Articles tagged “metasearch”

TripAdvisor is smart to try to tap the ad budgets of cruise lines and online travel agencies with a relevant new price-comparison search tool. But many first-time cruisers may feel too overwhelmed by all of the review content given all of the complexity in booking a cruise.

Kayak is looking to get leaner and more efficient. The restructuring, though, doesn't exactly mesh with the upbeat picture about the metasearch company that parent Booking Holdings described during its fourth-quarter earnings call this week.

The fact that Booking Holdings and Expedia Group are leaning away from TripAdvisor is a wake-up call for many metasearch sites. However, travelers still love to use the damn things for comparison shopping, so there's that.

A new name shows that GoEuro has ambitions outside of Europe. Can it deliver on this promise?

Uh-oh. Trivago changed its user interface again. Last time it did this, it referred fewer customers to some advertisers and prompted Booking Holdings to pull back from advertising on it. Trivago is betting that Booking won't retaliate for this new effort. Daring!

Southwest has perennially been a thorn in the side of online travel companies that lusted after getting access to its flights and fares. But no one can credibly argue that Southwest's insistence on direct distribution hasn't worked for the airline. Its competitors and peers inside and outside of the airline industry can only be jealous.

It's a matter of probability that some companies will face cash crunches. It appears HotelQuickly has. But global travel search companies need to detect problems sooner. They must quickly put a pause on referring consumers to troubled companies before too many victims pile up.

When it comes to Google and its hotels redesign, few things are all or nothing. TripAdvisor can worry that Google now has more traveler photos and reviews, but some of them are from TripAdvisor. Hotel websites and phone numbers get featured, but clicking on a book button brings customers to an online travel agency site. In travel, it's never winner take all.

The biggest knock on the online travel agencies these days is that the competition is intense and that their golden years are done. Expedia's Mark Okerstrom counters that his company has a single-digit share of a $1.6 trillion market, and he's going wide and deep to pick up more. The jury is still out.

Shares in the hotel search company rose the most in two years on news that a cut in ad spending had pushed the Expedia-controlled company into the black. But the company, which once enjoyed meteoric growth, seems unlikely to return to turbo-charged revenue gains anytime soon.