Is the Metasearch Model in Big Trouble?
Photo Credit: Pictured is a still from a TripAdvisor TV commercial. Metasearch sites have been feeling pressure as online travel agency advertisers give such sites a rethink. TripAdvisor
Skift Take
Much of the metasearch business is beyond the control of the metasearch companies themselves because their largest advertisers can switch things up five minutes ago. Just ask Trivago, and to a lesser extent, TripAdvisor. The best they can hope to do is to diversify their advertiser base and to keep plugging away.
Is it a temporary reset or the metasearch new reality?
Metasearch critics have long warned that comparison-shopping businesses from Trivago to TripAdvisor have been overly dependent on a couple of big online travel agency advertising partners. And two of the biggest, Booking Holdings and Expedia, have been stepping back a bit.
After all, hotel-metasearch site Trivago has been reeling over the last year as the Booking Holdings contribution to Trivago's total revenue fell to 38 percent in the second quarter from 49 percent a year earlier.
In 2017, TripAdvisor generated 43 percent of its revenue from Expedia, Booking, and their respective subsidiaries, and that was a drop-off from 2014-2016 when they accounted for a combined 46 percent of TripAdvisor's total annual revenue.
"I agree with the basic premise that having only two companies (plus Airbnb) is bad for metasearch as it puts too much power in only two companies," said Kayak co-founder and Lola chief technology officer P
