Scoot - new airline, still a lot of SEO work to do

Scoot is the new (mid to) low cost carrier coming out of Singapore. They launched sales yesterday and have just commenced the first push in Australia with a sale for departures in June and October. Unfortunately they have not prepped properly for their launch. Have a look at the below Google search results for keyword Scoot. Lots of code in their ranking and Jetstar news article in number two. Gentle (if not firm) reminder how important it is to get SEO right at any time but particularly before a launch.

PS - they also need to get their twitter planned sorted out. @scootariline is not them and neither by any stretch is @flyscoot

Taiwan Tourism trying to sell snow to eskimos

I cam across this advertisement by Taiwan Tourism while catching a train in Sydney. They can also be found in buses all over the city.

I am all for promoting Taiwan as a destination and am happy for them that Lonely Planet named the on of the top 10 countries to visit in 2012. But this is an absolutely stupid campaign idea. If the target market is Australia, especially Sydney siders, then here are probably 107 things you should promote about Taiwan ahead of surfing. I showed this advert to my 9 year old son and asked him "what do you think?". His reply "waves look crap, Dad". Hardly a great tag line to inspire travellers. My marketing tip for Taiwan tourism - selling surf to Australians is like selling snow to eskimos. You better be very very very good at it before you try. Have a look at the below and tell me what you think.

Google brand bidding war extends to tourism orgs

I am an only child so sibling rivalry is a bit of a mystery to me. That said I remember some very vigorous games of football and role playing games against cousins. Nothing beat the satisfaction of crash tackling a cousin during a family event. I imagine that is part of the motivation for this screenshot from a Google search page. On it you can see Tourism NSW bidding for the search term "tourism vic". I would love to be in the room when the head of marketing from Tourism Vic calls their cousin in NSW and demands a please explain....

Video of the BOOT at WebInTravel - talking search, inspiration and the future of online travel

Channelling The Customer: Bridging The Chasm Between Inspiration & Transaction from WebInTravel on Vimeo.

Siew Hoon and WebInTravel team are posting over here a series of full length videos from the WebInTravel. If you want to see me and a panel talking about search, inspiration, the customer and the future of online travel then press play above or follow this link

Tnooz: the future of search is multi-destinational and multi-dimensional

Tnooz is one year old. My latest 1000+ word piece is live called "Google Instant is just the beginning in the search revolution in travel"

In this post I discuss the history and future of search and the role Google Instant is playing. I propose a future that has search being based on more than one destination site (multi-destinational) and more than one way to measure authority and trusted content (multi-dimensional).

check out the full post here.

Virgin Blue starts brand review - why not rebrand Ansett?

News out that Virgin Blue CEO John Borghetti has brought on long term collaborator Hans Hulsbosch to help with a brand review for Virgin Blue.

Hulsbosch previously helped Qantas with their brand review though I think the minimal changes of lengthening the Roo tail and slanting the acronym is more of a tweak than a review.

From press reports it looks like nothing is off the table including scrapping the use of the world "Virgin". Given the current DJ product and announced plans for it, I recommend DJ drop the Virgin brand, write a cheque to administrators KordaMentha and re-brand the whole business Ansett.

I am being facetious of course but there is some rational thinking behind this. Below is a table comparing the Ansett of 2001 with the Virgin Blue product of the same year and of 2010

My point is that as Virgin Blue chases more and more of the Qantas business (aiming to increase corporate share from 5% to 20%) it is getting closer and closer to the Ansett business model and further and further away for what made it a success. From the table you can see that the edgy brand and free food are the last pieces differentiating DJ from Ansett. They need to be very careful in this process that DJ do not end up catching just enough of Qantas share to lose what built their brand and suffer the same fate as Ansett.

PS: for those that don't know Ansett was the long term Star Alliance full service competitor of Qantas that went bust in 2001 after (but not caused by) Sept 11. Virgin Blue launched in August 2000

Tnooz: 5 tips for launching a social media strategy

My largest post ever is now live in four parts over at Tnooz. 2,500 words on "5 steps for a travel supplier looking to launch a social media strategy". 5 steps in four parts. Here they are with links to the individual pieces

Step 1 - Decide who you want to talk to and what you want to say

Step 2 - Start monitoring social media. Make it a customer service and marketing priority

Step 3 - Collect data - all of it

Step 4 - Craft product and content plans

Step 5 - Start saying and stick to it

Critical to this analysis is that it is not until Step 5 that full blown social media content creation is recommended.

With hotel rooms from $999,999 thank goodness breakfast is included

Screenshot of web version of Booking.com newsletter. Says "Don’t miss out – Top destination vacations from 999999". Thank goodness you get breakfast included at that price.

Two great information pieces on Korea

I have had the good fortune to visit Korea twice for work in the last nine months. It has been fascinating getting to understand the market more and work on strategies and plans. In my quest for more information on Korea in general and the online industries in particular I have come across two articles that may interest you.

First - an article on search engine marketing in Korea via SearchEngineWatch and Michael Bonfils called "Search Around the World: South Korea". The first paragraph has the hook - South Korea has three search engines ahead of Google and "the highest CPC prices in the world". Local sites Naver, Daum and Nate have beat Google and Yahoo so badly that the two search giants are fighting to see which of them can claim 3 and which can claim 4 percent market share in search. G and Y have all but given up doing it on their own with Google providing Daum and Nate with their paid search and Yahoo! doing the same for Naver. If you are interested in how search is different in Asia then this is a great read.

Second - a collection of 5 essays on Korea from the McKinsey Quarterly called "South Korea: Finding its place on the world stage".

The first essay by Stephen S. Roach and Sharon Lam of Morgan Stanley examines the South Korean economy. A highlight for me was their reasoning behind the South's rapid recovery from the Global F'n Crisis. They credit an ability by the economy to hit a middle ground. Not trying to compete with the Chinese on price and not trying to compete with the Japanese on quality. Rather finding a price/quality balance not found in products from the two Asian eco-powerhouses.

The second by Christopher Graves of Ogilvy looks at South Korea the brand talks about how South Korea has broken away from the "Hermit Nation" history through World Cups and Olympic Games but still needs to do more to establish the brand identity that benefit neighbours like Japan.

In the third Richard Dobbs and Roland Villinger of McKinsey take a different look at the economy with particular focus on the rise of the services sector. Concluding that for the next level of growth and any chance of achieving Japan like levels of GDP per capita the South must dramatically increase the size of it's services sector

For the fourth essay Shen Dingli of Fudan University outlines "Four steps to prosperity for Korea" including an interesting discussion on how to turn North Korea into an economic asset.

In the final chapter former Economist editor Bill Emmott discussing Korea's geographical advantages as a cross road between China, Japan and Russia. Drawing (possible strained) parallels between South Korea and Italy.

Both are worth a read for their commentary on Asia as a whole as well as Korea.

thanks to yeowatzup for the photo via flickr

Qantas In-flight Video Kills Virgin Atlantic Money Shot

Yesterday I flew Auckland to Sydney on Qantas. Playing on their in-flight video was the new Roman Polanski movie Ghost Writer. This movie contains one of the now ubiquitous airline product placements. This one is a doozy.

It starts with Ewan McGregor enjoying a scotch in an amazing looking lounge with no mention of the brand - though clearly the Heathrow Virgin Atlantic Upper Class Lounge. Then it quickly moves to McGregor sitting very comfortably in a beautiful herringbone seat being served by a lovely looking stewardess while both are bathed in red/purple hue lighting. Again no mention of brands but clearly a Virgin Atlantic Upper Class Seat. Then it is time for the closing shot. The sweeping music filled mid shot of the airline filling the sky and filling our screens with the Virgin Atlantic brand. The VS brand money shot. But that is how it plays out in the cinema not on a Qantas flight. No way. As the grainy blackberry photo below shows the money shot is blurred out, the tail is a generic red smudge rather than a bright and embolden declaration of the Virgin brand . Can't blame QF for the mid-air editing - it is a natural reaction to blur out "unsavoury" images from an in-flight video.

Future of design, games, loyalty and chips in your head

Not directly travel related but great presentation/video in the below embedded player. Carnegie Mellon University Professor, Jesse Schell, dives into a world of game development which will emerge from the popular "Facebook Games" era. Thanks to G4TV. 20 mins long but well worth it for the content and how to give a presentation using powerpoint (pictures not words)

PC Games - E3 2010 - Guitar Hero 5

The BOOT is perfect for Qantas Affiliate Program....really??????

I received an email this morning from Affiliate Future. A company providing marketing services to help companies generate affiliate sales. They are pitching an affiliate relationship between the BOOT and Qantas. The offer is for $15 a sale. The email invite contained this sentence as the big hook to draw me in

"I’m reaching out [to you] as I think Qantas is highly relevant for your site and traffic"

Why is that people write to me (to anyone) to pitch a business without have spent a moment to read the source material. Here are some quote from the BOOT about Qantas.

re relationship with Amadeus
"Unlike the PR love-ins of the previous announcements, Qantas was very happy to very publicly blame the whole thing on Amadeus. Newly appointed Qantas spokesman David Epstein used all of the tact that his former Labour party bosses are famous for by being very polite in his finger pointing but stating clearly and cleanly" [full post]

re service on the A380
"More and more this [service] becomes Qantas' weak point. It is provided to their schedule not the passengers'." [full post]

re the outrageous prices on the AU-US route
"Right now Qantas is gouging me and every other customer on the Pacific Route (East Coast Australia to West coast USA). " [full post]

re changes to frequent flyer program
"I have been fuming about the recent changes to the Qantas Frequent Flyer program." [full post]

re a VOD system that did not work for two years
"Shame on you Mr Cox and shame on you Qantas. Your customers are telling you the system is busted, your staff are telling you the system is busted and the best solution you can come up with is moving seats. This is completely useless advice" [full post]

re Price fixing in air cargo
"Aaah Qantas - the "spirit of Australia". So long as you mean old fashioned pre-colonial convict spirit of Australia to steal as much as you can from anyone you can." [full post]

And this is just a sample. It is not all negative for Qantas here on the BOOT. There are some high praise/positive posts including these three:

• "Thank you Qantas";
• They remain in my top 5 airlines in the world; and
• "In defence of Qantas."

But this is not a site that (if I was Qantas) I would want to be sending to cheques to or having my booking engine on. Clearly Affiliate Future have just printed out a list of top ranked or trafficked sites in travel - especially those generating links for seat reviews - and not bothered to actually look at the site to see if the content would suit the partner.

Let this be my version of the warning post to PR companies and marketing people. Take a moment - just 5 mins will be enough- to look at my site before you write to me. How embarrassing.

New Expedia.com Logo: its a 21st century thing - I think

It is a day for Expedia webite posts. Thanks to Ciprian Morar for alerting me to the new Expedia.com logo. Gone is the softly swooshing yellow aeroplane on a bright blue background evoking happy thoughts of travel and living in the noughties. Hello to the sharp pointed rocket ship that blasts forward into the second decade of the 21st century- a world of darker hues and serious companies. No more Mr Nice Guy and next stop the moon. What would Freud say about this change? What do you think? Here is the old one.

2010 Predictions: The BOOT on what to expect for 2010 in the online travel industry

You think 2009 was full of surprises. Well fasten your safety belts, lock in the tray table and get ready for the turbulence, change and excitement that I expect 2010 to bring.

Here we go - I have five predictions for 2010 (two of them drawn from my contribution to the Tnooz post "Tnooz predictions for 2010"):

1. The non-refundable not enough: 2009 was the year of the deal. Lastminute specials returned and ADR/Ave ticket price fell through the floor, past the basement and almost reached magma. But the main (maybe the only) weapon in the 2009 deal war was the non-refundable. I predict that to win round two of the deal smackdown will require suppliers and intermediaries to come up with something more creative that just non-refundables The non-refundable is successful in driving demand while protecting "normal" pricing (ie BAR). But it is a crude weapon - targeting only those with no scope for a change in plans. Driving demand in 2010 will mean finding additional market segments. Which in turn will require more creativity and subtlety in pricing and deal structures than afforded by the non-refundable. Jeremy Philips in a review on WSJ.com of the book "Priceless" by William Poundstone ran an interesting quote that summarises the prediction here. As Robert Crandall, a former CEO of American Airlines, has said: "If I have 2,000 customers on a given route and 400 different prices, I'm obviously short 1,600.";
2. Year of the app: mobile may finally be here as a force in online travel but in 2010 the action will be in "apps" not phones. By app, I mean a piece of software designed to perform a function where the function is stand alone but can only exist as part of an operational eco-system. I am not thinking just iPhone here. Though the numbers are extraordinary. On March 27 2008 Apple launched its SDK to the public. Just eighteen months later (Nov 4) they announced more than 100,000 apps available for the iPhone and more than 2 billion downloads. But this is only part of the app story. On May 24 2007 Facebook opened up its platform for third party application development. On their stats page (checked 3 Jan 2010) they are claiming 500,000 apps. It does not stop at smart phones and social networks- HP have launched a printer with an interface and app store. The easy part of this prediction is to say that app numbers will grow again both in number (they will more than double in 2010) and in platform (more sites and more phones launching more of them). The real prediction is that I think the app trend equals a change in how web services are accessed. While not the death of the browser, the rise of the app is a sign that the browser is no longer an essential part of the Internet experience. Further proof that we have left the Web 1 era that defined web success through website stickiness and are well into the Web 2 world of syndication being the success measure. That confining your internet viewership plans to the computer and browser is a doomed strategy;
3. New marketing measurement metrics will emerge: The very mature online media and advertising world has settled into a comfortable metric duopoly of clicks and page views. Measuring audience reach and advertiser value by either the number of clicks generated or pages views. I predict for 2010 that we will see a new metric emerge. Not sure what it will be but it is clear to me that the market is looking for a measure of engagement rather than traffic. A way of showing marketers that consumers have taken in a brand message not just clicked on a link or maybe glanced at a flashing 468x60. The portals have had behavioural targeting technology for more than two years (Yahoo! has Blue Lithium, AOL has Tacoda) and Google is looking for the Next Big Thing to be video advertising (read more in interview with Rob Torres of Google reported on Tnooz). These are clear indicators of the need for a new metric;
   
4. Consolidation in the sector (surely!). This is a left over prediction from 2009. The conditions in the year of the GFC seemed perfect for consolidation. Stock prices were depressed, cost cutting acceptable and appetite for organically funded expansion low. But we saw virtually nothing that could be called a “big deal”. There was deal activity but at the lower end such as through regional tuck-ins (ie Travelocity buying Travelguru, and Ctrip buying EZtravel), small local deals (ie Wotif buying GoDo) and constant content site acquisition by TripAdvisor. With bankers chasing bonuses and companies chasing growth in 2010, I expect to see some consolidation in the big end of online travel town (from Tnooz post); and
   
5. Recommendations as the future of online travel: Search – as a means for customers finding what they want in online travel – is no longer as effective in 2009 as it was in 2005. Two causes – the explosion of content through the UGC revolution and consumers desire to seek answers to open ended questions (ie where should I go next) that are not easily answered by a search model based on taking you to one site. 2010 will see even more investment by start ups and established companies on different ways of searching and on methodologies for recommending. The long term future is the ability to generate a recommendation of one based on the individuals unique combination of desires, needs and interests of an individual at a particular point in time (EveryYou). The 2010 future is increased profiling, increased data collection and even more start up activity around search and discovery (from Tnooz post).

Close the door, buckle up, it is time to push back and take off. It is 2010 and the BOOT is back.

If you are interested - check out my 2009 predictions

thanks to pfala for the photo via flickr

3 rules for what is needed to start a consumer information or UGC based online travel start-up

User/crowd generated content available through the mega review site TripAdvisor has done a lot of things to the industry. On the consumer side they arguably changed the purchase patterns by putting user generated content at the heart of the decision making process. On the hotel marketing side they generated a whole industry of review gaming and UGC manufacture. And...on the start-up side they have convince online travel entrepreneurs that there is a business model based solely on attracting customer because of users contributing their experiences, ideas, content and more is unbeatable.

I had one such company write to me recently called cost4travel. Their plan is for consumers to share with each other their experiences on the costs of travelling to various destinations and for various activities. The idea is that consumers will share the prices they have paid for the greater good of allowing other consumers to get user supported price estimates. Allowing users to search by cost as a first point of reference rather than by destination. Interesting idea and reminiscent of Joobili's idea of coming to the search process on a time/date basis rather than destination. The challenge for cost4travel and any business that needs a scale of user content or data is how to get that scale. In the perfect world consumers add all of the data you need. That, like TripAdvsor, thousands, then tens of thousands and eventually millions of consumers will add the content for you. The challenge is how to get the consumers to volunteer information when the initial content collection is sub-scale - when a contribution by the earlier users is not going to be responded to on mass by the contribution of other consumers. Finding a way to build a business model that depends on consumers contributing the answers and information before...well...consumers have contributed the answers and information. You can call this the UGC paradox.

I have been trying to think back on the early days of TripAdvisor as surely they had this issue but I cannot recall how they managed it. Can you? Therefore I moved to looking to two non-travel examples for inspiration. From these 2 I suggest 3 rules for starting a consumer information (UGC) dependent business in online travel. First the rules and then the inspiration.

My 3 rules on things you must have to start a consumer information or UGC based online travel start-up

1. You need a source of data to kick things off. Look for and index available data first. There will be little incentive for consumers to search or contribute without a baseline of data. When looking for this data do not be afraid to use expert or professional data. In fact seek out great quality existing content and add value to it by being the best index and distribution mechanism for it;

2. Reward consumers for entering data and content. Altruism is not enough to get consumers to give you data. You need to give them an reward. For example make data contribution a "cost of entry" for consumers. You have to give something to get something. Make it so that if a consumer contributes data, then they get a better result; and

3. Syndicate, distribute and get it out there. Make it easy, very easy for consumers to send the information around, blog it, share it, tweet it, swap it....get it out there.

Inspiration number 1 - Payscale

Payscale is a Seattle based salary and compensation site. Anyone can open a profile, enter in their skills, experience, location and job title. Payscale then matches you against everyone else in the Payscale universe of contributors and returns salary and compensation comparison information. Another UGC play that requires scale. It can only provide an information seeker with a valuable experience if there are millions of consumers contributing their skills, job descriptions and salary information. Scale they have. In Oct 2008 they reported 15 million profiles. But at the time of launch they probably only had a few hundred profiles (assuming they beta-launched with info input by friends, family and founders). Thus they kicked off the business and populated their database with statistical data from a variety of external (read non user generated) sources including government sources. Plus before you could access the data they had collected from others, you had to submit your own data. Means there was enough initial data to provide a answers to early customers and those customers had to submit more data. We learn from this that you need to collect some starting point data to kick of the business and will be more success if you reward consumers for entering data (in this case by making it a cost of getting a response).

Inspiration number 2 - YouTube

YouTube is the biggest UGC site on the web. Without user generated videos YouTube is dead. The purist YouTube UGC argument is that YouTube over came the UGC paradox through timing in technology and social desire. That is launched itself at exactly the right time - when the desire for consumer sharing of videos matched the technology capability to shoot and upload in moments. However the real truth (OK arguable truth) is that what made YouTube popular enough to attract scale in UGC videos was not UGC videos. Rather it was copyrighted material. In particular consumers uploading and then sending to each other copyrighted material from Viacom (Daily Show, Colbert Report, MTV videos) and NBC Universal (Saturday Night Live). Before videos like Dancing Matt and LonelyGirl15, the huge YouTube hits were videos like SNL's Cronic of Narnia (no longer avail on YouTube). YouTube was built on the back of sharing professionally produced copyright material not UGC. Don't believe me? Then think back to the first time you were sent a YouTube video. I'm betting it was a clip from a TV or a music video. Still don't believe me? Then look at the list of top watch videos of all time. Seven of the top eleven are music videos or clips. YouTube's early value was in being a repository and distribution means for non-UGC. The learning from this is don't discount "expert" or professional data. If fact you may want to encourage it. Secondly we learn - make it easy, very easy - for consumers to send it around, blog it, share it, tweet it, swap it....get it out there.

So from YouTube and Payscale I have developed my three rules for launching UGC based start-ups. There will be more rules for making it a success but these are my view on what you need to get started.

Anyone one out there remember the early days of TripAdvisor well enough to add to the list of rules? More ideas in the comments.

thanks to richbeechina for the crow shot

3 + 3 recommendations on how offline travel can save itself

I remain stunned how often I still read announcements from large off-line travel agents (in Australia, Asia and elsewhere) saying that they don't need to worry about competition from online players.

Just recently in separate reports leaders of two of the largest in the Pacific region reaffirmed their online travel disinterest.

Peter Lacaze is the CEO of Stella Travel. One of the Pacific's largest network of offline franchise travel agents, corporate travel and wholesale/consolidators. Lacaze is confronted with a lot of challenges. Today he announced plans to cut franchise fees and other measures to retain stores/members. Despite the challenges to his business, he does not believe online is the answer. In fact he has gone beyond just ignoring online to being positively negative on it. In a recent TravelTrends post he said “not in my lifetime” in response to a question about the internet taking over half the market in Australia. I am not sure what market or stats he is looking at. The online domestic air business is already above 50% and online hotels are in the 30% range. PhoCusWright (in their recent APAC report) say that 26% of leisure and unmanaged business travel spend is online in Australia (2008) set to rise to 41% in 2011. At this sort of pacing more than half of the spend will be online before the end of the next decade (as it already is in the US)

Graham Turner (Lacaze's rival over at Flight Centre) continued the "denier" talk during the presentation of his FY09 annual results (see TravelToday pdf here). Telling the audience and media how little he was worried about online travel companies and that they were not a threat to his business.

How to get serious about online

I regularly write stories on this continued denial by the off-line players. In response I am often asked by email and at conference either "how would you know if the online companies 'got it' and started a real push into online?" or "what would you tell an off-line CEO that he/she needs to do to be serious about online?" The answer to both questions is the same. There are three things that players like Stella and Flight Centre need to do right now to take online seriously:

1. Hire a new person and restructure: Appoint a senior exec to be the boss of online. Critically they need to report direct to the CEO and be free of any "cannulisation hand-cuffs". That can buy, invest and drive online without fear of the sales taken away from the store-front;
2. Set a specific Target: Make a company aim and shareholder commitment of a number of transactions (or dollars) that will come in from online bookings by a certain date; and
3. Embrace Technology: Accept the fact that technology is critical to selling travel well. Hire a team of developers (or do a deal with a technology company) devoted to online only activities, reporting to the new online boss.

How to revitalise off-line

To be fair, I do not expect a 100% off-line company to become a 100% online company. Therefore I am going to add three more recommendations on how off-line players should use technology to protect their existing business and stay relevant to consumers looking to fulfil their more complicated itineraries off-line and therefore protect their revenues from complex itineraries. They are:

1. Destination Experts/Complex Product Methodology: Brochures and Famil trips are not enough to provide off-line agents with the level of information they need to sell complex itineraries to consumers better than the web. To effectively compete with the scale of information online, off-line agents need to be able to add their skills to a deep content library of destination information and a discovery and recommendation system to help sort through all that is available;
   
2. Massive CRM investment: Off-line agents get to see their customers, online don't. This means that off-line agents can make decisions about purchase intention and consumer activity that online can't. Also means they can ask more detailed and targeted questions about consumers than off-line. This improved access to information on consumers is currently wasted by the major off-line agents because they either don't collect it, or if they do, they don't know what to do with it. I recommend a massive investment in a CRM systems tied to the desktop sales tools and to the incentive plans for staff; and
   
3. Rewrite store experience (copy the supermarkets): The travel agency store layout has not changed in my lifetime. The rows of brochures in no particular order with deal led window displays look the same today as they did in the 70s, 80s and 90s. Meanwhile other retail organisations (especially supermarkets) have invested heavily in consumer retail pattern research and store layout. The location of items, stores and promotional spaces has become a science. All designed towards bringing the customer to the store, keeping them inside the store and directing their purchasing behaviour. Travel companies have to do the same. They need to rewrite the consumer experience to make more of the merchandising opportunities offered by access to customers walking around with their wallets in the pockets.

The other view is that it is too late to save the offline players. What do you think? Too late? Answers in comments

thanks to salinadarling at flickr for the great photo

Why travel companies aren't building top global brands

Interbrand and BusinessWeek have been publishing a list of the top 100 Global Brands for 9 years now. In preparing the the list for 2009 they have set up a hoop or two that a brand has to get through to be considered a global brand. These require more than just name recognition and sales. The test is that the brand

“must derive at least a third of its earnings from outside its home country, be recognizable beyond its base of customers, and have publicly available marketing and financial data.”

As they say in the BW article, this means a lot of big private or nationally contained companies missed out on the list. That said, in the list of 100 brands (topped again by Coca-Cola) there is not one travel company. I might be being narrow in my definition as the list contains Disney at number 10 and American Express at 22 but these are not pure play travel brands like a major US or Euro carrier (American, United, Continental, BA) or a mega chain (Hilton, Starwood, Marriot). I am trying to figure out why that is and what that it means. Despite travel being (by many measures) the largest industry on the planet and despite what feels like every other advertisement I see being from a travel company, according to Interbrand niche but high profile products like Ferrari (88th) and Moet & Chandon (82nd) are more valuable brands than the long list of travel companies that we could all debate as the biggest brands in travel.

We know that travel brands are well known – by that I mean recognised by consumers in prompted and (more importantly) unprompted awareness tests. We also know that there is a degree of brand loyalty in travel as evidenced by frequent flyer programs and flag carrier love ins. Though the first kind of loyalty (frequent flyer programs) is a “bought” loyalty and the second (flag carrier) is often tied to misplaced jingoistic behaviour. The reason for travel being missing from Interbrand’s list is therefore clearly not a “recognition” factor.

The main test in the BusinessWeek/Interbrand survey is the significance of the “earnings derived from the power of the brand…the brands effect on earnings relative to other…assets”. For the travel brand builders this means that BusinessWeek thinks that these 100 brands get dramatically better sales bumps just from their brands than the equally as well known travel brands. That the recognition and awareness of travel brands does not translate as much into sales assistance as for equally as recognisable non-travel brands.

If this conclusion is right, then we need to think about why this is and whether or not this means that travel companies are worse at marketing than we thought. Or - is there something about travel that makes it harder to build a brand that in tech, fast moving consumer goods and luxury brands (the majority of the list).

In analysing this I turned to thinking about the brand battle between Coca-Cola (ranked 1st) and Pepsi (ranked 23rd). Each throws hundreds of millions of dollars at marketing products with subtle but not extreme differences (much - dare I say - like a lot of travel products). One theory is that the travel consumer is more fickle than the cola consumer (as a proxy for most fast moving consumer good) because they have more options to choose from and given the high cost more reason to change supplier. Clearly there is some loyalty within the travel consumers but I consider it more like a “basket of loyalty” rather than a dedicated loyalty. That is, consumers have a basket or collection of brands in their minds and are open to buying any product in that basket. For example I will fly to Europe on any of Qantas, Cathay, Singapore, BA and Virgin. Sure I have one that I would like to fly more than the others but for a specific trip the decision point between these brands is price and schedule. Which one is cheaper and at the right time. With Coke and Pepsi schedule and price are not issues. There is usually no shortage of supply (schedule) and price is usually equal between the two products. In the case of the luxury brands like Ferrari price is still not an issue as people are not choosing based on price and schedule/supply is not an issue (if you want one and can pay for it they will get you one). The question is then, can a travel brand break out of a consumers “basket” such that it can develop the same psychological hold on a consumer that a cola, luxury or soap brand can. A hold that can overcome the price and schedule/availability advantage that another brand has in the basket.

I can’t think of one and therefore understand why there are no travel brands in Interbrand's list of top 100 global brands. Can you?

EveryYou: Individuation and going beyond the Long Tail theory

This post is part of my developing series on the EveryYou concept– the ability we are developing to create a specific and targeted recommendation of one based on the unique combination of desires, needs and interests of each individual at any moment in time (first post here).

It is Internet marketing heresy to say anything that might contradict the gospel of the Long Tail – Chris Anderson’s now famous 2004 book on how the removal of the constraint of needing to support physical inventory and location (ie moving from stores to sites and physical to bits) has expanded marketing and sales opportunities beyond items that have achieved mass popularity to the niche and obscure. Anderson says this will result in demand shifting shift from the Head (mass popularity) to the Tail (niche products). But in my introduction to the EveryYou concept I said that one of the advantages we now have from the four dimensions of data available to us is that…

“We could kill off the head, body and long tail of sales and replace it with a sale of one, a market of one for the EveryYou.”

It is dangerous to be a heretic in Internet folk law but thankfully I found some support for my blasphemy in a recent article from Knowledge@Wharton called “Rethinking the Long Tail Theory: How to Define 'Hits' and 'Niches'”

In this article professor Serguei Netessine and doctoral student Tom F. Tan looked at Netflix data to see whether or not the growth in niche or tail sales was proving that the tail was catching the head. They concluded that

“The presence of the Long Tail effect might be less universal than one may be led to believe."

Instead of seeing the death of the 80:20 rule, Netessine and Tan found that the growth in demand for the top 20% of the movies (ie the head) was faster than the rest (the Tail) (note that the data was comparing 2005 to 2000). One of their conclusions was that the challenge with internet distribution was not the supply side (making digital inventory available on the web) or the traffic side (bringing people to the web) but was the discovery side (getting the people to find the thing they did not know they were looking for). Netessine and Tan say

“product variety has been skyrocketing in the Internet age, and therefore more and more products can be left unnoticed by consumers, or are being discovered very slowly, even though the customer base is also expanding."

This is exactly the point of the EveryYou principle adds value. The Long Tail is based on matching the unconstrained supply of the Internet to niche demand. What is missing is that the niche demand in Long Tail theory is constrained because it depends on knowledge. That is, someone can only demand a niche product if they know about it and believe that they like it (or could like it). For unconstrained niche demand you need to have a systematic and automated means of making trusted and targeted recommendations to someone. This is the EveryYou principle. Using the four dimensions of data we now have on people interacting with our sites (breadth), the different things an individual does on a site (depth), the interrelation between the data we have one person and others (context) and the freely provided data we have unrelated to transactions (community) we can develop a specific and targeted recommendation of one based on the unique combination of desires, needs and interests of each individual at any moment in time.

Without the recommendation part the tail is undiscoverable and therefore demand constrained. Through the EveryYou principle you don’t need to think about a head, body or tail as you can use technology and social change to target each recommendation and individual as a single, individuated marketing activity.

More on EveryYou soon.

PS - thanks to Madame BOOT for sending through the article

EveryYou: using Individuation in travel to target a recommendation of one

I have just finished presenting at TRAVELtech 2009 on trends in social media, mobile and my new concept of EveryYou.

There is a concept from psychology, economics and demographics called Individuation. I will dodge the Carl Jung and Neitzche inspired definitions and give you the short one – Individuation is the process in which individuals become differentiated from each other. I am seeing the theories of individuation coming into the mobile and social media space in travel and I predict that we will all have to come to term with this notion as we develop means for capturing consumer attention.

In a recent article in Theoretical Issues in Ergonomics Science (Sep2009, Vol. 10 Issue 5) called "Individuation: the N = 1 revolution" by P Hancock, G Hancock and J Warm say that...

"a continuing increase in computational power and associated memory storage capacities will lead to circumstances in which each and every single person can be coded as, and treated as, a separate individual and therefore not necessarily as a representative part of any group, sample or population"

This is the concept of Individuation that the travel industry can now embrace to target consumers on an individual level rather than through representative group samples.

In the past we have undertaken consumer planning through analysis of the average behaviour of a group of consumers. Individuation in this context says that once we have the right matching of technology and social trends we can move from tracking the average, generic profiles or demographic groups to at scale analysis of what Hanckock et al call “specific instances of momentary behaviour of one single individual”. This already exists in psychology, neuro science and molecular genetics where the combination of data, technology and social preparedness allows those sciences to be able to track and understand for the first time “how specific individuals perform their own personal and very complex acts of cognition” (Hancock et al again) rather than rely on averages.

In travel we can use these same techniques to classify and recommend at a level of EveryYou rather than Everyone. The reasons I am attracted to this concept have arisen through the technology capabilities that we now have and the community/social environment we are now in. Let me explain how this happened and why you should care.

In the early days of online travel we revelled in the data we were able to collect from customers but really we were only able to see that data in two dimensions – Breadth and Depth. By breadth I mean that we were able to use and collect data on more than one person interacting with the site and sometimes other sites. By depth I mean that we were able to track the different things that consumers did on the site. This allowed us to manage our sort orders. To bias the display based on consumer behaviour to help generate what we think are the best result for a basket of consumers.

In the last few years we have improved on this and added a third dimension to our data collection and analysis. We have added Context. The ability to see the inter relationship between the data we have on one person and the data we have on others. Through our actions, those of the consumer and other consumers we can link previously unrelated data based on the relationship between different people and past collective behaviour rather than one off activity. We have seen this in the complex CRM systems we have all bought and use every day.

The common theme with the first three dimensions is that we have collected the data from consumers “without their knowledge”. That is not as sinister as it sounds because we have regularly asked for consent. The fourth dimension is Community – which is data that is freely given to us by the consumer. Often unrelated to a particular purchase. And not necessarily for a tangible gain. Though there is very often an intangible gain. What are examples – writing reviews, forwarding links to friends, making recommendations to strangers, building online profiles, contributing to forums, writing a blog etc. The combination of these four dimensions of data can result in an individuated experience. An experience in online media, retail, or community that is unique to an individual but also part of a group experience.

We have seen this individuation in media already. Your twitter feed, facebook newstream and RSS reader list is different to any other anywhere. As the Digital Deliverance group said in their post "What are Individuated Media (What are the New Media)?"

"...the most widely used Individuated Media vehicle today is Facebook. Its more than 200 million consumers give it a mass reach that very few of the world’s Mass Media can equal, yet each of those consumers see different content than one another

Collecting four dimensions of data is not easy. It requires technology leaps in bandwidth and computer processing power - which we now have. The technology needed to allow us to capture and process the data is now matched with the desire of internet users to seek answers to open ended questions and contribute into a community process.

For us as marketers, retailers and media people it means we no longer have to be constrained to gear our marketing to EveryOne. Sure we developed demographic cuts and installed CRM systems to improved the targeting but we were still marketing to EveryOne in the hope of catching the individual. Now with the matching up of technology and social desire we can seek to market to the EveryYou.

The four dimensions of data and technology now allows us to do away with 30 years of econometric dependence on distribution, central tendency and variation – you know bell curves – and instead we can envisage the ability to research an individual at scale rather than rely on measuring their responses as part of a group or sample. Instead of seeing individual behaviour as a “variance” or “outlier”, we can aim to target Every combination of individuals. The EveryYou rather than EveryOne.

Here is my definition of EveryYou:

“The development of a specific and targeted recommendation of one based on the unique combination of desires, needs and interests of each individual at any moment in time”

The EveryYou concept I am working on says that technology and social change put us in a place where we can work on a recommendation of one rather than relying solely on generalisations.

EveryYou marketing and planning approaches are now available to us because of new developments in:

• Social trends that favour online interaction;
• technology innovations that provide organisations with the four dimensions of data; and
• scalability.

In the travel industry, EveryYou means we can answer the question “where should I go next” with a specific answer. We can answer the question which hotel should I stay in "Rome" with an answer that references past purchase behaviour, past reviews written, friends on facebook, people trusted, media read etc. That takes into account that human beings are a mess of contradictions in the things that they like and want. For instance I love the blues, Byzantine mosaics, bad zombie movies and body surfing. No bell curve can market to that.

Companies can treat users as co-researchers in developing a bespoke solution for their individual requirements. The user's needs are met by conjoining the company's expertise in travel and the user's expertise of themselves, thereby creating a tailored travel solution for one. Consumers are and will be willing to provide information on the understanding that it will eventually be deployed to their benefit.

If we use the technological capabilities and social trends available to their fullest potential then we can conceive of a day where we do away with general principles and customisation for the group and instead market to the apparent contradictions in consumer behaviour and aim for the delivery of specific, unique and targeted answers. We could kill off the head, body and long tail of sales and replace it with a sale of one, a market of one for the EveryYou.

Want to hear more? Stay turned to the BOOT as this will be the major area of analysis and work for me on the blog. You can also see me speak on this at WebInTravel October 20-23 in Singapore.

BTW - sorry to get all proprietary but this concept of EveryYou has been put together by me and all in the IP including copyright in it is mine.

Update - thanks to Paul Baron for a photo of me speaking



PS - anyone know how to turn it the right way round?

Jetstar on Virgin Blue - Perils of in-flight TV

In flight TV is all the rage with Low Cost Carriers because it opens up a revenue stream without the complexity of managing a video on demand system. Unfortunately streaming live TV comes with a lack of editorial control. Here is a photo of me watching a Jetstar TV advertisement while sitting in a Virgin Blue seat somewhere between Sydney and Melbourne. That is 192 people looking at your competitor's brand while consuming your product.