NEWS

ONLINE TRAVEL: SLOWER SPEED AHEAD

Signs are everywhere that the once-hot online travel business is beginning to slow down, prompting some sites to look for creative new offerings.

Reports indicate as early as last year this is due in part to consumers’ desire to hunt for the cheapest priced holiday, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. 

A spokesperson added, “Online travel agents are not yet providing sufficient differentiation in their offerings… to (consumers) everything looks the same. Providing different, unusual products, bundling various offerings together, delivering exclusive content to consumers on a number of online platforms will all contribute to a strong business model for the future.” 

Yahoo has already begun to follow this key for improvement with a revamp of its travel site features. 

These include a new mapping feature (Yahoo Trip Planner), a chat-based collaboration tool (Yahoo Messenger Flight Planner), personalized trip recommendations, travel deals (Yahoo Farechase), and an ability to plug in key words such as “romantic” or “family-oriented” to find vacations with specific themes. 

Of more than 2,300 adults, 43% had not decided on a location for a summer vacation, and 70% had not locked down summer travel plans, according to research conducted by Harris Interactive on behalf of Yahoo.

-Summary derived from original report by David Wilkening