Articles tagged “sfe2018”

According to Accenture, a “living business” is a company that marries technology innovation and an agile corporate culture to ensure its relevance amid always changing consumer expectations.

The future of brand engagement relies on connecting product attributes and customer preferences on a much deeper level than before. Hospitality and travel is finally catching up with other industries.

"Anybody telling me you should be limiting the number of brands, I think it's bullshit," said AccorHotels CEO Sebastien Bazin at Skift Forum Europe. We wouldn't be surprised to see him expand the hotel giant's portfolio of brands to at least 40, up from today's 32.

Of course Google could become an online travel agency if it wanted to, but why would it want to jeopardize such a lucrative revenue stream in terms of ad dollars it receives from booking sites?

Are consumers discarding price-consciousness for convenience? Uber is convenient, but it's also cheap. These dueling preferences aren't clear-cut, and the trends will remain complex.

Travel hasn't invested in marketing and sales solutions like bots on Facebook in the same way that other global industries have. A spirit of experimentation is necessary, particularly since online advertising is usually a costly endeavor for travel companies.

Consumers are starting to realize that the negative effects of our increasing technology usage are very real. Airline industry leaders recently discussed what this means for the experiences they offer.

Lufthansa Group's Airlinecheckins.com may not be the most amazing innovation ever, but considering it only took about 30,000 euros to build, the return on investment has been impressive. The platform allows customers to check in for flights on more than 200 airlines. And as the facilitator, Lufthansa gets a lot of data about passenger preferences.

Ryanair hasn't had the best year. Its reputation took a hit recently when it was forced to cancel thousands of flights because of pilot scheduling issues. But the customers have come back. Why? Cheap fares. It's the secret sauce.

Do hotels really need to be flagged under a big brand if online travel agencies are most effective at selling rooms? Hotelbeds' Joan Vila thinks hotel chains may be forced to wind down some brands that aren't succeeding in the marketplace.