The Perfect Mini-Storm - Tours and Activities
November 19, 2008
The PhoCusWright perfect mini storm session was facinating, and featured a great panel of industry titans. Doug Quinby hosted Tina Fitch (EZRez), Rod Cuthbert (Viator Inc), Kenneth Purcell (Iseatz.com), and Ranjan Singh (Isango!).
Here is a summary of the session with some thoughts at the end. These are not quotes, but I tried to capture the main points:
The point was brought up that there are thousands of varied suppliers, what is it that they want?
RS: Differentiation
TF: Sexy representation and and easy to implement system.
KP: Multi Payment options, ie reward miles etc. Also are looking for priority placement.
What do consumers want from these sites?
TF: Consumers want alternatives during the buying process, early packaging options and multiple paths to the booking. The business should have the capabilities to upsell during and after the initial booking. (Email followup/rewards)
RC: Consumers treat destination product differently than other ingredients of the travel picture. Flights, hotels and cars are like bugers, fries and drinks, while activities are purchased after, and are like the dessert. There is not a large opportunity to bundle with other travel products.
RS: I agree and disagree. There are ‘Why not’ products like hop-on hop-off tours that can be bundled well with other products, and the ‘Why’ products which are often the reason WHY people are traveling to these destinations.
KP: Things like groud transport/parking are the most relevant to bundle with other travel products. 80% of the sales we see are in the transfer/parking market.
Will you look to develop Mobile apps?
RC: It is a great opportunity, however we would need an infrastructure upgrade to accommodate our vouchure confirmation model.
RS: Technology maturity will need 3-5 years.
Will these transaction based sites eventually change over to an ad based revenue model?
TF: We give our customers the tools to decide. They can combine onsite booking as well as ads.
Thoughts
This is a developing market that really lacks an underlying infrastucture. The lack of standardization is a barrier to further innovation. There are underlying issues such as the lack of consolidated availability means that consumers are often given bookings that can not be confirmed, and in certain cases, have to wait for a confirmation email. Free sell products represent the minority of destination suppliers, and there is a massive opportunity to bring these long tail suppliers online, well that is probably why I work with Rezgo 
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The PhoCusWright Whirlwind From The Storm
November 19, 2008
PhoCusWright has again packed a lot of amazing networking, workshops and presentations into one conference. Well the morning of the main center stage conference is in full swing and the trending is looking interesting. We have heard from the VC community; William Carroll, Cornell, Jeff Clarke, Travelport Inc, Sophie Frost, Brightspark Ventures, Jake Fuller, Thomas Weisel Partners.
While there were strong references to economic trending with Philip C Wolf saying that “it didn’t look like a economy in recession at the bar last night”. Jeff Clarke was confident that there will be an upswing eventually. Jake Fuller on the other hand pointed out that there was no denying the current economic climate and how there was an inevitable loss of competition with smaller innovators being pressured out of the game. Sophie was talking about the drying up of investment capital for the next 18 months. She stated that that they are going to tighten their belts, cut expenses where ever possible, and then also lower their level of investment by an additional 10%. With Brightspark having a notable portfolio, this could be indicitive of a far reaching down swing in travel technology investment. Lets hope not..
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The Unofficial Bloggers Meetup
November 17, 2008
Photo back: Tim Hughes, Kevin May, Phil Caines and Stephen Joyce. Front: Jaime Horwitz, Claude Benard, Sean Keener (Thanks Jamie for the great photo!)
Well the bloggers are joining forces once again at PhoCusWright. It was good to meet some old blogging associates after Stephen and I prepared for the Travel Innovation Summit. We are excited and ready to go as we are presenting at 12:08 on the dot today.
I am currently in the TIS showcase surrounded by some great companies. It seems like we are the only ones in our space for this competition, and there are many opportunities to network/partner with these innovators.
More info to come!
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Written by Phil · Filed Under Misc | 5 Comments
