New SocialIndexEngine Portal Launched

Check out the new site at http://SocialIndexEngine.com
And the new video that describes what it is all about.

Video on Youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOp25UNaYU4

Subscribe to our channel to get the latest developments in Social Indexing and the new Brand Marketing.

Youtube Channel http://www.youtube.com/user/SocialIndexEngine


What's New

Our first site still exists but in reality it is a page and it is dedicated to the travel and tourism industry. Our new site lays out the platform of SocialIndexEngine in more detail with some really important new additions.

Pillars of Success

We have simplified the general view of the architecture to half a dozen pillars. Of course, all the details still exist but it was a bit overwhelming.

Next is the Proof of Concept

We have added several case studies and will be adding more. Every single campaign has aced it. Our strategy is to build these SIE campaigns with their own websites like Party-destinations.com and partner with just a few top travel companies in each area.

Exclusive Marketing Opportunities

The marketing will be very exclusive and limited to those we invite . So don't miss an opportunity in your travel niche. See our notes re what we have and where we go (below). We have assembled a few videos that help demonstrate some of the concepts. We will add more as we move forward.

Tutorial and Newsletter
Do join these. The tutorials are being shared openly for the launch. Once we have a core of interest, the tutorial will not be distributed. We will still invite all interested parties to register as we plan to have 25 or more targets.We will invite only a few selected companies to participate in each market.

Register to Reserve your Opportunity

Register now to be included in our invitations. Just go to http://SocialIndexEngine.com

The form is on the top right hand of most pages. Just enter your name, email, and the website you might like us to market with you. Sorry, but we must have a website and you can’t register without it. We do need this and we will evaluate it in order to select our candidates.

Looking forward to your success with SocialIndexEngine. 

Current Campaigns

Travel2ExoticPlaces | Adventure-travel-destinations | Romantic-Holiday-Destinations | Bolivia | Dominica | Barbados | St. Lucia

Next

We will be rolling out a site every 2 months. The site we choose will be based on our research and will have a good ROI for partners. Our aim is to bring a new level of selectivity to weary travelers who typically have too many choices and want a source that helps organize data for the.

Please Subscribe to our youtube channel if you find this helpful and of interest. http://www.youtube.com/user/SocialIndexEngine

More >> See our Press Release

http://www.prweb.com/releases/2012/05-SocialIndexEngine/prweb9474894.htm
Portal - http://SocialIndexEngine.com
 

New Travel Marketing Platform for Hotels & Tourism

AXSES Travel Marketing and Bookings Platform launched.

we have published a 16 page color brochure to outline this unique travel marketing, bookings and publishing solution. This new arcRes tourism platform combines technology, services, automation tools, distribution services and application software for hotels and tourism operator, travel destinations, tourism association, chains and affiliate marketing.

Publish your travel products and travel bookings to mobile smartphone, social sites, facebook, google shopping and hundreds of travel sites.


AXSES arcRes Travel Platform Features
arcRes travel platformAXSES arcRes is a powerful travel marketing platform
It can be used for hotels, villas, condos, apartments, car rentals, tourism activities and destinations.

arcRes is a booking engine and a central reservation system
The booking engine comes with easy to install travel booking & shopping widgets for any website. The central reservation system can be a simple widget or a full destination website.

arcRes is a travel publishing system
Rates, specials, packages and destination content in arcRes can be published to channels such as mobile phones, social media and travel portals. Special promotions may be sent directly to travelers via email, RSS and special purpose applications developed by AXSES.

arcRes help you to organise, manage and market your travel business

InteractiveBrand

"A brand does not exist on a shelf — it exists in the hearts and minds of people"... Mahesh Murthy 2010

This blog is about the new age of the Interactive Brand. It will point you to a series of newsletters and web sites that explain the secrets of the Interactive Brand. The brand that connects!

To stand out from the crowd you need a purpose that defines your brand as different. This is the hook. It makes your brand news worthy and, if people like it, it may just enter the conversation.

Take a look at our Social network site - it has a great video about social media. Made a few years ago when facebook was still a baby, not the second most visited website in the world, it is very valid.

This social conversation is part of the interaction that successful marketers are engaging in. The Apple iPad and Google Buzz both have created a Buzz of conversation without a single ad.

The Social Media hotel in NY climbed to the top of the conversation using Twitter and facebook to get a message out that they were friendly, open, social and interested in things that are happening in NY. Their hook was connecting with special interest groups and building around events that interested them, like Craft Beer Week and hosting a party for a Mashable Social Media event.

In Barbados theCoconut Court Hotel has hired a Community Manager and moved into the community conversation announcing its social happy hours, breakfast specials and a full calendar of social events which is communicated using social media.

It's a crowded field but brands can take off "hook, line and sinker", via viral marketing, word of mouth, social media and the Internet.

Viral marketing does not need to be conducted through major advertising firms or tech savvy companies. It is managers and staff, real people that make the conversation. Well mostly, we note that Obama needs a social media aid to keep up with the conversation.

Obama's hook was "Yes we can" and his team turned that into a victory, it was clearly a purpose that was different.

Once you have your purpose you need a website that communicates this - see our 10 steps for good website design.

Your website is one of the most powerful communicators of your brand. Your website is where social media will go to discover more about you. If you do it right its where Internet searchers will find you. So make it special, make it have the best content and best process. Be wary of how your content is used on the net and be the guardian of your brand. In particular be wary of how other online channels and online travel agents can effect your brand.

Promoting your brand on the internet has a lot to do with Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). All that you do in Social Media will help you get indexed and found on the major engines. Unlike Social Media Interaction, we don't suggest you do your own Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), this is a job for the pros. If done wrong it can wipe you off the Net. See our summary of the key points in Your Brand and SEO

As we note in "Your Brand and SEO", an important differentiation in communications and brand appeal as well as in Search engine Ranking is the Process. The process is about Interaction. The process refers to how the brand is deployed, the methods, form and function and all the ways that it is dynamic, changing with your use, tracking your experience and your interaction to give you what you want. It is, in a way, both the media and the message.

Rates and quotes are a simple example; if travelers perceive that your website rates are not clear and not fair rate, they will go elsewhere. We are in a buyers market and getting the best price is almost a way of life now. It's too easy to find great deals at Expedia and Priceline and if your website is not in line you will lose direct business and brand loyalty. Read about the fair rates perception and your brand Interactive fair rates and brand Integrity


The Hook

A Tourism website and product needs to have a purpose and be different - we can't all be the best luxury hotel or the best budget hotel, so some are opting for the best party hotel, with non stop improvised jazz, jam sessions, beach parties and picnics. Others cater to families, singles, couples, the getaway crowd and to sports tourism etc. Soon these differences are not enough and the hook has to be something more. The "best" is tired and better retired.

A hook is a hook only if it connects with the customer. It has to be more than a market segment; which is best described as travel and holidays theme marketing. The hook, by contrast is about differentiation across market segments or themes, it has to have a global purpose with real appeal. When Nike used "Just do it" it connected. It connected to the sports minded who wanted to just do it, and it connected because of its association with the "Best" athletes. Best is Ok if it's real and not just a tired word. You have to show it.

There is trend today to be more edgy. I am not sure I like it. I don't think a good cook has to use foul language to win customers but, Hey, It works. Even Mickey Mouse is showing his darker side in Disney's re-branding of Mickey.

Mickey's popularity in the United States has begun to wane with the growing competition from Nickelodeon, Pixar and Dreamworks characters that are more edgy. Mickey's personality has to grow with the times to remain relevant in the marketplace.

Travel writers are doping the flowers in their language and become more outlandish telling the good, the bad and ugly with character. So too the brand needs to be articulated with straight talk and frank conversation - see Mahesh Murthy on Interactive Branding.

AXSES Interactive Brand directory

SEOContent

SEO Content and your Brand in the age of interactive Brands

I like when Max Starkov (eHotelier) says "Creating
the best, deepest, most unique and relevant content (textual and visual) about your hotel on your own website, naturally optimised for the search engines (SEO), should become a top priority for any hotel in 2010.

A year ago we did a study to see where our hotels placed on searches for their own names. The results were not great, in some cases they were not even on the first page, falling behind TripAdisor, Expedia and a dozen other mega sites. After reading Max's article we did another study of hotels we host and surprise! they are tops.

Well we have been preaching the benefits of strategic content and putting it into practice for years. It has helped, but we cant be patting ourselves on the back to hard. Google and all are always tweaking their search systems to be more RELEVANT.

If you are looking for a brand name hotel you probably want to see the official website in the top results. The engines are getting it right at the same time as hotels have become more aware of managing their brand, mastering their own url and optimising their content, taking control of their intellectual property and product.

Max's insights are helpful - here is my annotated summary of his views relating to a hotels SEO for its brand:

- Keep your own website content unique (duplicate content will hurt your SEO)
- Use the Best content on your website
- Be very smart about sharing content - Don't give away your brand
- If the channel is not linking to your site, be sure their description is “different”
- Make sure your content is optimised for your USP and for the Search Engines (SEO)
- Offer live quotes and availability calendars
- Display available Rate Plans and seasonal Specials
- Dont Duplicate content - see the full report


Giving away your best content and best rates to other websites can be bad for business.

Search Engines send travelers to the BEST content।
If you want direct business, be sure your website is better that the rest.

The pressing question today is how will a brand get top billing, not only for its own name but for its target markets and keywords.

It is a good time to review the whole business of Search Engine Optimization. For those of you who care to look under the hood, here is my summary - for a summary of this summary see our newsletter. For more detail see our SEO hints page.

The 5 essential of SEO optimisation


1. Define key pages.

The first point is that we never optimise a site - we optimise
a page at a time. Each page must have its own distinct message and content. If you duplicate content it will hurt your SEO.
2. Establish key phrases.
The point is that you need to translate the message into a simple word or short phrase; for example, if you want to be on the top of searches for "Caribbean Romantic Holidays" then that might be your phrase. Check it out by doing a search - there are 2 million results- can you get to the top? Remember only 10 of 2 million will be on the first page. look at your top competition and be sure you can compete. Is your
site going to be as authentic, relevant and with great content?. If not try to refine your phrase to something you can be best in and that is relevant (ie has a market use https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal).


3. Tags. The phrase then must become the name of the page (eg caribbean-romantic-holidays.html)- it must be added to the search engine tags (meta tage in the page) and it must be the title of the page, it must appear thru the content and again in the end of the page.
4. Links. Of course there are 2 million pages vying for top spot for that phrase, so all this will not get you top billing. SEO choose the pages that are most relevant and have most authentic links. You need respected links. Links from the AXSES and barbados.org network are high valued links. Be sure to be linked from several of AXSES urls: BookingsBarbados.COM, realholidays.com, barbados.org, barbadosHolidayThemes.com, barbadosholidaypackages and barbardaosholidayspecials
are all excellent links.

Seek out similar directories and listing opportunities that have good Page Rank (popularity - over 5 is good Borg is 6 out of 10. Expedia is 8).

5. Social. A good place to start linking is on social media. Write comments
that link to your page. Find other sites that will link to your page and subscribe
to appropriate directories. Create a facebook page and use twitter to send out
invitation to vist your page. twitter about event in your area and of interest.
Twitter about your activities it all gets counted.


Dont loose site of the objective.
If a traveler gets to your site make sure they find what they want, have a reason to buy and an easy way to do it, right away.


Content is king. In the end it all comes down to content. Search engines
look for relevant and rich content. Use videos, sideshows , images, dynamic
content, quotes and calendars. The technology you use counts. Form, function and process is an important factor in determining relevance. Event the speed of your site will get it points or loose them. Optimise everything, make your site dynamic and interactive.

We are in the age of the interactive Brand

An honest interactive brand consultant

View more presentations from Henning von Vogelsang.

More on SEO see http://arcres.com/search-engine-optimisation-tourism-marketing.cfm

Branding Crossroads

Branding at a Crossroads


Today, a brand must appeal to the psyche of customers to make a connection. For example: many senior travelers want hospitality and service above all. The core seniors market does not typically care for technology. They don’t like answering machines, PCs and automation. Younger travelers, in contrast, like casual and tech-friendly hotels with convenience, where food and drinks is a priority. They prefer to stay in hotels that have the look, feel, and comfort of their own homes.

Targeting a market niche start at the design stage.

Starwoods created the ‘Aloft’ brand for the young entrepreneur market and designed its hotels to include a bar, a food and beverage center offering fresh bagels, fruits and drinks, an outdoor area serving light meals, a fitness center with swimming pool, wireless Internet access property-wide, and flexible meeting and function space. Guest rooms have 9-foot ceilings and oversized windows, a signature bed, a work space with an MP3 docking station, and a flat-panel TV. Bathrooms are furnished with Bliss amenities and walk-in oversized showers. Starwood plans call for 500 Aloft to be open by 2012 (average daily rate: $100 to $125).

Brands for Small Island Hotels

Small hotels often don't have the opportunity to rebuild for a market. Nevertheless, the market for differentiation is strong and the small hotel is often sought out, particularly in Europe, where chain brand penetration is low (i). Small hotels can tap into the booming market for Boutique hotels, where uniqueness and character are preferred over big brand names. Differentiation and personality are the key.

Building a strong brand requires use of all appropriate channels, but too much reliance on the OTA channels can be have very negative side effects. Choice hotels discovered it had created a monster by building up its business with Expedia. In re-negotiating its contract with Choice, Expedia suggested that its brand was more important and that Choice just had no option but to abide by its rules and demands. The widely known secret is that OTAs don’t want all the hotels in the world, so many are going to get left out. Its wise to be direct!

Brand Integrity in the OTA Channel

We have seen chain hotels make great progress in building their own brand marketing and direct business, reducing their dependence on the OTAs, like Expedia. (81% of bookings to major chains are now direct). The Chains understand that reliance on OTAs is not good for Brand integrity.

Brand Integrity is a measure of the cohesiveness of the brand message and your ownership of it. This integrity is influenced by your message and how you present it, the medium/channels you use, what you promise and what is expected.

Your brand is your differentiation & your personality. How you market will influence your relationship with guests, their loyalty and your ownership of both the brand and the business.

See more on The Medium and the Message.

First be clear and then be seen

Branding requires being clear about your market and your USP and putting this across in words and pictures, with the right emotion and the right process in the right place. Next, get the message out with an appropriate call to action on all advertising, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and with appropriate exposure on the right marketing channels.

Shoppers need a reason to remember you and to return to complete their shopping experience. Create stickiness and be in true shopping channels, like Barbados.org, BarbadosVacationSpecials.com and BarbadosHolidayThemes.com, where shoppers can add you to their shopping lists and compare options. Shoppers must be able to visit your website and take action on interest; get a quote, save it or buy at any point.

The AXSES Travel Shopping Network is unique in its ability to provide easy access to your website at many strategic decision points. AXSES also provide many POS opportunities with bookable-maps, bookable-ads, bookable-banners, bookable-lists, etc. (click here for details). In fact, the entire AXSES network is bookable, every advertisement, listing and link is or will be driven by arcRes Tourism Bookings & Reservations System.

Branding with fair pricing and revenue management

A recent Cornell University study shows that travelers are confused by hotel pricing and often see it as unfair. This is not good for your brand! Many hotels now offer travelers a choice of rate plans and full disclosure. Many chains offer best rate guarantees.


We recommend that you manage rates and expectation with loyalty programs and special group pricing. Travel shoppers want to act (get a quote, save it, add it to a list, buy it) when they are ready, and they want to know they are getting a fair price.

AXSES is now introducing a new collaborative marketing solution, where we help tourism suppliers use technology to brand and market their products, get exposed and close more direct sales!!

For more information on how you can build and sustain your brand - please contact iclayton 'at' axses.net

More about AXSES: see
http://axses-travel.com | arcRes Marketing

---

i. The brand penetration index that measures the percentage of hotel rooms that belongs to a flag out of the total capacity, is over 70% in the US, while France is the market with the highest brand penetration index in Europe, with less than 30%.

OTAs

The debate on Direct VS. Distribution took center tage this week with the release of PhoCusWright stats on OTAs, a survey that finds hotel not competitive with OTAs and the decision by Choice to quit Expedia. There are many discussions on the net.

Direct sales have been gaining market shares over the last several years. But that seems to be changing, or might change. OTAs are holding their own and gaining shares in these troubled times, when all markets count more that ever before.

The OTAs have taken the lead in travelers' minds as the best place to shop for deals. Hotels are not competing - USATODAY.com: Travel Deals Compared.

So what, if OTAs are bringing in business, does it matter? There are hotel managers who think OTA distribution is great. In many parts of Europe, hotels have almost opted out of the reservation business, allocating the majority of rooms to tour operators. There are hotel managers who do not like distribution and have done much to get out of that channel. Some have been burned, some just find the terms are getting more and more difficult, some say it is blackmail!

The issues are complex. For a very good analysis, see Robert Coles' article - Expedia and Freedom of Choice

We have also prepared a detailed analysis about brands in the channels. Watch http://tourismplatform.com/ for the latest news. Our first issue explains branding from a new perspective. It outlines AXSES' approach to the Next Generation Tourism Platform, which integrated all media and attempts to strikes a balance with direct and distribution marketing. http://axses.com/destinationmarketing/1-shopping.html

LINKS

What happened when Georgia lost its OTA listing
OTAs Rev up at hotels' expense
OTAs' market share breakdown
Get out of the OTA Trap

LESSONS
What is the Brand definition: Johnson & Johnson Customer Business Analyst, Hannah Chi, says, "Orbitz, Travelocity, Expedia, I feel like they all give you the same options, with results from multiple airlines, kind of giving you a slew of what fits that criteria.” “Each doesn’t give me anything that another travel engine wouldn’t give me!”

Consumers will go where they find the best deal. This is good for Hotel Websites, if they are competive!

PR: wait... I: wait... L: wait... LD: wait... I: wait... wait... Rank: wait... Traffic: wait... Price: wait... C: wait...

facebook

How to use Facebook for tourism and travel marketing

A frank discussion of how Facebook operates and what its terms and condition imply. The article illustrates how Facebook is positioned relative to search engines and what may be in store!. It illustrates how to use FaceBook to boost your position on the search engines and drive more travelers to your website. How to use Facebook pages, discussions, groups and events for tourism and travel marketing. There are strategic Tips on how Facebook can help you reach out to new social groups and market your hotel, activity or tourism destination.

Links to the best social media marketing resources and technology on the net.

http://arcres.com/facebook-travel-marketing.cfm

SocialMedia4TravelMarketing

How to market travel on social media

Who is using which social media - how is the traveler using social media, which social media site is best for travel marketing.

This blog/web page offers a simple explanation with easy to understand detail. Social media clients have been analyzed in depth. Patricia Brusha of hospitality.net talks about 5 types of social media users - what they like and what social sites they might frequent - she adds marketing implications and lots of good advice for the travel marketer.

The blog/page summaries this dialogue with a simple table chart. In addition it offers a table of the leading social media channels for travel - with a layman's explanation of what they are and how they can apply. The page is full of examples and links to useful tool and resources for hotels, tourism operators and destination marketers.

The page is a social media resource of AXSES.

AXSES is a travel marketing and applications developer; building tools for travel suppliers (hotels and tourism operators) to market and manage their travel business. AXSES recently launched a Bookings engine and tourism marketing & e-commerce application for Facebook.

Travel Marketing

Travel Marketing Tools for Travel Suppliers
(hotels & tourism operators)

Marketing tools for travel marketing and management range from a simple booking engine to managing content on multinational sites and on numerous Internet travel portals and marketing channels. They also include property management systems relating to managing inventory and reservations.

To optimize an Internet marketing campaign, hotels and tourism operators need to deploy multiple strategies such as Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising, Brand advertising (Impression), Direct e-mail marketing (such as iContact) and a spectrum of e-commerce and rates management across channels such as Global Distribution Systems(GDS), Internet Distribution Systems (IDS), Social Media Channels (Facebook, Twitter, etc.), Affiliate Programs, Travel Agents and Tour Operators.

Managing allocation in all channels has become a major problem for travel suppliers (hotels and tourism operators). It is so complex that many hotels and tourism operators opt out and prefer to contract their entire inventory with prime wholesalers and distributors.

The opt-out strategy is a quick fix, but it is not sustainable in the new order. All too often, these dependencies result in huge loss of market when things go wrong. A hotel I know lost its entire distribution when its sole contractor asked for conditions it could not meet. They took their business elsewhere and bookings of 100 rooms per night were gone. It is imperative that hotels and tourism operators build a balanced strategy and take more control of their own brand and marketing.
A wide array of tools, technology and marketing options exists for tourism operators. Channel management systems such as EZYield, rates management with RateGain, Global Distribution via many GDS integration companies and hundreds of Internet Distribution Systems (IDS) like Travelocity, as well a thousand Destination Travel Portals and Travel Guides.

At AXSES, we have developed a marketing suite for small and mid-sized hotels and tourism operators. This was built on our travel booking engine, arcRes Bookings-Expert.com. The Booking Engine has been vastly expanded to do much more, and it is now a Travel Marketing Suite; an e-commerce platform that works for Social Media and conventional travel channels. See http://www.arcres.com/ecommerce-and-travel-marketing suites

Many hotels have opted to jump on the GDS bandwagon and mistakenly concluded that they are now well represented on thousands of IDS channels, such as Travelocity. Wishful thinking! It was true, at one time, but IDS are opting for direct contracts with hotels – Expedia has signed up nearly 100,000 hotels to its Expedia Special Rates (ESP) program and GDS content is far down the line in priority. That is unfortunate for the hotels, as they must now manage Expedia, Travelocity and all the major distribution contracts that they choose.

Optimising distribution channels requires diligence. To be on the top of the IDS ‘by price’ list, you have to offer the best rate. But it is not always desirable to be at the very top! You need to be high on the list for hotels in your own class and offer a value added service rather that the best price. That way, your ROI and Brand is protected. There are e-commerce companies and consultants that specialize in running IDS campaigns. They arrange the contracts and manage them for you.

The travel industry is working to integrate the marketing channels and you can purchase channel management software. Generally, this software is not easy to use and is too expensive for a small hotel. An industry standard that would ease the management of channels is not imminent.

The GDS representative companies who have built Central Reservation Systems (CRS) that interface hotels to the GDS systems ( Sabre, Amadeus, Travelport and Pegasus) >, are also building systems to help hotels manage many IDS channels (Expedia, etc.) from the same CRS. For example, Genares has integrated their CRS with Expedia/TravelWeb (Expedia Quick Connect). This allows hotels to manage Expedia and TravelWeb rates and allocation using the Genares CRS and saves having to learn another online system. The cost is $4 US per booking. For Orbitz, Travelocity, Priceline and others the fee is $4 plus the GDS fees. The IDS will generally require a minimum of 25% discount from your rack rate. Using the GDS as a channel manager thus will cost anywhere from $4 to $10 per booking in addition to the channel cost (25% minimum). It’s not a lot, if you consider the time it takes to learn all the different systems.

arcRes Travel Bookings for Facebook (arcResBookings) is the first-of-its-kind travel bookings application. It allows any hotel to load rates, property information, room descriptions, photos and rates directly from arcRes into Facebook and manage it from arcRes. It is a huge time saver and makes managing Facebook very easy. Both the booking engine and quotation system are embedded in Facebook, so that guests can easily book directly with the property or tourism operator, or get an immediate quote. See Facebook Travel Bookings (Live example)

ArcResBooking.com for Facebook is a part of the arcRes Marketing Suites, a comprehensive e-commerce platform for travel. It is currently the easiest GDS setup in the industry. Contracts are signed online, and the hotel's information, rates and seasons are all loaded directly from information already in arcRes.

As more and better tools for travel marketing become available, the role of the hotel marketer is becoming more technology-driven. Hotels need to invest in hiring the right people and training staff to understand and be comfortable with technology. It cannot be avoided! It is essential to success in the long term.

Marketing

Marketing at a Crossroads

No longer are the 4 P’s; Place, Price, Promotion and Product the main tenants of marketing. Marketing on the Internet is more about Relationships and Process.

Process is about technology, platform and intelligent, expert systems. Marshall McLuhan said a long time ago that the medium is the message. The Internet is a very sophisticated medium capable of delivering messages target to a single client, tuned to their precise interest at every point of purchase. It is automatic, re-engineering and personalizing the message for multiple users all in the same instance of time.

Your travel product, a travel experience, is as multidimensional as your clients. For example, you may cater to weddings and romance as well as lazy beach living, active holidays, gold vacations and gourmet dining. You can’t say it all at one time to one traveler. Information about your product must be engineered and differentiated; it must be made personal to each traveler.

Information must be malleable, configurable, searchable, accessible and delivered tailored to suite।

For example you may choose to advertise a golf holiday, you deliver content and images that are tailored to what you offer the golfer. You direct golfers to a special page dealing with that experience. You do this on your website, and on every channel you market on. – you cannot organize and deliver it manually. The process and platform configures and deliver the message dynamically. For this your information must be engineered with systems that are very smart, learning what motivates the clients and delivering the experience they are looking for. The difference is that the online message is a "Pull" message prompting an action, offline it is typically a "Push" message to gain awareness. With that the entire focus of marketing has changed. For more on this, see United Airlines Case Study by Double Click.

People are not talking to people at this stage, it’s a process, and the process understands people, gathering and analyzing information about them every step of the way. The smart systems (the Platform) tracks clients interaction, recognizing patterns, responding appropriately, managing and analyzing data in the process of building the digital relationship. See digital-relationships

But Process and Platform are not enough. In a complex integrated world, Partners are essential. Microsoft has said this clearly, telling its Value Added Resellers (VARS) to Partner or die!. Simply put you can do it all yourself, so you must rely on people with skills and passion that complements your own. The mechanics of Internet is very complex, we must cooperate to succeed; outsourcing is essential!

Finally, the Internet is driven by Passion. Thousands of ordinary people, professionals, workers, teachers and student donate time and resources freely, building content, services and applications that they feel passionate about. People are building relationships, offering comments, writing blogs, helping others, for free. This community has spawned the social network, which interacts and influences everything on the Internet.

Jason McNamara, CMO of Atlerian says that the new marketing is driven by passion, we need to be passionate about marketing and today, more that ever before, that means being passionate about understanding and measuring the digital footprint. ”Being able to apply sophisticated marketing analytics to every piece of information you collect about your customers is like bringing the customers themselves in-house to tell you not just what's working and what isn't, but why. You can use this passion to your advantage, helping generate ideas, proving their relevance, and justifying the money you spend” See Jason McNanara’s article on the new 5 P’s of marketing: People, Process, Platform, Passion and Partners (http://www.alterian.com/solutions/marketing.aspx)

###### Over 50% of leisure bookings are online in 2012. An estimated 89% of planners are researching event locations on the web.

Related Posts (at a crossroads series):

New Order of Commerce: 
Destination Marketing 
Distribution http://axses-ianclayton.blogspot.com/2008/10/distribution.html
Travel Marketing http://axses-ianclayton.blogspot.com/2009/05/travelmarketing.html
The Supplier http://axses-ianclayton.blogspot.com/2008/06/thesupplier.html
Marketing http://axses-ianclayton.blogspot.com/2008/06/marketing.html
Advertising http://axses-ianclayton.blogspot.com/2008/06/advertising.html
Search at a Crossroads http://axses-ianclayton.blogspot.com/2008/04/have-now-lost-their-opportunity-to-be.html Publishing at a Crossroads http://axses-ianclayton.blogspot.com/2009/03/atacrossroads.html

TheSupplier

Who is the supplier of travel

It worries me that many of our small hotel customers, do not perceive themselves as suppliers. They often see themselves as a “product” “supplied” to the market by middlemen. Nothing is further from the truth. The hotel owner is the supplier of rooms and of an experience. Together these make up the core product of a holiday. The hotel owner should choose to be inventive and create total packages that fulfill the travelers dream”.

Ultimately travel marketing is about selling a dream, and each hotel is distinct, offering a unique experience. All of the tools the hotel needs to package an experience, even including airfare is available for direct bookings.

Believing that middlemen are suppliers erodes the hotel brand and places market leadership in the wrong hands. When consumers go to online channels to book reservations, they are influenced as much by the channel used to book the reservation as they are to the actual hotel they selected

It is time to take control.

Control of the channel is not about getting more sales out of middlemen – it is about offering a service that competes with middlemen, marketing your own brand and engaging customers directly; getting high margin sales at lowest costs, being in control of your market and your brand.

Max Starkov, Chief eBusiness Strategist, Hospitality eBusiness Strategies writes “The Internet is all about transparency, efficient distribution of information, and inexpensive e-commerce transactions. It is simply the best direct-to-consumer distribution channel ever created and it definitely favors supplier-buyer relationships”.

The trend is clear, the Internet is revolutionizing marketing with more and more travelers choosing to go to the suppliers website and book direct rather than with a middleman. Travelers say they feel they have more control working with the supplier directly, but they expect rates and services to be comparable.

There are now new tools and services for travel suppliers to help them provide the full set of interactive and social networking solutions expected। AXSES has been a pioneer, providing 'supplier centered tools' to manage and distribute travel products. These can be installed directly on the suppliers own website. They include:

• Airfare ‘search and book’ that can be put right on the hotel website
• Dynamic packaging that for hotel suppliers that adds activities that match travelers profiles
• RSS feeds, blogs, travelers’ comments and travelers ratings
• Website booking engine
• Rates management and
• A range of travel components that hotels can put on their sites

All of these may be integrated with:

• Hotel Property Management Systems
• Global Distribution Systems (GDS) and
• The Internet Distribution Companies like Expedia.

What the middlemen do well is offer comparison shopping and search capabilities. AXSES bookings and reservation portals like http://bookingsBarbados.com, http://BookingsStlucia.com and http://CaribRes.com provides this also, but with this twist - requests and bookings are made directly with the hotel. (see axses arcRes supplier travel suites).

Unlike middlemen systems the hotel is not hidden and travelers can go direct to the hotel website at any time. There are popups and standard views of the information which travelers like as supplier websites follow no standard and it is confusing to compare several. All information on the direct channel (including websites content, amenities and features) is under the control of the Hotel.

These new tools are different to middlemen solutions for suppliers and destinations। The supplier-centered tools are designed from the ground up for suppliers, ie hotels, apartments, villas, activities and all tourism operators. They are configured to any set of rules and rate options. The tools are a powerful set of integrated suites to help tourism suppliers compete with all middlemen, for more high profit DIRECT business.

But be wary, not all who claim to be direct are!. Some marketers are jumping on the bandwagon, without credentials. A direct channel will not hide your brand, infact direct is about marketing your brand. A direct channel will allow users to go to your website and will not require guest to prepay the booking, deposit it in their bank, and pay you the balance less commissions. A direct channel gives you control on payment options, terms, content, rules, branding, and customers.

In 2008* 60% of online travelers chose to BUY Direct from the supplier, bypassing the middleman. The trend to direct is expected to continue. Merrill lynch forecasts that it will exceed 65% in the next 2 years. Current the large chains receive over 80% of online business direct (see trends by Merrill lynch HeBs).

We need to gear-up now for this market and take control



* Merill Lynch report is dated 2007, the table says 2008 but it probable is 2007. This is to be verified!

Advertising

Advertising at a Crossroads

Free reports, Tips and Guises:
 http://powerconsultants.axses.net/free-marketing-reports/

2015 Update - MediaPost call it an irrelevant argument -
See how Advertising Gets #Unbundled

Why The Biggest Debate In Advertising Is Irrelevant at MediaPost
Brands the say  ""We now care little about the record label and less about the singer or band"
I add add "and less about the brand, none of these are ny any means less vital, In fact consumption is up and all sectors gain, it just gets #UNBUNDLED (see link at end of article)

2013 update...
Its been a while since we forecast these changes and more.. So its rewarding to see this slideshow of the history of advertising. We were right on track in 2008 and today we are seeing search moving more into integrated marketing pushing search drops small hotels off of search results.

The Evolution of Advertising: How Consumers Won the War for Their Attention from HubSpot All-in-one Marketing Software

ORIGINAL ARTICLE.
 

 At AXSES, we have been musing about the internet advertising business, wonder how it will evolve. With Google loosing ground to other choices, such as social networking, meta search, bookings and interactive services, it will not be long before they morph their business to give travelers what they want. Google decided not go the bookings route, and did not offer to buy Expedia. It has opted to move more into social networking see Google Travel Plans. MSN in contrast is moving to interactive shopping, with its purchase of Farecast.

In our view the days of static ads and list that link to websites are limited. We expect to see this change even on the search engines. Travelers need to be able to compare options and get fully costed holiday at a click.

Hitwise, the Internet statistics company recently noted a significant shift in searchers favouring Branded searches. “I looked at the top 300 search terms sending visits to Travel websites and found that more than three-quarters - 77% - of visits from these queries were from branded search terms such as “Hilton hotels” or “Expedia” in the four weeks ending April 26, 2008”, Heather Hopkins, VP Research, Hitwise UK.

Simple put, the Hitwise findings, mean searchers are now looking more for names they know and not relying as much on generic terms. If the trend continues, it will mean that we can’t rely on the search engines to help people discover our hotels for the first time. We can’t rely on a middleman to market us!. Marketing ourselves is something we can’t avoid.

In light of the trends to buy direct, it is interesting that Expedia is a top of mind search term. Yet Expedia reports, unofficially, that 70% of visitors to the their site use their list to find resort matching a budget, and then go directly to the resort website to make a contact and book. 95% of Expedia visitors do not buy from Expedia. Aware of this trend Expedia introduced a Cost Per Click (CPC) advertising option, similar to Google. Interesting indeed! Has Expedia seen the writing on the wall?. Perhaps they got the idea that they were the new search engine for travel. So now instead of paying 25-30% in commission advertisers are paying 30-40% and don’t have any control on their brand.

The Cost Per Click (CPC), is the cost to deliver a single customer to a website as a result of a paid listing or advertisement on a medium such as Google or Barbados.org.

In a recent study of advertising costs, AXSES revealed that the Cost Per Click on Barbados.org is now less than 1/5 of costs on sites such as Google.

But they are all static ads that link travelers to the advertisers website. In addition we do free listing for every resort in the destination.
All of them, not just advertisers.

Our next release will make these ads interactive and link directly to dynamic quotation, reserve and book options. Of course all direct to the advertisers. What this means is that Barbados.org advertisers will have interactive advertisements that allow travelers to get an immediate quote and to reserve or book a holiday package, including air, online, on almost every advertisement and listing on Barbados.org. Travelers will now be able to click a button on the advertisement itself and make a booking directly with the hotel right there and then,. and this is right across all media, even on Google maps. Pretty powerful when u consider that Barbados.org maps are on the Google website ((http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=http:%2F%2Fwww.barbadosbymap.com%2Fgeorss.php) )as well as on Barbados.org map pages (and http://barbadosbymap.com)

Couple low CPC advertising with bookable ads and the supplier centered technologies now in place with  axses travel platform and other supplier solution, and you get a powerful direct marketing solution: Enhancing suppliers brand and delivering commission free business directly to the tourism operator. Giving control back to the supplier. For AXSES Power Marketing Free Resources and Marketing Tips go to http://powerconsultants.axses.net/free-marketing-resources/

We look forward to hearing from. Do you agree, do you have a point of view?. Please let us know what you know!

Oh - Do read the MediaPost Article its very on target on how advertising is unbundled

Need for Bookings Franchise

I have just returned from World Travel Market, London, 2007, the biggest destination travel show in the world. I spend some time chatting to destination about the Bookings systems they are using. In the Caribbean many are using WWTE a white label product of Expedia. It is not working well.

The problem is that Tour operator (TO) systems just don't work for Destinations. The Destination authority is responsible for marketing its member tourism operators. This means it must use the market channels and not conflict with it. Its prime responsibility is to help its clients get access to markets, be represented in global distribution and to encourage Direct Sales.

The TO booking systems operate on a distribution and Merchant model. They get net rates on hotels, mark them up and resell them, collecting the funds in advance and paying operators. Their systems require clients to abide by their rules and terms including setting aside rooms and units for their exclusive use (allocation). If a small hotel can't do this they often don’t get listed. They don't get listed if they are too small and can’t offer acceptable NET rates. TO systems do not promote direct sales and they don’t build hotel brands. Many are opaque, obscuring the hotel brand in favour of Best Price. The Destination Marketing company has an entirely different objective.

A sensible solution for Destinations is http://BookingsFranchise.com.



PRESS Release:

Powerful New Travel Platform Now Available for Destination Marketers

http://BookingsFranchise.com: Affordable Branded Channels for Direct Marketing. A first of its kind product for tourism destinations and travel portals.


BookingsFranchise.com platform delivers top e-commerce services. It is a powerful full featured solution, integrated with Global Distribution (GDS) and Internet marketing driving Direct Business and Distribution sales. BookingsFranchise is easy for destinations and tourism operators to setup and manage and easy for travelers to use; to get quotes, find, compare and book properties.

It is a proven platform of travel technology, developed and implemented by AXSES for Barbados.org, http://BookingsBarbados.com, http://BookingsStlucia.com and http://IntimateHotelsBarbados.com to name a few.


Ian Clayton CEO of AXSES, says “BookingsFranchise.com lets you do business your way, with your own terms and your rules. Unlike Tour Operator centered system, there are no commissions and no net rates. There is no limit to size of properties and all properties have complete flexibility with terms, inventory models and payment options. Ultimately, it delivers a way to take control of the entire supply chain with supplier centered tools”.

Advance your travel marketing; global exposure, more bookings, more control.
email AXSES BookingsFranchise


For More Information please see http://BookingsFranchise.com



Contact: email AXSES


Ian Clayton, iclayton@axses.com

AXSES
Knowledge engineering

Tel: 246 429 2653





















Do Business your way with multiple client terms, rate plans and rules.





Axses Travel Platform

delivers a fully interactive personalised solution



+ leading technology



http://arcRes.com |
http://arcRes-crs.com |
http://arcRes-pms.com |
http://Portal-keeper.com |

http://DestinationSuites.com |

http://TravelAgentsRes.com |
http://RealHolidays.com





AXSES Solutions cover all aspects of Travel Marketing and tourism Management.

GDS Next Generation

GDS NEXT GENERATION SEAMLESS
The GDS' are the distribution backbone for travel agents, in-house corporate travel departments, and many of the Internet distribution systems like Expedia. They deliver rates and availability information for travel covering air, hotel and car rentals. The information is delivered to the travel agent, so that it appears on their desktop computer using special software to search, display rates and book.
The GDS' Hotel information was originally all input by hand and this is still done manually in many cases. Pegasus employed a house full of workers to do this work, much of this is now out sourced to India. The process is very tedious and time prone to error. Once the information is loaded software system maintain the rate and inventory changes in all GDS. The Pegasus Switch coordinates hotel information bewteen gds sytsems. Data from hotel chains, Internet sites and GDS agents all at some piont use this switch.

To avoid delays and errors hotels and their technology providers opted to integrate the GDS information with their own reservations and property management solutions. This was called seamless integration. 2 way seamless refers to the systems that can manage GDS rates from the hotel CRS or PMS. One way integration simply means the hotel system can view the GDS sales but not manage the data.
Seamless Integration is not the same as NEXT GENERATION.
Next Generation capability was built by the GDS to allow compatible systems to input the data directly into the GDS´s. There are several such sytems in place. (list of services). This means that a hotel might use an online form to input their rates and data and this goes directly into the GDS. It substantially reduces the time to get to market and eliminates some errors when re-keying data. GDS sold this option to vendors who it turn incorporated it into their hotel solutions. Some setup shop as GDS agents to offer this service.

NEXT GENERATION ROBOTICS
The technology to update a mainframe is not trivial. It involves robotics that interface online internet system with GDS mainframe computers. Mainframes are not Internet savvy computers and cannot be accessed directly to change and add data. The data is sent via packets relayed on telecommunications network. The packet relay is interpreted by the Mainframe. As these mainframes are all different systems, protocols and standards were created. Mainframes also have very specific rules on what characters are accepted. Charters and in some cases words act as tigers to set off process in a mainframe, so the information sent to a mainframe must be accurate and comply with their rules. Even years after implementation the GDS-load process was finding errors in data integrity. A simple quotation mark can trigger a failure with disastrous results.
The Pegasus switch (originally called thisco, now called Utraswitch) is not a next generation technology. That is why Pegasus bought a similar system developed by Trust that was. Pegasus plans to upgrade all system by 2008 with conversions starting with hotel factory (their Central reservation system) in November 2007. Pegasus PR



SUMMARY

Next Generation provides GDS users with real-time rates and availability that is 100% identical to the information used by a hotel company's own reservations staff. The information is more quickly available and more accurate resulting in increased confidence and usability by agents. With NEXT generation Seamless, agents are more inclined to sell more using the GDS rather than book via telephone to assure their clients the lowest rates. Galileo Inside Shopper, Worldspan Integrated Hotel Source, Sabre Direct Connect Shop, the respective GDS' Next Generation Seamless products, were implemented by 2004.


GDS Chain Codes

© Ian Clayton, AXSES SCI 2007.
see arcRes solutions for tourism, AXSES web Solution

GDS History

GDS, CRS and channel management
The GDS have long been the primary source of travel agents bookings in the world. Today they do much more and supply content rates and hotel inventory to thousands of On-line Travel website.
The GDS systems are a huge network of thousands of computers set up originally by companies like Sabre, WorldSapn. Amedeus, Galileo and Pegasus. They provided Computer Based Reservations (CRS) services to all travel agents long before the Internet. These system are still in place and are used by more that 480,000 agents worldwide.
When you visit a Travel Agent you will see them at the CRS to find and book flights and resorts.
It has traditionally been an expensive distribution system requiring setup fees in the thousands of dollars as well as booking fees, transaction fees and agents commissions. As a result many smaller hotels are not represented in the GDS and GDS have not been too interested in this sector as they problem of coordinating inventory has been too great (a small hotel just does not have a sufficient supply of rooms to justify the effort of cost them up).

With the advent of new technology this has changed. Now there are GDS agent companies who specialise in supplying content to the GDS computers. The Internet also makes it easier to get the information and distribute it. This has made GDS widely available to hotels of all size. An inovator in opening up the Market was Tom Egan of reserv, who single handedly changed the face of distribution by offering an easy to use system with no setup fees and no minimum charges. His system worked on next Generation technology meaning that the entire process of setting up a hotel was done on-line, no manual entry. Alas Tom sold out and his ideas hot the dust.
2 way integration
New e-commerce systems (such as arcRes http://Bookings-Expert.com, http://axses-innkeeper.com and http://arcRes-CRS.com) are integrated with the GDS system to make it even easier and more affordable for hotels to market throught GDS. The two way integration makes it easier to setup and to manage rates and inventory in multiple channels. It essentially means that a hotel can use their own web booking engine or front desk software (that is GDS integrated) to see and process GDS reservation and to update allocation and rates. This is a great advantage as it means less to learn and to manage.
see also GDS Next Generation Seamless
A major problem facing the industry now is the proliferation of vendors. Whereas before we had a few key Tour Operators, now there are numerous Internet companies, like Expedia, Travelocity, Hotel.com, Priceline.com and many others that have vastly more exposure that the traditional Tour Operators. Getting products onto these system and maintaining rates, content and inventory requires full time management and is not feasible for many small resorts.

Fortunatly new hotel tools like arcRes Website Bookings Engine (Bookings-Expert) now provide a single system to maintain. It also makes rates management easier by allow suppliers to specify any rate in any channel as a % of another rates or a markup on costs. Other companies like AXSES are working on building tools that will change the face of distribution giving suppliers (hotels and tourism operators) control over the supply chain. The new model emerging is supplier centered, supply chain management.

In the new business model the hotel and tourism operator tools (field tools) are fully integrated at the operator level and with downstream distribution. For example the web bookings engine is integrated with property management, housekeeping and inventory. All this is integrated with the GDS system and destination portals like http://BookingsStlucia.com as well as with the GDS, and retail sites like http://travelocity.com feeding from the central database updated by arcRes.

Very Long Ago.
The history of the development of GDS is a great story. One of the best accounts I have seen is available at http://www.innadvance.com/index5.htm
In breif, it follows the development of a reservation systems spearheaded by American Airlines. The startup of ThisCo the switch that connected hotels to the airlines and travel agents systems and all the steps leading up to that.


© Ian Clayton, AXSES SCI 2007.
see arcRes solutions for tourism, AXSES web Solution

Strategy for Small Travel Solutions companies

This article was inspired by my visit to the travel Technology Show 2007.

See previous blog

At AXSES we believe that ultimate control of distribution rest with the travel operator. That means the hotel, activity and rental company supplier.

Hotels have encouraged distribution dominance by offering huge discounts to tour operators in exchange for guaranteed bookings. At the same time the distributors had marketing clout and could afford the technology that consumers demanded (on line booking, dynamic packaging etc). In a fragmented global market, distributors emerged as the place to shop.

The tour operators set their own rules and resell price. Prices in distribution were thus often much lower that the hotel published rates. As competing distributors try to match rates the pressure on hotel profitability is intense. Often a hotel that would not meet a requested price would be dropped. In this agressive distribution driven market, the hotel Brand was eroded and rates fragmented.

The large hotel chains have moved effectively to take back control with Best Rate Guarantees and by offering consumers the service (technology) they demand. (on-line costing, bookings, packaging). Thanks to technology, operators have increased and continue to increase their influence via direct bookings and by greater clout in managed distribution pricing and inventory.

At the same time “travel consumers are exchanging more information and exerting much greater influence over online content - from travel blogs to social networking, they are driving change” (source).

Travelers prefer to deal direct(1) and the core technology that is driving this trend is Field Management Systems and small travel application developers and integrators play a large part in delivering these solutions.

Consider AXSES portal clients like Intimate hotels of Barbados. The Intimate portal is managed by Portal-keeper.com and arcRes-CRS (central reservations Systems) these solutions are fully integrated with GDS and with the hotel bookings and (bookings-expert.com) and Property Management System http://axses-innkeeper.com.

In this senario the small hotels can manage the rates and inventory on the Intimate Hotels Barbados Portal as well as the GDS. The technology they use not only powers Intimate in Barbados but at least 10 other channels that are vital marketing forces for Barbados and the Caribbean. The next step is to add full channel management extending to sites like Expedia, Travelocity and all 40,000 IDS sites.


Notes
1. PhoCusWright 2005: "In fact, more than twice as many online travelers (36%) believe that the supplier-direct channel provides the best customer service compared to 15% who choose the online travel agency channel. Even offline agencies, which are coveted for their personal touch in a technology-driven world, did not fare as well, with 33% claiming they provide the best customer service". ....more