jumeirah, with whom he shared the platform.

Giving a perspective on the future from the other end of the multi-channel spectrum, Goshow says the customer is now setting the leadership strategy.

“They own it and we manage it,” she says. “Every channel is an opportunity. E-commerce directors will have to become directors of opportunity. Analytics will have to be cohesive across the channels. Marketing teams will have to reflect their customers and we’ll have to recruit more behavioural analysts and fewer salespeople.”

It is interesting to see how two very different suppliers are tackling the new world of distribution: one by focusing on its customers, the other by reaching out to partners. A clear signal of the far-reaching commoditisation of one, and the service culture needed by the other.

More detail from the EasyJet and Jumeirah speeches.

Kevin May, editor, Travolution

Technorati tags: easyjet jumeirah

Travolution Autumn Conf: Last orders

The world's gone purple...

And it's time for a well-earned cocktail.

Travolution Autumn Conf: Can meta search move beyond flights and price?

Travel Republic's Paul Furner muses on the future of meta search...

Meta search works for flights, but hotel rooms and holidays are emotive purchases, and meta search today is one-dimensional; you see the brand, the product and the price. We'd like to bring more of our content into the meta search environment.

There is also too much focus on price, he argues - can meta search broaden itself to cover less quantifiable things such as customer service?

Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: The independent travel agent perspective

Global Travel Group product development and e-commerce director Jason Edwards had the unenviable task of representing independent travel agents to the crowd of assembled online travel types, and came out bullish, stating immediately that

The independent sector has been massively underestimated - travel agents have been multi-channel distributors for a long time.

The formula for success in the ITA space, according to Jason? It's the product and development provided by the consortium, and the mentality and initiative provided by the agent.

Putting my Travel Weekly hat on for a second (just for a second, Kev...) it was nice to hear knowledgable salespeople brought into the equation.

Global's grasp of where agents need to be is obvious, but as Jason says channels such as affiliate or SEO marketing and social networking are difficult when resource and understanding are lacking - and it's here that many (though far from all) ITAs are vulnerable.

Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: Kudos to Simon Robinson...

The Thomas Cook executive director of distribution is the first speaker to break away from the podium and go freestyle...

Travolution Autumn Conf: Can easyJet learn to love third-party distributors?

EasyJet distribution development manager Jerry Dunn talked at length about the uneasy relationship between the airline, which likes to sell direct, and other distribution channels - meta search sites, OTAs and so forth.

Currently these players are using screen-scraping technology to get hold of easyJet's fares, a method which Jerry describes as 'not robust'. But, of course, it drives sales.

So what's an airline to do?

Well, you develop an API to give the brand more control over what fares are presented and how. And easyJet is doing just that. But only for the corporate travel market, which it has historically had trouble capturing.

The API should be available to selected third parties at the beginning of next year.

Tackled by Travelsupermarket's Chris Nixon on whether easyJet can work closer with alternative distributors in the leisure market, Jerry waxes positive: "I do think there is more we can do". It looks like the door is far from closed...

Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: Quotes #2

Jilly Welch of Fortune Cookie begs websites to ease up on the error messages:

Don't tell users they're wrong; they'll think they're rubbish

.
Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: Making car hire interesting

"Hands up who got excited about their last holiday?" asks Stuart Nassos, managing director UK and Ireland, Holiday Autos.

Hands go up.

"Keep your hand up if you got excited about your car hire experience."

Hands go down.

A brave start. Stuart is honest about the challenges of the market - brand loyalty only exists in as far as that consumers won't use you again if you 'screw it up', and the purchase is far from emotive.

Stuart says the key to capturing consumers is simplifying the purchase - which means being in the right place at the right time - and added value, which could be:

• Maps, destination guides
• User-friendly presentation of T&Cs and insurance documentation
• Carbon offsetting
• Editorial (e.g. blogs)

In other words, do your level best - and use all the channels at your disposal - to make a traditionally uninteresting transaction more three-dimensional. See also Jilly Welch's comments about data entry and travel sites earlier...

Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: A quick quiz from Jumeirah

Pop quiz, hotshot. Jumeirah's Kristie Goshow gives us the following details and asks us which channel we think the customer booked through...

• Couple
• Not familiar with the Jumeirah brand
• Found a Jumeirah hotel in a Conde Nast advertorial
• Watched videos of the hotel on Youtube
• Checked it out on Tripadvisor
• Asked friends and family
• Looking for a seven-night stay, at a budget of around £3,000

It's based on a real customer. Any guesses how they booked?

Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: Factoids #2 and #3

BSkyB's Charlie Redmayne came up with these gems while discoursing on the increase in internet usage among over-50s.

• Two-thirds of the people who have ever lived to over 65 are alive now
• We only retire at 65 because that's the age that Otto von Bismarck, creator of the first pension scheme, decided on. The average life expectancy for a German at the time was 47...

Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: Proof that gorillas can't do marketing

Yahoo's Tracey Cheffey - standing in for Richard Firminger, who was sadly incapacitated - has been impressing on us the importance of integrating display and search advertising.

She cautions marketers to remember that offline executions inspire searches, and that consumers who arrive on a brand site after a display-inspired search tend to be more engaged and more willing to spend.

A cautionary tale? Okay. Apparently the Cadbury Gorilla, which as readers will know is EVERYWHERE, only appears fourth on a Google search of 'Cadbury gorilla', behind Youtube, funny-videos.co.uk and - horror of horrors - free commuter paper the Metro.

Bit of a waste, Tracey fairly points out.

No doubt some readers will think that this serves the gorilla right, but I'm not going to get involved.

Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: And that's lunch

Refreshments in the lobby of the Imagination Gallery...

Travolution Autumn Conf: Solving the data entry problem

Interesting to hear Jilly Welch's (Fortune Cookie) diagnosis of the problems that plague many travel sites. In short: research and booking are being treated as separate processes, which leads to overlong, unnecessarily complex transactions.

You start out excited by your holiday in Mauritius; six pages in there's a loss of purchase momentum

Why? Two words: data entry. Nobody wants to do that stuff. But as an audience member points out, the complex legislation and technological infrastructure involved in travel purchases means a fair amount of data entry is unavoidable.

One of Jilly's suggestions is to put an editorial spin on data capture where possible. She points out that a day-month-year date search can be humanised by flagging up school holidays, or the best time to visit particular destinations.

Black Tomato gets praise for using its top-level navigation to guide users to 'Active Time', 'Escape Time' and so forth. Which is better than a dull old 'holiday type' drop down.

Expedia, though, is marked down for channeling users from its (highly praised) Inspiroscope, which captures information in an engaging way, to flat, text-heavy pages, which shatter the illusion.

And as for the Virgin Holidays interface...

I haven't picked on Virgin Holidays because it's awful; I've picked on it because it's moderate and unexciting

Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: David Soskin on personalisation and technology

Some notes from David Soskin's speech, which focused on how (whether) technology can deliver personalisation in travel.

- Amazon does personalisation better than anyone in the travel sphere (top of David's recommended books list, apparently, are something about Pushkin and a book about Ryanair)

- Travel is difficult to personalise because consumers want different things based on when they're travelling, who with and whether for business or leisure, not to mention unpredictable variables like the weather

- Search is 'not nearly good enough' in travel

- Predicitons for 2015: search will improve hugely; mobile content will take off, reviews in particular; traditional media will continue to decline; social networks will continue to evolve as users and technology become more sophisticated

- Cheapflights has drafted in a US expert to focus solely on personalising newsletters, and continues to invest in social networking through Howzat Media

Nathan Midgley

Travolution Autumn Conf: Can you guess...

Which 19th Century writer has been quoted by two different speakers this morning (and it was the same quote...)?

Travolution Autumn Conf: Quotes #1

David Soskin, CEO of Cheapflights tells it straight:

If people spend time on media, sure as night follows day the money will follow. Social networking sites will be a huge recipient of travel advertising dollars.

Caroline Knight, online commercial partnerships manager for ITV.com allows her masterplan to slip out:

Total freedom of entertainment. This is what ITV.com - sorry, I mean ITV - is aiming for...

Travolution Autumn Conf: Broadcasters talk multi-channel

Some interesting examples from this morning's speakers on multi-channel media.

Broadly, we hear it conceptualised two ways. First as a way of reaching multiple audiences with varied media preferences (Caroline Knight of ITV.com observes that a show might have 10 million TV viewers with limited interest in consuming content online, but another smaller audience whose preferences run the other way).

Second, as a way of extending core content to create several touch points for each individual. Red Bee Media's Sarah Alexander points to the success of the Life on Mars series two campaign, whose 1970s-themed posters and booklets so enthused the audience in the real world that they were pinched and hawked on eBay.

Similarly, Caroline points to I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here, which used several channels (TV, online video feeds, mobile voting and so forth) to create 'five impact points a day' for fans.

Medianiks note that you now have two five-a-day regimes: fruit and veg, and channels.

Both ways of approaching multi-channel are arguably extremes - one has consumers approaching the choice of media monogamously, the other promiscuously.

Travolution Autumn Conf: Sky to relaunch travel channel

We've just heard from Charlie Redmayne, head of commercial parnerships in BSkyB's online business unit - and among other things, he revealed that Sky is to relaunch its online and TV travel channels in December.

Watch this space...