Nominations now open for EyeforTravel’s Start-Up Travel Awards 2017

Does your travel company have what it takes to succeed in travel?  Is your app or product a key weapon in your battle to win and engage travel consumers?  New travel brands will find out as they battle it out as part of EyeforTravel’s Start-Up Travel awards taking place in San Francisco, April 24th – 25 as part of EyeforTravel’s San Francisco Summit.

Research showed us Travel startups attracted billions of dollars in funding last year, and the travel booking sector attracted some of the most investment — more than $650 million.

“Start-ups represents a fundamental shift in innovation in travel.  At EyeforTravel we believe that the brands investing and innovating in mobile and new offerings deserve to be recognised”, says Tim Gunstone, MD, EyeforTravel Ltd.

As Charles Ralston from TripStreak said on the previous EyeforTravel Awards “The Start-up Village is a really great value for money, especially for start-ups that can’t typically afford to spend thousands on conference. Bravo to EyeforTravel for pioneering this!”

Travel is being changed by mobile, the sharing economy social media and that constant drive to deliver the best customer experience.  Technology is transforming the way travel is sold – providing exciting opportunities to enhance the customer experience, grow loyalty and ancillary revenues.

EyeforTravel’s Start-Up Awards seek to recognize the young brands who are making significant progress for travel – trailblazing the way for others to follow.

With new apps, services and devices hitting the travel market and extra capabilities coming to devices, travel brands cannot sit still and must continue to innovate. EyeforTravel are offering new brands a stage to shout about it!

Previous finalists include FLYR, Seatwizer, Flitways, Stiya, Biz Airlines, spacebase, tripstr, Grabr, wellobox and more!

The Start-up awards is a day-long event

• Starting with learning sessions – quizzing travel entrepreneurs on their secrets of success
• Meet the investors – and see what they look for in a travel start-up
• Start-up Pitches for the companies that are shortlisted
• Finalists and Winners announced

To get involved and see if you make the cut you can register today to pitch or just attend the day – learn more here

All entries must be received by February 28^th. Find out how to enter your brand and for full terms and conditions, visit –http://events.eyefortravel.com/san-francisco-summit/startup-village.php

For all awards enquires contact: -

Shreya Ganapathy

Project and Content Director | Eyefortravel

W:  +44 20 7375 7150

shreya@eyefortravel.com

Advances in data, analytics and technology are creating exciting opportunities for growth in APAC’s travel industry

Asia is a complex and fragmented market with vastly different types of consumer behaviour, languages and cultures. With rapidly changing technological development, the increase of low cost carriers in the region and the capability of the middle class to travel further, the possibilities of travel in Asia are becoming limitless.

 But the question remains, how can travel brands tackle such a diverse market? 

The revolution in data and analytics is changing what brands know about their customers. At the same time the growth of mobile use by travel consumers’ means that travel brands can service and sell more and for longer. According to a study by LeNovo, about 59 per cent of the respondents in Asia said they searched for travel accommodation online via mobile devices – 13 per cent above global average.  

 However, as Tim Gunstone, MD, EyeforTravel highlights, “In the battle to win the travel customer, if you don’t use both mobile and data to send contextualised communications then you risk losing customers to the travel companies that do”. In a recent interview with Tarandeep Singh, IHG’s Director of Revenue Analytics for the Asia Middle East and Africa (AMEA) region he said “data analytics have been able to rewrite our consumer segmentation and break it up by every brand to ensure we are talking to the right audience at all times,” This enables the group to target far more accurately with much higher conversion rates than a few years ago. 

 All this change means that established business models are showing signs of failing and huge opportunities are in place for the brave and insightful. New business models from start-ups such as TravelMob, HotelQuickly, Stayzilla, GrabTaxi and many others could potentially grow into billion dollar industries.  

 EyeforTravel’s 17^th Travel Distribution Summit Asia couldn’t come at a more opportune time. Taking place in Singapore, 20-21^st May, it will aim to bring together some of the leading APAC experts. 

The changes in the industry mean that the travel professional needs to fundamentally re-visit and discuss how they can work together effectively and profitably.  If they don’t, they risk facing commoditisation of their product and missing the huge opportunity to use data and analytics to increase ancillary product sales. 

For years, EyeforTravel’s TDS Asia event has been the educational meeting place for the innovators in the travel industry.  This year is no different, but we also have added into that mix some of the biggest brands in travel to brainstorm on the future of APAC’s travel.

 Marketing, innovation, technology, analytics, RM and mobile experts from all branches of travel use this event as an annual meet up to predict the future of  travel in the region and to network in view of profitable partnerships.

By Mariah Assuncao, Global Conference Director, EyeforTravel
Mariah@eyefortravel.com

The President of Sabre Hospitality or the CTO of Airbnb or the COO of Citizen M hotels?

All three are meeting to look at how mobile is impacting accommodation sales. Who has the best plan to grow?

If any travel sector is reeling from the impact of mobile it’s the accommodation sector. The dominance of OTA hotel booking apps has led to our researchers hearing about huge drops in brand led direct bookings. But the hotels occupancy levels are still high. How will the owners react? 

One way that the brands are defending their position is by investing in incredibly useful apps that their guests will want to use. We are seeing huge ROI on the brand apps that extend the services the big brands can offer and the products they can sell. 

And we heard this week that Barclays financial analysts finally recognise that Airbnb (and its 50% per annum growth) is having an impact on the hotel industry. Accor is singled out by Barclays for attention with “9% of its rooms under threat”

This debate is part of the event I am running at Mobile World Congress this March 2. Who do you feel is going to have the best future strategy?

Come along and participate in the debate live or subscribe to gain access to the recording.

Tim Gunstone

Managing Director

+44 (0)207 375 7557

Mobile +44 (0) 7815814314

tim@eyefortravel.com

“The Occasion Marketer” by Rosie Akenhead

By Rosie Akenhead


You can’t blink in London at the moment without seeing Prince William’s and Kate Middleton’s faces splashed all over tacky teacups, snowdomes, aprons and every other piece of tourist junk. It’s seems a fair statement that international tourists are perhaps the target audience for these sales (rather than us Brits). I’ve been contemplating for a while about how this would pan out for the travel industry and british tourism specifically. I have a specific interest in this topic as I live about ten minutes walk from Westminster Abbey. All my friends keep suggesting that I rent my apartment for a vast sum of money while William and Kate walk up the aisle. So I beg to ask the question- is this do-able? And, how are other travel companies preparing for and responding to the surge of interest in the royal wedding?

It makes sense to backtrack a little before throwing ourselves in the deep-end. We know that targeted “event” or “date” marketing works for travel. You only need to ask lastminute.com or Travelzoo about the increasing success of their Valentine break deals to ascertain that. Are “events” becoming more essential (or appealing) for the discening traveller? Is it more important now (with budget and time constraints) to have a REASON to holiday? A Valentine’s break in Venice? To see someone in concert in Moscow? To tie in a holiday with a business trip? A once in a lifetime royal wedding perhaps?

I think our industry marketers speak the answer on this one. How the royal wedding is being presented by travel and accomodation operators is a good indication. Some hotels in the vicinity already have their homepage reservation systems set to the royal wedding dates to facilitate easy booking, and rates start from a high £250 per night (there’s a few happy revenue managers in Westminster I’d bet). However, what are the other options surfacing besides expensive hotels in the area?

Well, the first port of call on google ads is Airbnb (favoured by Lonely Planet’s Tom Hall) which is a mix of Couchsurfer, a B&B retailer and TripAdvisor too. It serves to let locals list their spare room (or their whole flat) for free to travellers. Both hosts and the accomdation are rated and reviewed in the same way as most user-generated sites. Hosts choose their rates (loosely based on quality, location and neighbouring apartments costs) and then it’s up to the traveller to pick and choose a bedroom or apartment. 


It’s an interesting idea and it seems perfect for the royal wedding holiday-maker, largely on the basis that Westminster is full (and I mean FULL) of flats and houses that aren’t used on the weekends (politicians and civil servants who leave the city to go to their country pads each weekend). Quite frankly, I’m impressed by AirBNB. I like that the guests are also rated which means they stand to lose out if they behave badly in your home.So- is this is a future trend?  I wait with anticipation to see if this trend develops further as we become more and more fussy about what we want from our holiday break. Will I put my flat up for rent? Watch this space while I decide J

On a different level, VisitLondon aren’t missing a trick with their guides and suggestions for the big weekend. Topics include the places where Kate shops and hangs out. Slightly creepy but there must be a reason why Visitlondon has risen nearly to the top of the Google ranking for the search term “Royal Wedding London”. 


Tripadvisor rightly has it covered too. So what with wedding fever in the air, how are the travel industry feeling about it? Namedly all of us are BORED of it. Kevin May of Tnooz certainly is. So are all of us at EyeforTravel. 


However, besides all the tourist tat on the streets, expensive hotel rates and mindless wedding chat, I think we can conclude two things. Firstly, the royal wedding is (and was always going to be) essentially a good thing for travel: we’re seeing innovative new travel products brought to our attention which may well stick around for the Olympics next year. Secondly I think the royal wedding has reminded marketers of the elusive guest :“the event traveller”: namedly travelling for a purpose not so much for the sake of it. Re-evaluating how we look at these consumers and how we reach them is not a new topic: it’s an old one that needs to be re-looked at.

Comments welcome. I’m @rosieakenhead on twitter.

EyeforTravel