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a word from the

Chairman

The quarterly TTI newsletter Issue 46 May 2012

They say that summer is finally here… although I find that hard to believe following one of the wettest few weeks I can remember for a very long time! It seems that each month that goes by, more and more weather records get broken. The one thing that wet weather does do is to make people book overseas travel in their droves to get away from it! I was amazed to see that Thomas Cooks website traffic increased by a whopping 27% following the bad weather

over the first Bank holiday in May and specifically for travel over the Queens Diamond Jubilee weekend, whereas Hoseasons fell by 38% in that very same week. Anyhow, whatever the weather, I hope that your businesses are all doing well and that you are also faring well given the on-going economic conditions that we continue to find ourselves in. Here at TTI we have all been very busy with our various projects and the planning for our two upcoming events later this year. I am also happy to report that we are continuing to do well with TTI membership numbers growing month on month, which is very encouraging news indeed. Our TTIcodes project is also doing well and we now have several major players signed-up, with many more in the pipeline. You can read more about how we are doing with the TTIcodes initiative in a special feature here in this newsletter that has been written by Pete Hazel - our TTIcodes Coordinator. By the way, please don’t hesitate to contact Pete if you need any further information on TTIcodes or if you would like a demo of the web facility itself, which I must say is very impressive indeed. Our Project Management Working Group is currently considering a number of new initiatives including the possibility of creating a number of TTI technical briefing papers. Subjects currently under consideration include; cookies, mobile technology development, semantic web development and resort codes. If any members would like to be involved in these new initiatives please do not hesitate to get in touch as these subjects are worthy of consideration given their growing impact on travel technology as a whole. Looking ahead, this year of course sees the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee and the Olympic Games which means a very busy time for London as a whole during the summer period and for all of those involved with incoming tourism into the capital. I just hope that they can find a better solution for immigration control at our borders to get those queues down! Perhaps one of you can suggest a good technical solution? In terms of our two events later this year, we have our autumn conference entitled “The Future of Travel Distribution” which will take place all day on Wednesday the 12th of September at the Strand Palace Hotel in London, and our winter forum which will once again take place in conjunction with World Travel Market in November entitled “The WTM Travel Innovation Summit” which we will again be organising in conjunction with OpenTravel. Details on both of these events will be published shortly on our website, but as before, they are likely to be well over-subscribed, so I urge you to book your place early to avoid disappointment. In the meantime, I wish you all a very pleasant summer and happy

holidays.

Travel distribution is a fast moving discipline. Across the recent decades It has changed out of all recognition. The complexities of channel management and the plethora of electronic distribution options could not have even been dreamt of just a few decades ago. At the start of the Internet era, it was thought that disintermediation would render the role of the travel agent redundant as suppliers now had the means to reach out directly to their customers. The thinking was that this would simplify distribution, for example, allowing hotels to simply sell via their websites. In fact, travel agents are still in the game, online travel agents have become a significant distribution channel and hotels now face incredibly complex distribution choices requiring a new genre of channel management organisations to assist them.

Meanwhile, airlines find themselves in the position that they can also be tour operators, selling accommodation alongside their flights and tour operators compete with consumers who are happy to self package. To add to the complexity, travel companies now need to be considering their mobile distribution strategies. Mobile has brought travel distribution right to the consumer so that they can make a purchase wherever and whenever they want. This immediacy is a revolution for last-minute sales. TTI’s Autumn Conference will examine the latest travel distribution trends and glimpse into the future. The event will feature a group of top rate speakers who will give their views on this important topic. More details soon.

TTI Autumn Conference - Wednesday 12 Sept, London

The Future of Travel Distribution

Welcome

- Anixe Polska - Gateway Belgium

- Kuoni Group - Low Cost Travel Group

TTI on You can now keep up with all the latest news from TTI by following us on Twitter.

Follow @TTI_org

A warm welcome to the following new members who have joined TTI in the last few months:

by Peter Dennis

Project Management Meetings (All members welcome, contact Liz if you would like to take part) 17 July (conference call) 4 September (conference call) Conferences & Forums 12 September - Autumn Conference 5 November - Winter Forum

TTI Events 2012

TTI is supported by

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Having run three travel companies in my time, including a major direct-sell subsidiary of Thomson Travel, I’ve come to believe that the two elements most able to affect company performance and profits are its people and its IT.

Of course Product, Pricing, Marketing, etc. are all vital too, but just witness the damage to Thomas Cook’s business of not moving its distribution far and fast enough onto the web. In an industry where the ‘product’ is essentially the intangible of service delivery between supplier and consumer (until the

holiday or trip is actually taken, at least) then in the internet age especially, the technology to deliver that information service efficiently is the key to customer purchasing and therefore revenue. Nowhere is this more true than in the resource/people-heavy environment of the contact centre, where a significant number of interlinked dynamics can directly affect margins and customer satisfaction too, such as call answering/abandoned rates; waiting times & automated call distribution (including spillover, outsourcing & remote workers); blending of calls/web chat/e-mail/SMS handling; call conversion to sale; monitoring, recording & quality control; call outcome/source/cost of sale reporting; & disaster recovery - to name but just a few! So I was delighted to be invited last year to become a director of Syntec

Telecom and to see first-hand how transformative the business benefits can be of cloud-based (or ‘hosted’) solutions for our many travel company clients, as well as blue-chip companies from other sectors including Catalogues, NHS Trusts, Charities and the Finance sector. Syntec prides itself on the development of its own proprietary ‘value-added’ contact management software, with the sort of personal back-up and service you can only get from a smaller company. But perhaps the first key benefit is the immediacy with which our business solutions can be delivered, since ‘cloud’ means no hardware to install (as it’s all hosted in our own network and secure ‘private cloud’ environment) – so no CAPEX outlay or boxes to install at the customer end, nor hardware integration or major project lead times to manage. So .. simple to integrate and turn on, with transparent & volume-related pricing which can ebb and flow with business seasonality. Another major benefit is the seamless integration of Syntec’s whole suite of business solutions, so you don’t have to try and combine services from different suppliers, with all the compatibility issues and separate reporting and data sources which can result.

We can handle your call traffic via our digital interconnects (PSTN) as well as VoIP, with our additional network-level services giving you fully-integrated Syntec control.

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CardEasy takes your contact centre/home & remote working environments out of scope of PCI DSS audits, handling customers’ credit card details securely by

keypad entry mid-call, even when calls are recorded. Customers enter their card number and 3-digit security number using their telephone keypad, so your agents do not see or hear the sensitive card information; it is not stored in your systems and is excluded from any call recording. The agent remains on hand throughout the call and is informed of the payment result in real time once payment has been processed by the CardEasy system, which can be installed with or without installation of/ integration with AgentCall.

MouseTracker identifies which of your website searches and visitors are generating your telephone enquiries/sales, for true analysis of your online

marketing spend and ROI, even when completion is offline. MouseTracker can link individual ‘phone conversations with the customer‘s web session, giving your contact centre agents real time visibility of what the caller has been doing online before (and during) the call, in a simple graphical display alongside previous call history/notes. Detailed and aggregate tracking data is delivered in real-time and reports with prospect/customer information delivered to your call agents and marketing managers on: • Visibility of search terms and links, both to your site and within your site • Online advertising & SEO performance and ROI, even for enquiries and

sales which come through by telephone Syntec offers a free trial of the entry-level ‘referrer’ version of MouseTracker which immediately unlocks aggregate data on searches and links (but note that individual caller display requires further integration with AgentCall). Other Marketing Response and Behavioural Analysis options include: after-call Customer Surveys and the full range of Geographic & Non-geographic numbers (01/02 & 03, 0800, 0844/0871 etc.) to track & report advertising response. Revenue- sharing is available where applicable.

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Social Media Corner

TTI has teamed up with award winning social media agency Digital Visitor to provide a series of articles on social media. In this first article, Digital Visitor’s CEO Anthony Rawlins looks at some interesting statistics regarding how social media has influenced the travel industry.

10 social statistics from the travel industry No-one can argue that social media isn’t now a part of the marketing mix – whatever industry you’re involved in. But the days of simply having a presence on channels like Facebook and Twitter are over. . Using research provided by EyeforTravel, we recently created a video looking specifically at how travel providers, agents and operators are making the most of social media. Here’s a summary of some of the most interesting results: 1. Social is no longer a ‘maybe’ 100% of global travel brands surveyed had a Facebook brand page (up from 82% in Feb 2011), and 75% had a Twitter profile. The question of whether social media is right for your brand has now passed – it is essential if you want to keep up with your competitors and engage your customers in the spaces they are most likely to listen. 2. Social and search are linked For companies looking to preserve or improve their rankings, social marketing activities will no longer be optional - they will be a necessary element of traffic driving success. Social media is becoming of more and more importance to the algorithms that sit behind search engine results pages. Companies that take the time to not just be active on social channels, but build connections and deliver relevant, rich content will see their reputations – and rankings – rise. 3. Social is a traffic driver 51% of travel brands cited an increase in traffic from Facebook (Q3, 2011). Social networks are the 2nd most influential source of online traffic for travel suppliers (Q4, 2011). The second biggest search engine behind Google isn’t Bing, Yahoo, or AOL; it’s YouTube – a social channel. Consumers don’t just use social channels to chat with friends, they use them to discover new music, share fashion finds, and get inspiration for their next trip. Tap into this by creating great content, exciting competitions and interesting ad campaigns. 4. Social is a sales driver 50% of travel brands surveyed agreed that they have generated direct bookings from social media. Peer recommendation is now a big part of the buying cycle, and social channels are where people communicate with their peers. If your customers are talking positively about their purchases from you, there’s potential to reach new audiences and new sales. Social is also a great place for promoting new offers and deals – which are frequently shared amongst friends. 5. Social media is an engagement tool 71% of travel brands agree to some extent that social media has improved engagement.

Capturing your audience’s imagination can be difficult, when you’re competing against everyone else. But Barbara Pezzi, Director Analytics & Search Optimisation for Fairmont Raffles Hotels, explains it is possible: “For social media strategies to have longevity, they need to engage the users with stimulating, relevant content, and/or provide then with the tools necessary to meet their needs over time.” 6. Your competitors are investing In Q3, 2011, 33% of travel brands allocated more of their marketing budget to managing their presence in social media channels, and 61% of travel brands are expecting to increase their investment in social media over the next 3 months. Social media marketing now comes in third place for marketing spend, after search engine marketing and email marketing. This shows that brands are recognising the opportunities of the space – and showing their commitment with actual investment. 7. Social ad spend is up In Q3, 2011, 42% of travel brands allocated more of their marketing budget to social media advertising than they had in the previous quarter. Above-the-line advertising has been losing out to more measurable digital methods for some time. Now online ad spend includes a social element, driven partly by the ability to highly target specific audience segments using data from their social profiles. 8. Investment can save costs elsewhere Travel marketers surveyed found that using social media reduced PR costs by 24%. Whether it’s a great offer or an imagination-capturing campaign – shareable social content can turn your customers into your PR team, as they spread your message to their friends and family – for free. 9. Facebook is still the centre of social Facebook has over 845 million active users, and accounts for 1 in every 7 minutes spent online around the world. Incredibly user-friendly, interactive and with endless opportunities for sharing – if you focus your efforts on one place make that place Facebook. For brands especially, it’s continually developing its offering – as seen by the recent timeline switch for brand pages and the upcoming revision of its ad packages. 10. Reviews are indispensable in the booking process for travellers 88% of travellers consult reviews before making a booking and half say that reviews are the greatest influence on their booking choices. There have been many reports highlighting the significant influence that reviews and user generated content have on consumers when making a purchase decision. Like it or not, today’s savvy internet users require user generated content such as reviews, ratings, photos and videos to help them make their decision to buy. Why? Because people trust other consumers for advice and guidance. According to research conducted by emarketer, consumer reviews are trusted 12 times more than product descriptions by the company. Find Digital Visitor on the web at www.digitalvisitor.com .

by Anthony Rawlins

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TTI’s Spring Conference, held in March, covered a huge amount of territory from getting online content right to EU privacy law around cookies and some start-up business models thrown in into mix. With Optimising Digital Sales as the theme of the event, Jonathan Greensted, business development director of website design agency Zolv, kicked off the day with advice on adapting content to what you know about the person coming to your site. For example, consider how they are consuming your products and on what device – it could range from website via PC, mobile phone or tablet device, PS Vita, email or social network. Frommer’s Unlimited EMEA director Giles Longhurst then launched into the various ways it creates and uses content on its own website as well as for partner sites. Longhurst said businesses should consider all content as an ‘extension of their welcome’ and tailor it accordingly in terms of language and tone as well as considering carefully where to introduce the call to action. He also stressed the importance of structuring content correctly to appeal to the target audience. Delegates questioned how to achieve a balance between too much or too little information with Longhurst saying it depends what phase users are in the cycle. “In the research phase you don’t know exactly what they want so you need a wide range. Once you get into the booking path it’s only the most relevant information and when they are ready to put in their credit card details don’t let anything get in the way. If they’re not looking at a piece of content, remove it.” Greensted suggested that consumers leave websites feeling ‘a bit guilty’ when something does not work and that guilt gets associated with the brand. Sam Gregory of Google discussed the idea of a ‘zero moment of truth’ – a new phase in the research and shopping cycle where consumers spend time seeking the advice of friends as well as other consumers via online reviews sites. While consumers used to go from stimulus to purchase (first

moment of truth) to taking the product home, they now go from stimulus to ‘zero moment of truth’ to purchase. And, all three elements – stimulus, zero moment of truth and first moment of truth – are equally important.

According to the search giant, 83% of consumers rely on ratings and review sites before making a purchase and buyers are reading between four and seven reviews before making a purchase. Gregory also provided further research, conducted with Nielsen in 2010, on online behaviour with consumers visiting 15

sites on average, visiting each site twice, spending two hours, 14 minutes in total on research and taking 50 days. He added that companies could win in the ZMOT phase by putting someone in charge, reacting quickly, answering the questions people are asking, consider video and optimising for ZMOT. With consumer behaviour changing so rapidly and new influences impacting purchase all the time, travel companies have to work hard to attract and keep customers. Frommer’s has found success in a number of developments in the past two to three years largely because of its focus on developing an image database and content management system. Slideshows, for example, are driving search traffic and page views with a 20% increase in page views. They now represent more than 45% of traffic for the company. According to Longhurst, the best performing slideshow - What Not To Wear When Travelling drove more than 1.5 million page views in one month with an average visitor duration of

(Continued on page 5)

TTI Spring Conference - Optimising Digital Sales Report by Linda Fox

Sponsored by:

Giles Longhurst, Frommer’s Unlimited; Elliott Pritchard, Travel Republic; Jonathan Greensted, ZOLV

John Howell, Multicom

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more than eight minutes. “It’s about giving people reasons to stay on the site.” When questioned on whether slideshows are better than video, Longhurst said that video has its place but that there are a lot of user-generated video clips online and not a great deal of high quality professional video. “I don’t think images quite offer what high quality video does but the big problem with video is cost and it’s difficult for travel companies to keep investing in it.” Frommer’s is now working with companies including hotels.com to create multi-language articles to establish the Expedia brand as an authority on key markets, boost conversion rates, build long-term brand loyalty and improve organic traffic. The content has resulted in hotels.com getting the #1 ranking on Google for its Where to Stay in Berlin guide as well as #1 on the search giant for Top 10 Paris Food and Drink article. Looking forward, Longhurst said mapping is beginning to be used as a way to find travel products and Frommer’s is already working with a number of companies who use maps as the main way into their product. “What maps allow you to do is focus much more on the proximity of the property rather than a price. Using maps to sell products is something to watch.” Finally, Longhurst provided a glimpse of Frommer’s partnership with Hewlett Packard to create Frommer’s Remix, which allows users to choose the bits of travel content that are most relevant to them and combine them alongside a trip itinerary into a searchable customised guide which could sit on your iPad. Start-up personalisation specialist MiGuide, which also enables users to create bespoke city guides as a basis for travel companies to customise their product offers, provided a glimpse of its offering as well as some good insight on how consumers feel about companies using their personal data to offer them products. Pew Internet research for March 2012 shows 73% of US consumers would not agree with search results being personalised via data collection and the figure rises to 83% among those aged 50+. MiGuide’s David Smith stressed companies had to strike a fine balance between privacy issues and the consumer desire for relevant and personalised offers and products. The cooler side of content was then swapped for a very detailed presentation on EU Cookie law, the UK’s position and how travel companies should prepare. The session was delivered by Travel Republic’s Elliott Pritchard who grabbed the room’s attention with the mention of £500,000 fines. In the UK, the EU directive has been law for a year but will be enforced from May 26, 2012 with online service providers

obliged to get consent for website visitors before planting cookies or any tracking devices on their computers. The job of enforcing the regulations falls to the Information Commissioners Office which has already said implied consent, relying on browser settings and cookies which are deemed necessary for websites functionality such as shopping baskets are unlikely to be good enough excuses. However, the Department of Culture, Media and Sport has

published a letter stating it intends a light approach to the legislation. Pritchard finished up by saying that mobile uptake could kill the cookie issue because browsers such as safari don’t accept third party cookies. A good portion of the day was also given over to the less consumer-facing side of technology with Multicom’s John Howell advising travel companies to let companies such as his work out the integration, caching and distribution issues leaving them to focus on selling holidays.

Howell added that emerging technology was making the problem of data aggregation more complicated while consumers are becoming increasingly demanding in terms of the expectation of responses in one to two seconds. He also said there would always be a trade-off between data and speed but that Multicom was looking to develop sub-second dynamic packaging by the end of this year using its omnicache technology. Delegates aired their frustration of caching by saying that nothing undermines the industry’s credibility quicker than a

customer seeing a great price only to find 30 seconds later that it is no longer available. TTI chairman Peter Dennis wrapped up by saying the whole industry needed to come together to solve the issues around caching and that the majority of travel companies would die without it.

(Continued from page 4)

Anthony Rawlins, Digital Visitor; Sam Gregory, Google

Daniel Reilly, BlinkBooking.com; David Smith, MiGuide

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The 2012 North American Advisory Forum was held in Miami, Florida in April; the main themes of the forum were:

− The Potential of Semantic Technologies in Travel (keynote speech from Professor Deborah McGuinness of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute): Business rule engines are now starting to use/access ontology (e.g. OWL);

− Customer experience - enriching it through more connectivity between partners (Delta/Datalex); - improving it by using data mining;

− RESTful (REpresentational State Transfer) XML resources rather than objects is being regarded as the coming thing for message exchange, replacing SOAP.

A full report together with most of the presentations can be

found at http://www.opentravel.org/News/ArticleView.aspx?ArticleID=140

Ongoing OpenTravel projects:

− Vacation rentals;

− air merchandising - common ancillary merchandising object definition;

− air operations baggage and enhanced seat map schema;

− joint ground transportation/tours & activities structure;

− OpenTravel 2.0 (changing the message structure to XML objects)

− Potential new project to define a structure and messages for validated customer reviews

It is 3 months since the launch of TTIcodes in London and many of you will have heard our esteemed Chairman repeatedly saying that the need in our Industry has never been greater. “Yeah, yeah … heard all this before” is not an unfamiliar response in an industry that is known to muddle through with technology. In fact sometimes I was left thinking that companies would fail to see the benefits that will accrue from TTIcodes.

But sometimes fate plays a hand in determining the street cred of a new product & that hand of fate came into being just recently. Lo & behold, one of our first TTIcodes customers delivered a file of about 1,000 properties for matching which, on the surface, did not look like a difficult task until the information in the data file was examined more closely. Why has the Newport Bay Hotel in Euro Disney an address in Rhode Island? Is the La Cheyenne hotel in Euro Disney really in Wyoming!! Other examples of errors found include - mailing addresses instead of the real hotel address and 4 different hotels in the same hotel group with the same address. Further examination of the content revealed that there was no structure to either names or addresses making automatic matching unlikely. It was a case of ‘cometh the hour cometh the man’ or rather ‘cometh the TTIcodes Utility’ to the rescue. To solve this issue we used the geographic & part name search to match over 98% of the properties and also identified many duplicate entries. Result — a happy customer. Whilst TTIcodes is designed primarily as an operational tool we have also come to realise that it has tremendous value as a research and marketing tool. On a recent project for a tour operator, one of the challenges they faced was a lack of competitive offerings (hotels of the right star rating, choice of room types etc.) in specific

markets. Using TTIcodes as one of my base research tools, I saved hours as I was quickly able to ascertain which of the bed banks and wholesaler’s best served the markets the client operated in and which offered the best portfolio of the hotels that matched their aspirations. Using the My Channel and Partner Channel search options one could easily see the overlap between suppliers or look at the total potential if one used more than one supplier in a market. Whether it was the Caribbean, Cuba, Vegas, New York, London, Rome, Dubai, Disneyworld or the Maldives the versatility and global coverage of TTIcodes shone through. These are just two examples but I have had many similar discussions with other entities across the travel distribution domain. All I can say is “embrace TTIcodes. It will help you more than you ever imagined, it is much more than a geeky XML solution.” Mr Chairman keep beating that drum, you are right, the industry needs the solution not tomorrow but today!!

OpenTravel Update

by Tony Williamsby Tony Williamsby Tony Williamsby Tony Williams

TTIcodes - 3 Months On

by Peter Hazel

No. of Unique Properties with

TTIcodes

No of Property / Distribution

Channel Cross-References

No of Channels & Tour Operators

227,758 2,798,936 265

Latest News

Vibe, Gateway DB, Holiday Taxis implemented

2 new major clients in contract stage

38 Active Enquiries

Expedia cross-referencing completed

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The quarterly TTI newsletter Issue 21, February 2006

Below is a resume of the main points discussed at the TTI Project Management Meeting held on 17th April 2012. All members are welcome to take part and help set the direction of TTI. Just let Liz know if you

would like to be involved. TTIcodes & Launch TTIcodes was launched in January as planned and was successfully demonstrated at the Travel Technology Europe show at Earls’ Court. Interest remains high with serious enquiries from major players in the hospitality distribution space who recognise the value TTIcodes can bring. As we speak with these players we are seeing requirements evolve such as holding both the chain id and the brand for the large international groups with multiple brands in their portfolio. This includes the date when a hotel changes brand or is re-branded as part of another chain. Also high on the list of items to be addressed is standardisation of locales or resort areas which is a high priority amongst many potential customers. Administratively we are working hard to ensure customers who are not currently members of TTI become members before their account is activated on TTIcodes. It was agreed that we should set-up a series of webinars over the forthcoming months to widen the industry knowledge of how TTIcodes is working in the real world. OpenTravel The good news is that we have agreed changes to the key hotel based messages within the OpenTravel Message Set to include the TTIcode as an optional field both in requests and responses. We are now looking for sponsors to enable us to get the amendments published as part of the OTA2012B message set. With OpenTravel 2.0 becoming more and more prevalent plus the move to RESTful (Representational State Transfer) based web services design methodology which is replacing the more complex SOAP & WSDL designs, TTI will be introducing a regular update session at its conferences so that its members can keep abreast of changes in the area of OpenTravel and system to system communication.

Travel Technology Europe As previously mentioned, Peter Dennis, Peter Hazel and Andreas Posmeck from GIATA gave a 45 minute talk about TTIcodes which was well received with plenty of interest at TTI’s exhibition stand. Spring Conference 19 March 2012 ‘Optimising Digital Sales’ was held at the Harrington Hall hotel in South Kensington where numerous speakers discussed different strategies across the web, social media & mobile in order to maximise sales and conversions. Whilst the room was not the most conducive in terms of layout and acoustics, feedback has suggested that we need to work much harder at creating an environment more geared to encouraging interaction between attendees, particularly new members. This will be addressed in time for the Autumn conference in September. Summer Forum 17 April 2012 Once again this was held at the EyeforTravel Travel Distribution Summit at the Business Design Centre in Islington. The focus was the role of business and market intelligence in determining one’s sales and marketing strategies. The key was utilising the vast amounts of information that is available to you whether it be market intelligence, web analytics, trip reviews or the number of Facebook ‘likes’ it is very often the simple information that tells you the most about your business. Presentations are available for download from TTI’s website and a full report of the Forum will appear in the next newsletter. Autumn Conference 12 September 2012 The autumn conference will be held at the refurbished Strand Palace Hotel where the topic will be the “The Future of Travel Distribution.” Winter Forum 5 November 2012 The Winter Forum will be held in conjunction World Travel Market and has been named “The WTM Travel Innovation Summit in Association with TTI & Open Travel.” TTI Website Now up & running & much smarter with an eye catching look & feel. . Next Meeting Our next Board & Project management meeting is scheduled for Tuesday 17th July at 10am and will also be by conference call. Please let Liz know if you would like to participate.

Project Management Committee Discussions

Published on behalf of TTI by Genesys - The Travel Technology Consultancy Email: admin@tti.org www.genesys.net

Travel Technology Initiative Ltd, Registered office: Victoria House, 51 Victoria Street, Bristol, BS1 6AD Company Registration Number: England 2398368

by Peter Hazel

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World Travel Market

World Travel Market Travel Technology Sales Manager Jo Marshall outlines the rise of WTM as a hub for travel technology business. World Travel Market, the leading global event for the travel industry, has cemented itself over the last couple of years as the event for travel technology.

WTM 2011 will generate more than £1,653 million in industry deals

before WTM 2012, with the Travel Technology region’s deals growing every year along with the size of the exhibitor floor space and the number of exhibitors. Travel technology is the fastest growing region of the WTM exhibition floor, increasing by more than 40% last year compared to WTM 2010, making it the largest travel technology event in the UK. The region had a massive 48 new exhibitors – the highest of all the exhibition floor regions - at WTM 2011 covering all aspects of the online travel world including 3D interactive travel-guide platform 3rd Planet, hotel room accommodation site Room 77, online marketing specialists World Independent Hotels Promotion, website onsite experience company Triometric, hotel reservations system e-GDS, Ixaris Systems, Spatravel.co.uk, FACT-Finder Travel, TravelSim and car rental software firm Thermeon Worldwide. Two new pavilions were introduced including one dedicated to Mobile Technology, with exhibitors including AppiHolidays, AQ2 and Ecocarrier, and the other for New Exhibitors to the event – including Fortune Cookie, SustainIT Solutions, TigerBay Software, Rezopia and Groupo1000 Lugares. Furthermore, the Travel Technology seminar programme had the highest attendance of all seminar programmes at WTM 2011 with more than 3,600 delegates. The core Travel Technology programme, organised by Genesys Senior Partner, Paul Richer, was moved to ExCeL’s headline Platinum Suites to allow more delegates to attend – 2011 saw a 62% increase in the seminar attendees. The standing-room only sessions had headline senior executive speakers from companies including Google, Yahoo!, TripAdvisor, British Airways and lastminute.com. WTM 2012 will see an even greater focus given to Travel Technology, expect the exhibition floor space to be even greater, with a number of new exhibitors and longstanding exhibitors taking even more floor space. The Travel Technology seminar programme, which will remain in the headline Platinum Suites, and will have even more senior executive headline speakers from the industry’s leading companies. WTM really Means Technology. World Travel Market 2012 takes place between Monday 5 - Thursday 8 November at ExCel – London. To enquire about exhibiting at WTM 2012 or for more information contact me on 020 8910 7982 or jo.marshall@reedexpo.co.uk. www.wtmlondon.com

by Jo Marshall