Best Use of Social Media
Winner: STA Travel
“Once again, STA Travel is a leading light in this area, ensuring that it engages people in as many of the relevant channels to its target audience as possible. Most importantly, customers engage with one another AND the brand.”
Best Cross-Media Advertising Campaign
Winner: Tourism Queensland – ‘Best Job in the World’
“A campaign of pure genius, attracting coverage and product placement – much of it free – across a number of key media channels. The mark of true success was getting the media completely behind project, …

《纽约时报》“节俭旅行者”专栏作家Matt Gross在研究他即将进行的纽约—西雅图之旅的机票价格时，对以下搜索引擎进行了仔细分析：Mobissimo、Vayama、Sidestep、 Kayak.com、ITAsoftware.com、Dohop、cFares.com以及微软的新旅游搜索引擎“必应”（Bing）。
　　让我们先说说落败者。必须承认这是一次不怎么科学的调查，其发现Mobissimo 排名垫底——显示结果是国泰航空的纽约—西雅图直飞航班，票价503.17美元。那比Gross经常预订的网站Vayama、Sidestep,、 Kayak.com的相同航班价格高出17美分；而在ITAsoftware.com（有点靠不住，但价格灵活多变）上找到相同的国泰航空直飞航班价格要低一些，为491美元。
　　这次测试的赢家是Dohop 和Bing，两者都显示了那一趟国泰航空的班机，价格为448美元，可在国泰航空网站直接预订。这么看来，只需多做搜索就可以节省下55美元17美分。
　　对Gross而言，一个出乎意料的失败网站是他最近开始使用的cFares.com。该网站只供会员预订，缴纳50美元的年费可以享受特别折扣和退款。六个周前计划去巴黎旅行时，Gross注册了该网站，搜索到直飞戴高乐机场的航班价格为543.17美元（又是有17美分！）——比其他网站找到的价格低几乎200美元。但这次搜索纽约-加拿大机票时，cFares.com显示最便宜的价格为503美元。
　　问题的关键在于，没有一个搜索引擎是完美的；让人沮丧的是，旅行者仍然需要不辞劳苦四处查找，才能保证找到最优惠的价格。Gross将继续坚持 Kayak是他的第一选择，cFares和Dohop作为补充。可以听取一位曾是旅游代理商的人士的建议：在周三和周四搜索，那时美国和加拿大的机票通常更便宜。
　　并非所有网站上的旅游提示都是关于机票的，有些提供酒店建议，如Venere.com，其专注于全欧洲的酒店。通常，Gross喜欢直接通过酒店本身预订，但偶然情况下——例如语言障碍，或者你认为自己可能要取消预订——那么最好通过网站作为中介预订，当该网站可以为你争取更优惠的房价时尤其应该这么做。
　　Gross给读者的最佳推荐并不是与具体的旅行计划和预订特别相关，而更多的是如何寻找各种方式享受旅途。例如，AitaiJapan.com是一个将到日本旅行的游客和愿意当导游的当地人联系起来的网站，非常有趣。
　　“你不需要跟着一个很滥的‘旅行团’，这太棒了；你只需要和新朋友一起玩就行。你只需支付门票、饮食、公共交通费用等。我遇到的三个导游，说英语都非常流利。”
　　另一位读者推荐的WheresCool.com，适合于“年轻、囊中羞涩而且寻求真正需要的建议”的旅行者。其中一些推荐非常标新立异，例如在伊利诺伊州森林公园的“80年代主题天堂” Cyklopx进行的一场锐舞派对。
　　如果你喜欢Loverboy的唱片和法国奶昔，那么一定会喜欢新上线的AtlasObscura.com。正如联合创始人Joshua Foer所称，这个网站是一切“稀奇古怪、不为人知的地方”的花名册，这些地方可不会出现在一般的旅游指南书中。有多稀奇？例如位于西伯利亚东部的世界最大的人造坑、宾夕法尼亚州Ringing Rocks公园的响石（Sonorous Stones）、伊朗伊斯法罕的鸽子塔，等等。
来源：环球旅讯

Bing Travelthis morning announced that it is rolling out Bing Travel, one of the verticals it’s focusing much of its attention on when it comes to the recently unveiled “decision engine” the company set out to conquer market share from Google and Yahoo Search. Bing Travel, as we mentioned when we posted the first screenshots based on the Kumo preview, combines a lot of the airfare and hotel reservation tools from Microsoft’s 2008 acquisition of Farecast with news and other editorial content from MSN Travel (in fact, travel.msn.com already redirects …

travelocity2009年6月3日：在线旅游公司Travelocity有史以来的首份《旅行者信心报告》（Traveller Confidence Report）显示，机票价格的不断下调以及酒店房价下降，正对96%的受访者的夏季旅行计划产生积极的影响，令人们在夏季的出行意图更加强烈了。
　　Travelocity最近的一次民意调查发现，人们的旅游意向强烈了许多，表明了旅行者的信心正在逐步恢复。
　　报告的精华部分包括：
——计划在2009年增加旅行次数的旅行者比例大幅上升，2009年4月接受采访时，有21%的人表示计划增加出行次数，而在去年11月访问时，这个比例仅为10%；
——计划在2009年减少旅行次数的旅行者比例则巨幅下降，从2008年11月的34%下降至今年4月的24%。另外，旅行者更可能缩减预算，而不是完全地取消度假计划。
——当被问及低价会如何影响其出行计划时，25%的受访者表示机票价格降低会令其进行计划之外的旅行，而18%则表示酒店房价下降会令其选择入住星级更高的酒店。
——三分之二的受访者表示，今年夏季旅行预算与2008年夏季相比会维持不变或有所增加。在计划减少预算的三分之一受访者当中，绝大多数会将预算削减50%或以下。
　　“Travelocity曾预测2009年将是‘旅游特惠年’，目前来看，这个预测是准确的，” Travelocity高级编辑Shaw Brown表示，“目前为止，旅行者是否会利用这些特惠机会仍然有待猜测。《旅行者信心报告》则显示，他们的确有意享受这些优惠。“
来源：环球旅讯

kayak“Thanks to an abundance of travel deals, last year’s Staycation trend appears to be over as we’re seeing consumers using savvy cost-saving strategies to once again embark on a traditional summer vacation,” said Brian Harniman, KAYAK EVP of marketing and distribution. “According to KAYAK’s survey, our users plan to take advantage of historically low airfare and hop on a plane in search of culture and nightlife with trips to domestic and European cities topping the list of destinations being considered. This is a major change from last summer …

comscore
RESTON, VA, March 20, 2009 – comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, today released its monthly analysis of U.S. consumer activity at the top online properties for February 2009 based on data from the comScore Media Metrix service. February represented a softer month for total Web activity due to having fewer days, with only a handful of site categories achieving gains versus January. Among the gaining categories were Flowers/Gifts/Greetings and E-cards, which benefited from Valentine’s Day, and travel and tax preparation sites, which also saw …

One year ago, rising oil prices were taking travel costs to new heights and business travelers were feeling the pinch. Now travel prices are falling again, fueled by the global recession, and airlines, hoteliers and car rental companies are taking evasive actions to survive. Here are ten trends caused by the global economic meltdown, and what they will mean for business travelers in 2009:
1. Air travel on sale. With fewer travelers in this sputtering economy, airlines are desperately trying to fill seats. From January 2007 through July 2008, U.S. airlines …

hotel-tax flapOnline travel websites have been ordered to pay Anaheim $21 million in hotel taxes that officials say they are owed, but the companies are fighting back against the increasingly common claim that they have shortchanged cities from Los Angeles to Las Vegas.
The fight in Anaheim is the latest in an escalating debate between online travel companies and tourist-dependent cities. San Diego, for instance, alleges that it lost more than $30 million by 2006 and Los Angeles says it is losing about $10 million a year.
The travel sites, however, maintain …

With the assistance of a proprietary analytics tool, available online, Egencia – Expedias business travel arm – will help both existing and non-Egencia clients diagnose the health of their travel program and prescribe a regimen to help weather the recession.
Egencia today announces the worldwide implementation of a free program diagnostic for business travel optimization and spend management. With the assistance of a proprietary analytics tool, available online, Egencia will help both existing and non-Egencia clients diagnose the health of their travel program and prescribe a regimen to help weather the …

chicagotribuneAirport codes, travel dates and departure times.
For many consumers, the best way to research trips used to consist of keying those three components into the booking engine of a site like Orbitz.com, then checking for the cheapest results.
But as the Web evolves, online travel behemoths like Chicago-based Orbitz find they have to devise new ways to engage customers or risk becoming irrelevant as social media and search engines change how people shop for travel.
One challenge is finding ways to reap advertising dollars from people who browse but don’t buy from …