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Goodbye Amadeus...Bonjour TripAdvisor

This is no secret that I don't only work as a blogger on Hotel Blogs for more than 4 years but I have also been a full time employee at Amadeus working for the UK office in Crawley (South London if you've never heard about the place before). For the last 3 years and a half, I was fulfilling the challenging role of business development manager for UK and Ireland working alongside travel management companies, business and leisure agents making sure Amadeus was not only used for Air bookings but also for Hotels.

 

When I moved from Active Hotels / Booking.com to join Amadeus in 2006, it was an interesting career move as I was a total stranger to the GDS world. I have learnt a lot in recent years. The acronyms, the pressure on TMCs to compete with HBAs more effectively when making corporate hotel bookings, the complexity of the electronic distribution channels... I have also met great people inside and outside Amadeus. Too many to mention but you know who you are. One of my last assignments was to organize and moderate a roundtable about the issues that corporate and hoteliers will face in 2010 regarding RFP, rates, billback, reviews.

It's now time to move on to another challenge and to join a company that I have admired for many years: TripAdvisor.

I heard about the company the first time back in my Active Hotels days where we were trying things out with their affiliate programme. Very quickly, I was seduced by the voice of people that this company was translating into hotel reviews. Today, TripAdvisor - part of Expedia Inc - is without a doubt a success story where consumers go and check reviews to find the best hotels for their next trip.

So you might ask me why this long to join such a respectable and innovative company. I was waiting for the right role...More importantly the right mission to be part of the ongoing growth of TripAdvisor.

With the Business Listings new initiative launched earlier this year, I thought I could be part of the launching team and therefore I am very excited to join Nathan Clapton's team in London to cover the EMEA region and to lead different areas such as Business Development, Marketing and Communication.

For those of you who have never heard about the Business Listings, TripAdvisor allows hoteliers to feature their phone number, URL of their website and email address on the dedicated hotel page like this one so that potential customers can click and book directly with the hotel. TripAdvisor in return asks for an annual fee starting at £360 per year if you have less than 10 rooms. Until the 28th February, you can benefit from an introduction offer of 50% of the normal yearly rate. If you want to join the Business Listings, find more information here. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me or leave a comment below this post.

 

 

eBay gives another try to Travel with Octopus Travel

According to Travolution, the famous auction site eBay has reached an agreement with Octopus Travel, a hotel consolidator who works with more than 50,000 hotels. 

Back in the 2006, eBay attempted to break into the travel market by partnering with Cultuzz. There is even a website called Cultbay which aggregates about 2000 offers right now. At least this is what I discovered at Eye for Travel at that time.

For some reasons, the travel category never took off with eBay. I have never ever come across anyone who purchased travel on eBay until today. Why?

I believe eBay is famous for tangible goods. Travel is not really tangible until you get to the hotel or you take the train. And therefore I would rather use Priceline to bid on a hotel room in New York than going on eBay. But that's another debate.

But let's take a look at what eBay Travel has to offer on the hotel side today.

To promote the newly signed partnersip with the Travelport company Octopus Travel, eBay offers you the chance to bid for Presidential Suites with Intercontinental Hotels. The sales revenue made will go to charity.

For instance, bidders can get a Presidential Suite in Mauritius for more than £500 at the moment (only 2 night stay though) or the Presidential Suite at the Grand in Paris for £1,200.

 
Besides, this promotional offer with a cause to support behind it, I am still unsure about the offers posted by hotels and operators on eBay. Have a look at this hotel listing and you will see a lot of offers expire today with no bids whatsoever.

Where is the Music gone in hotels?

There was a time where Music was sometimes associated with Hotels. And I am not talking about the spiritless elevator music we are used to in supermarkets, waiting halls and so on.

But too often, Music was a bit boring and all sounded the same. Until one hotel brand came out with the perfect association. Hotel Costes (with a terrible website in my opinion) is probably one of the fewest hotel brands that got recognised by its CDs more than by his rooms. The label behind the Costes collection CDs is still releasing one new CD every year and promotes successfully DJs like Pompougnac.




Back in 1999, Costes obviously was making a bet but it worked. The same applied for the famous Buddha Bar and its huge collection of CDs compilations and mixes.

Today with the right set up, you can have music in the lobby, in the bar, in the restaurant and in the rooms (remember that music played on the welcoming message on the TV set in your room).

But how come no other hotel chains or independant hotels followed up this initiative. I can see Music being one more personal touch about how your hotel brand is represented. And it doesn't have to be about selling CDs.

In 2010, you can simply register to different online music services like Last.fm or Deezer and make up your own playlist that most represent your hotel "audio" DNA.




For instance imagine I run this 30 room hotel in Florence. I come up with my playlist and export it to my website. If people want to play the playlist while browsing my site (and eventually book) they already know a bit more about my hotel.

 Text + Visuals + Sounds brings closeness to potential customers.

And then you can even sell the playlist thanks to Amazon.co.uk Associates services or iTunes.

Four Seasons recently have used a lot of YouTube to promote their hotels and they associated the video with some music background. But does the Music background is recognizable enough to relate to Four Seasons (Vivaldi anyone?).

I know there is the problem with royalties but there is music catalogue available  as well that woudn't cost you much http://www.royaltyfreemusic.com/hotel-music.htm. Besides,  have always heard that licences to play music in your hotel/ bar was not a big cost on your annual budget anyway.

HipHotels who is more famous for publishing hotel books (I own most of them) have released 2 CDs. As you can see the compilation is very diverse.http://www.hiphotels.com/music.php?cc=69.

W Hotels also attempted to create a CD collection as well. But they seem to have discontinued the collection.

But in today's digital world, you don't need to have physical support. Just create a playlist, share it with your customers in different areas of your hotel and why not have them contributing to a larger playlist.

Feel free to share your playlist on the comment box.

London Hotels get a nice Xmas gift before the end of the year

It's not even Christmas yet but London feels definitely Christmas with all decorations in the West End and also families picking up their Christmas trees to take them home.

Hotels can feel also very much the festive season and they have received a very welcome gift before everyone else for Christmas.

The hotel market place in London is fully booked for this weekend. Spanish people are on a bank holiday, the Dutch as well and many foreigners want to take the buying power they currently have with the Pound Sterling / Euro exchange rate.

Only a few rooms are available on hoteliers websites if you look very carefully.

What about the OTAs? Ae they any better to get you some rooms available tomorrow evening?

Expedia can fetch you double rooms in so called "Greater London" like Croydon, Sussex, Heathrow. Check out the results. Otherwise, you still can pay a £289 a night a modest room at the Holiday Inn Express in Hammersmith or try a £723.35 king double room at the Jumeirah Carlton Tower.

Available hotels are so rare in the city that the mapping facility gets you a very wide look at Greater London.

What about Booking.com (sister company of Priceline)? Well they show 24 hotels available in  London. You can find the most expensive (for that night) B&B Edward House selling their family room at £199 or you can find yourself a luxury 1 bedroom appartment from the Presidential Kensington at £450. In terms of what you can see on the map, hotels seem more central than their direct competitor but notice that they still show hotels in grey even though they are not available.

 

So from what I can gather, Central London will have to be avoided all weekend especially if you plan to do your Christmas shopping. The whole place will be packed. But you can maybe try the biggest shopping mall in Europe nearby Sheperd's Bush, the famous Westfield London. Happy Xmas shopping.

WTM - just like an ordinary edition

After 9 consecutive years visiting the World Travel Market - "WTM" for regular visitors - you can probably imagine that you can get a bit blase and bored by the same old stands and the lack of changes in the massive exhibition that is Excel at Custom House in East London.

The WTM is still divided in regions like Europe, Asia, Africa, America and so on without forgetting the Global Village where I have spent most of the time discussing with hotel providers, technology companies or third parties. The Monday and Tuesday are crowded days when you can't barely find a seat at lunch time to eat your £6 burger from Gourmet Burger Kitchen with your £2 crap coffee from the clueless barista in the middle of the main central alley.

On Thursday, you are fine though. Exhibitors are gone for the day probably doing some shopping in Central London whilst taking advantage of the low Pound / Euro conversion leaving other clueless people looking after late visitors trying to fill their bags with as many brochures as possible. Oh and Thursday is also "Students Day" highly recognizable with their green badge (nothing to do with environmental friendly) and their number one goal: get as many freebies from exhibitors in less than 2 hours. After 2 hours, these students start to feel exhausted and would rather go back to their computer at home and logging in on their Facebook account to tell their peers how not exciting fantastic the day was. What strikes me is to see that the number of kids who want to be a travel agent doesn't seem to be diminishing year after year. In fact, it looks like the number is increasing. Is that a good sign of how school are promoting a certain industry vs. others?

Back to the exhibitors. 2009 vintage is the year where you could really notice big brands skipping this year WTM edition.

Examples: Hilton, Starwood, Accor, Pegasus, Utell Hotels...

I believe there were more hotel representation companies or franchisers than integrated hotel chains. Apparently, they are here to make sure their hotel properties customers feel they could help them to bring more business for next year. But there is a lot of debate these days about how expensive these representative companies can be for independent properties. Some have already planned to pull out from luxury rep companies because they don't see the value they use to get in the good old days of traditional distribution channels.

What was different this year - for me at least - was the Get Funded Show organized by Eye for Travel on the 1st floor in one of those seminar rooms. 18 travel startups were invited to pitch (actually they paid to pitch) in front of angels, VCs and entretpreneurs on the Wednesday and Thursday morning, a group of people voted the best startup in terms of investment, best idea and growth perspectives. But let me write a quick summary of this specific event in a separate post...

So the question remains, will I go to WTM in 2010?  Probably yes as long as I see opportunities going there.

Oh did I forget to mention that Danni Minogue was attending WTM 2009 as well. I have missed her actually since she was late on Tuesday coming to Etihad stand...

The easy life of being Director of Public Relations at a hotel chain - part.1

I don't think we recognize enough how easier the job of Public Relations is in the 21st century.

Before the emergence of blogs, video sharing sites and other social media sites, you either had to rely on a 3rd party PR company to bring journalists to write and talk about your brand or you had to fight on your own to make sure every press release get read and covered by the same journalists.

These days, you have other options to get public attention.

Let's say you are a Director of Public Relations of a new hotel chain, you want to make sure you reach an audience very quickly and that people start to engage with your brand from the moment the hotel is opened.

How to do this:

1. You create a blog where you share how the brand was created and how you build a team at a hotel and how the development is going

2. You create a Twitter account related to your brand to make sure it is easy to remember and also SEO friendly

3. You create a YouTube, Dailymotion, Vimeo, Blip.tv, MetaCafe accounts with your brand as a username (don't forget to use TubeMogul to upload your videos in one go across all these video sharing sites)

4. You create a Facebook account where customers can become fans of your brand and share their experience

5. You create a Deezer and Last.fm account and share the relevant tunes related musically to your brand

Last but not least, you engage with all these above by being active and not passively throwing information to your audience. And then your brand is recognized and you haven't started to get recognition from traditional media.

So when you do start?

Social Networking and Travel Agents: a winning combination

In the last ten years, we have seen the emergence of low cost airlines, online travel agents and the globalization of content offering. All of these makes the work of an offline travel agent much harder that what it used to be. Can the agent on the streets survive?

The 20th century traveller has progressed into the 21st century to search information on the web in real time and is able to converse with his peers with different communities available to him like TripAdvisor, Vinivi or blogs like TravellersPoint. The behavior of the traveller has changed dramatically. She can make her mind quickly and cannot be predictable anymore. Access to exotic destinations is greater with competitive airlines fares available and no more does she have second thoughts about staying in cheap accommodation as long as she  has checked recently the latest reviews of the hotel thanks to travellers like her.

Even better, the words do not dominate the content she's after. She can preview a video of the room she will stay at, thanks to different sites like TvTrip.com, Trivop,  YouTube or Dailymotion. She can view the pictures on Flickr or Picassa that other travellers have taken at her next holiday destination. So she knows that this is the right destination for her. She can't wait to see for herself what it's like to be in front of the Great Pyramid of Giza. She can also download free audio guides from iAudioguides in her own language so she won't be lost whilst visiting cultural sites.

So professional agents almost compete with these Internet information savvy travellers. How can he re-gain trust from them?

A common thought is that short haul city breaks (below 3 days) are no longer in the hands of offline travel agents. Travellers can make their mind up and book on online travel agents like Expedia or Lastminute without spending too much time on the decision making process.

Long haul and long stays are still better to be booked with offline travel agents. Especially if you have a complex itinerary in your head. And this is where offline travel agent can add value and innovate.

They have access to real time fares, hotel rates and can generate in minutes different itineraries for you with different pricing options. Try to do this yourself online and you will see how painful the process is. Travel Agents also have their own online community thanks to sites like Vinivi customized portal GalileoOpinions or AgentStream where agents can report problems at properties, flights, transfers. They can also exchange tips about destinations thanks to TripShake and asks the question "What is the faster route to go from Bangkok to Chang Rai" and so on. The offline agent has also a name, a face and a personal experience that you can read by yourself. You can relate to this person and even contact him or her during your trip. In fact, you should be able to email him or her and if the offine agent is innovative enough, you can correspond with him via Skype or Facebook or Twitter.

The reach of travellers is 100% easier for offline agents. You just need to be geared up with the right tools and be keen to be adventurous. When I hear offlline agents in their office can't access these social networking tools because their IT director decided to, I feel sorry for them. Why take away the places where travellers exchange? Ok I hear the reason. It is to control work productivity. Really? What about phones, mobile phones where you can download Facebook applications, emails.

So here's the innovation. An offline agent can engage online with travellers and offer advice on their next trip and guess what, I am sure some will probably pay a visit to this travel agent who took the initiative to help him. And if the traveler is happy, he would probably tells his friends and family about this travel agent and why not sharing this on Twitter or Facebook. The benefit is free publicity for an offline agency employee who dared to interact online by using 21st century communication tools.

Happy agents! Happy customers!

HotelMap.com: simply the best customized London map on the market (forget the big guys!)

Last Friday I have spent a bit of time with Steven Potter from HotelMap.com (what a great domain name!), part of LondonTown.com to take me through their fantastic mapping solutions they bring to Venues and Even organizers.

In the heart of London Leicester Square, LondonTown has really what you need to get you the WOW factor when you enter their meeting room: big plasma screen, huge speakers with state of the art HIFI playing some lounge music and different Japanese collectors toys and a huge man sculpture.

Then comes Steven Potter who hands over his business card with no title on it. Who is he then? Find out at the end of the post...

So back to business...what HotelMap is doing than others don't? Who want to compete with the big guys like Google Maps, Virtual Earth and others when you try to make a great map.

Well the guys behind HotelMap - after careful consideration - decided to start a London map from scratch and employed designers to draw their own map that matters for their customers (essentially event organizers like Bafta).

The results are really really good. Not only do you get to see clearly the details of every street in London but more importantly you can see which hotels are available on a particular date and at what price these hotels are available thanks to direct contracts hotels have with LondonMap sister company LondonTown.

Step 1:  you need a venue and its postcode. Let's say you have a concert at Royal Albert Hall and you need a hotel nearby.

Step 2: you can manually change the point of reference

Step 3: HotelMap is asking you if you are organizing the event at this venue

Step 4: Create your account to get the map or fill your credentials

Step 5: you get a unique URL to send the map to your guests, friends and so on

This is the map I created around Royal Albert Hall.

HotelMap asks you for check in and check out dates + occupancy and then you have all hotels available wit prices.

Note that the map takes almost the full screen of your desk top and you can navigate from it, change your hotels preferences on the right side (price, occupancy...) and on the left you can show different point of interests like Tube station, Car parks and so on. Also you can initiate a chat with a person on the left side if you have any questions (the service is available from 8am until 10pm. !!!)

As you would expect, you can book from the map in one click by just selecting one hotel available on the map and you open up a pop up box that takes you through LondonTown website.

I was really amazed by the details you can find on these maps and I think it is so easy that my great grand mother could use this. The London map was created by LondonMarketing team of 50 experts and it shows...

You can also notice that HotelMap doesn't feature any ads or sponsored links of any kind. The business model is more around the commission they will get if you make a hotel booking with their hotel partners. And not they don't take money upfront. You will pay your hotel bill at the check out with the hotel directly.

So if you have any friends, colleagues who get lost in London to find you, create a map for them!

Next stage would be maybe an application on iphone, blackberry?

After my 2 hours meeting with Steven, he takes me down to their reception and thank me for the meeting. I am asking him for how long he's with LondonTown. 18 years he responds. To which I say he's very loyal to this company and that it must treats him well. Big smile on his face and off I go.

I discovered by "googling" his name on the Internet that Steven is the owner and CEO of LondonMarketing/LondonTown/HotelMap!

Well done Steven. Next time we will meet to discover how you created your venture.

 

Trivago releases the new Hotel Price Index

Disclaimer: this is the exact press release I have received, I didn't see the point of altering it since it is very complete and we found this could be valuable for you hoteliers or people in the industry.

European hotel prices remain favourable in August and are three percent cheaper in comparison to August 2008. Hotel prices in Madrid and Paris are at their lowest level this year. While the prices in many cities continue to fall, some cities are showing remarkably high prices in August. These are the findings of the tHPI (trivago Hotel Price Index) which is published monthly by the hotel price comparison site www.trivago.co.uk. 

The trivago hotel price index shows that average European accommodation prices in August are three percent less than the previous year and the same as the previous month. A standard double room costs 90 pounds in August 2009, compared to 93 pounds in August 2008. In 36 of the top 50 European cities hotel prices have decreased or remained the same. Average hotel rates in the United Kingdom are currently 13 percent above the European average.

Average hotel prices in some cities have risen considerably in August

Edinburgh has replaced Geneva as the most expensive city in Europe for the first time this year. A room in Edinburgh is 168 pounds in August 2009; 51 percent more than the previous month due to the International Festival in August. Overnight accommodation prices in Stockholm have also risen dramatically (121 pounds). A large Cultural Festival in Stockholm that runs from 11^th to the 16th August has driven the prices up by 20 percent from July to August. Additional cities that have seen a large increase in average hotel prices in comparison to the previous month are: Copenhagen (136 pounds), Valencia (75 pounds) and Oslo (126 pounds).

The cheapest European cities in August

The Southern European cities remain the most favourable in August. The average hotel in Paris is 102 pounds, nine percent less than this time last year, Madrid is 33 percent less (66 pounds) and Rome is 13 percent less (91 pounds) in comparison to August 2008. Hotel prices in the Spanish and French capitals are at their lowest level this year. Further cities at an all time low this year are Manchester (72 pounds) and Birmingham (65 pounds).

Hotel prices in the United Kingdom are 13 percent above the European average

In comparison with the rest of Europe, the United Kingdom is currently ranked the tenth most expensive destination in August; the average price for a standard double room is 13 percent above the August average (102 pounds). Wales (99 pounds) is the cheapest country in the United Kingdom, followed by Northern Ireland (109 pounds) and England (116 pounds). Scotland has the highest average hotel rates in August (145 pounds), due to the previously mentioned Cultural Festival in Edinburgh. In London hotel prices have decreased by six percent in comparison to the previous month. The most expensive overnight accommodation is in Switzerland (137 pounds), Norway (124 pounds) and Denmark (124 pounds). The cheapest hotel rooms can be found in Poland (60 pounds), Bulgaria (68 pounds) and Hungary (69 pounds). In Majorca, average hotel prices in August are 43 percent above the Spanish average at 123 pounds.

England regional price ranking: the West Midlands are the cheapest region.

Within England, the Greater London area is the most expensive region in England, a standard double room costs an average of 124 pounds. The second most expensive region is South-West England (101 pounds) due to the holiday season; South-East England follows in third place at 95 pounds. In England, overnight accommodation is most favourable in August in the West Midlands (71 pounds), Yorkshire and the Humber (76 pounds) and the East Midlands (77 pounds).

Subscribe for the monthly trivago price index by emailing: thpi@trivago.com.

The www.trivago.co.uk hotel price index shows the average overnight accommodation prices for the most popular European cities on trivago. The average prices for a standard double room are calculated on the basis of 40,000 daily price inquiries for overnight hotel stay generated through the trivago hotel price comparison. trivago stores all hotel enquiries for each month and therefore gives an overview of hotel accommodation prices for the upcoming month.

Hotel chains new worldwide ranking

The American publication Hotels Magazine has revealed the new 2008 ranking of hotel companies and what they call Sales & Marketing Consortia. The listing is ordered by number of rooms available per hotel group.

The analysis confirms the number 1 position for Intercontinental Hotel Group with 4,186 hotels and 619,851 rooms. The group includes brands like Holiday Inn, Intercontinental Hotels or Indigo. In terms of hotel brands, Best Western maintains it number 1 position with 305,000 rooms.

The Sales & Marketing Consortia list is an interesting one because it reflects how independent hotels have joined consortia. These companies are also called representation companies. They are helping independant hotels to be represented in the online and offline distribution and also be more powerful against hotel brands. For instance, hotels who apply to be part of the Design Hotels brands will have a clear advantage to attract the exclusive travelers generation who aims to find a special hotel whether on holidays or on business. Unirez/Utell (part of Pegasus) is clearly ahead of the game against competitors with 11,282 hotels and 1,381,379. Supranational comes second with 1662 hotels only. It's interesting to note that a lot of these representation companies are European, probably because 80% of hotels in Europe are not branded (the opposite scenario in the USA).