Articles tagged “online travel agencies”

Like Chinese travelers, Ctrip is breaking out of its domestic shell and looking to become much more of an international player. There is vast potential for Ctrip still to take advantage of in China and then there is a whole wide world out there too as it begins to service customers outside of China. But can the company tackle both ambitions simultaneously? Ctrip has great partners -- 16,000 of them, actually -- to assist but the partners may also turn out to be formidable competitors, as well.

Can TripAdvisor, with all its content and global reach, become another Booking.com-like success story or will TripAdvisor's prospects fade? There are plenty of possibilities within that range, too, but much depends on TripAdvisor's transition into a booking plus metasearch site. That's the $9 billion question -- and there's a wide range of opinion on the outcome.

Hipmunk's user experience in hotel search feels more convenient than on many other metasearch and booking sites but like everyone else, Hipmunk is experimenting and has plenty to learn. We have a long way to go but that's no surprise to anyone.

TripAdvisor took a beating in the second quarter, but its growing tours and activities sector is showing strength as the company tries to become all things to all travelers.

When it comes to the potential of Southeast Asia's diverse online travel market, investors and online travel brands can no longer view what will be a gigantic market as something they can ignore for now and figure out later.

In online travel and the lodging industry, as well as politics, astute observers follow the money. As it is with Marriott: The chain is using TripAdvisor 1) for bookings with lower-than standard online travel agency commissions and 2) to advertise even-lower-cost direct bookings on Marriott.com. Makes perfect economic sense.

TripAdvisor's strategy prioritizes the importance of the app over mobile Web and desktop. With its ability to access Booking.com's trove of hotel descriptions and photos, TripAdvisor is seeing lots of success through its app in driving repeat bookers. The bottom line, though, is cheap hotel prices are key.

Because of the proliferation of mobile devices and the propensity of TripAdvisor's metasearch users to meander off course after clicking off the TripAdvisor site, the company needed to do something dramatic such as Instant Booking to adapt to the future. As it plays the unglamorous "long game," the outcome of TripAdvisor's gamble won't be known until at least 2017.

Growth may be small at this stage but it shows that IHG is making some inroads into cutting its dependency on online travel agencies.

The Forces Shaping Business Travel Data Deck paints a picture of the business travel landscape and the trends impacting the business traveler of the future through a curation of charts,…