Gael Montouchet's List: online marketing

• dynamic packaging in Asia Pacific still lags behind the US and Europe . Participants felt that this was largely due to cultural issues such as trust of buying online and the complexity of cross-regional multi-city travel itineraries and the fact that consumers can book more easily by phone than they can online
• to cope with multiple cost platforms, controlling costs would be the responsibility of the technology provider and content aggregator. Any successful deployment that works in Asia given the constraints and complexities of the market will challenge the role of wholesaler
• From a branding perspective, the suppliers also felt that dynamic packaging and presentation through third-party sites commoditized their products and services and made it difficult to differentiate premium brands. Suppliers have taught consumers in the region to go to their branded websites first and provide special online services and low rate guarantees to take back control of inventory and pricing from intermediaries. Such behavior inhibits the ability of the online travel agent to compete and provide dynamic packaging
• Regionalization and consolidation were seen to be key trends for the future
• technology providers of travel distribution are heavily retail driven in the online space
• It was also felt that as majority players open up to accepting, for instance, local credit cards in China for payment, that consumer online bookings would increase.
• online travel agents needed to provide simple tools and more product choices online to help small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs) book their travel requirements online
• SMEs account for the majority of businesss in many Asian countries and seen as a growth engine for the region
• Participants in the discussion were senior executives in marketing and sales from hospitality, travel management and travel technology companies across the region who met last week to discuss a select range of issues posed to them at a roundtable hosted by the Cornell-Nanyang Institute of Hospitality Management and the Hospitality Sales and Marketing Association International (HSMAI) Asia Pacific chapter

7 more annotations...

• More than Half of Asia-Pacific Internet Users Visited Online Gaming Sites in August 2008

• Malaysia

       

  40.2

       

  3,463

       

  130.8

       

  11.9

• When she becomes a mom, she makes new “mommy” friends because her next-door neighbor, her sister, her mother and her coworker aren’t necessarily pregnant with a three-year-old in the house. But in a mom social network like BabyCenter or others, she can get some really good advice and practical tips from people who understand and have empathy for her. Some 71% of BabyCenter moms say there’s info they would put on BabyCenter that they would never share on Facebook

• The recommendation engine allows you to pose "what-if?" scenarios, and based on the models that have been built, validated and refined, this engine delivers specific instructions along these parameters:

• Channel Mix (in which channels should you invest)

  ·       Tactics/Attributes (publisher, size, placement, keyword, creative, etc.)

  ·       Affinities (run specific tactics in unison to produce 1+1=3 effect)

  ·       Timing (when to run tactics)

  ·       Sequence (in which order to run which tactics)

  ·       Frequency (with what frequency to run tactics)

• 73% of consumers prefer to get their information about an organization in articles rather than advertisements. That means it's more important than ever to include custom content in your marketing mix. Doing so will help drive purchases, improve relationships, and give your customers useful information in a medium they prefer.