With websites such as Tripadvisor, WAYN, Google Maps, Facebook, etc., do DMO/NTO/CVB’s need websites at all 10 years from now? Brand new director Armands Slokenbergs from the Latvian Tourism Development Agency asked for a show of hands and nobody raised even a finger. After 3 days of presentations and discussions it’s hard to ignore the fact that we need to go where the consumer is, instead convincing the consumer to come to us.

I was fortunate to have the opportunity to present some of my ideas and join about 50 online marketers from 25 European National Tourism Organizations for 3 days during their annual eBusiness Academy. The theme of the conversations was focussed on working with 3rd party websites to provide content and in the case of social networks, join the conversation. Isabel Mosk from Holland noted that “instead of asking to ‘please buy Holland’, we should be asking ‘how can Holland help you’”.

And the message from consumers is clear. You don’t help anybody traditional advertising but by adding value through relationships. Slokenbergs’ limited budget is focussed on encouraging word-of-mouth recommendations (bravo!). He shared some really cool research and one the conclusions was that the best opportunities for word-of-mouth is the though positive interactions between local people and their traditions. A great example is encouraging the celebration of your “Name Day” in Latvia; a local tradition that’s celebrated by everybody.
WAYN and Tripadvisor showed case studies of DMO campaigns. The WAYN campaign with South Africa was particulary impressive. A contest to win a trip (of course) resulted in 20,000 additions to South Africa’s consumer database at a very reasonable cost. The added bennefit was the community engagement who selected the winner and will probably be living vicaruasly through the (Canadian) winner when she goes on her trip soon.

To go where the consumers are is working well for some NTO’s. VisitBritain receives 18.5M visitors to its consumer websites and an equal number of visitors via syndication partners. Other NTO’s are doing interesting things well including Slovenia who works with local search angines and portals. Many syndicate to Google Maps and have developed widgets.

Joobili co-founder Jared Salter shared some interesting thoughts. Not every destination is a top 5 destination year-round. But many destinations are the best destination at least one day a year during a really cool festival. Joobili satisfies the for consumers need who plan a trip based on what the best place to visit is for a particular date or dates. Great way to provide a sense of urgency as well.
Google’s Andrew Pozniak tried really hard to convince us that Google has no intentions to enter the travel vertical but we all know they already have. Not through a big bang, but slowly though Google Maps, Streetview, Place Pages, YouTube and secret Android activities.

Isabel tweeted that we all might work for Google soon. But hey, if anybody is taking over from us, I hope it’s Google.

One thing I observed with some (most) of the Phocuswright innovators is that a lot of the products demo-ed are (still) conceived and created by engineers. Engineers are brilliantly smart. But most suffer from the “because we can” syndrome. FAIL.
Good products are simple and useful. If you don’t meet these criteria, you will fail guaranteed. Meet them, and you have a shot. They are your minimum requirements.
Take Twitter. Turns out Twitter us useful to millions of people. Twitter is also extremely simple. Post and follow. That’s pretty much it.
Twitter could add categories, replies, forwards, tags, google maps and much, much more. Twitter could allow its users to add pictures, voice messages, video. But they have resisted. Because it would stop being simple. And that’s a big reason why Twitter is successful.
Take Kayak. Kayak is also useful. Kayak is also extremely simple in it’s essence. From->to->dates->search and you’re done. The result page focuses on the core task; find the best flight. Features are optional after the core task is completed. These features are useful in itself, but don’t stop the core task from being simple.
I suggest to all the innovators to hire a product manager who understands this, focuses on the core task that’s being satisfied, and strips everything else.

I’m not at the conference but they’re always high tech at PhocusWright and the videos are posted on their website. Here are my impressions after the 10 minute demos:

• Escapia: JABS (Just Another Booking System) – there must be 1,000 of them – this one is targeted for vacation rentals – and has a distribution network.
• DealBase: Laundry lists of “travel deals” – not impressed at all – a meta search engine concept without a meta search because operators have to enter direct – problem: operators won’t enter deals if they don’t have significant traffic, and without deals they won’t retain traffic.
• Rezgo: Yes, also JABS. But Stephen and Phill are friends of mine, and I’m a fan of Rezgo because it’s a great product. Great job guys. The barcode check-in is very cool.
• Fogglight: System to build websites for small operators. Even though it builds a huge website, I doubt there will be a large pick-up.
• TravelMuse: I was impressed. They would need great content. The bookmark widget and planning tool is smart. If consumers like it, they have potential.
• TripJane: gimmick – search and book within Facebook
• Adventurelink: JABS – for adventure travel – also with a distribution network
• Worldmate: Manage your trip details – It’s like an assistant organizing and alerting you. Cool service, reminds me of TripIt, I think it’s only a matter of time before OLTA’s offer this as part of their service.
• Vacationroost: JABS – again for vacation rentals – it’s does everything one would expect – and includes a distribution network
• Your Tour: Complete itinerary building and booking. The technology is definitely impressive. Question is if people really want to use this type of tool to plan and book their trip. I’d like to play around with it
• Travelbeen: meta search for travel information websites, sort off – it feels incomplete – I’ll stick with Google for now
• TripIt: awesome – booking aggregation with added context – best thing is that you can take aggregate multiple booking sources automatically – should add the alert features from Worldmate.
• Nile Guide terrible name – content aggregated with advanced filtering – some interesting features – problem with mass aggregation is accuracy. Vancouver includes some unfortunate recommendations.
• Wandrian – global train tickets distribution system – definitely needed – booking train online is horrible – they should launch a consumer site
• Triporati – travel discovery engine – recommendation based on your ‘travel DNA’ – like Pandora in music – lots of potential – needs work because discovery needs to inspire through an emotional connection – another problem is the subjectivity of the destination DNA determined by a single destination expert
• eKit – keep a trip log – the twist is you can use your cell phone – auto geo-tagging, etc. – with a compatible plan or SIM card – they should take it out of travel and onto Facebook
• Worklight – creates gadgets/widgets for travel providers – clearspring for travel? – book/check-in/etc – what’s with the ‘book from facebook?’ – is that really the future?
• Cadabra – dynamic package generator for tour operators (like YourTour) – very flexible -do people want to plan their trip in this detail with one supplier – maybe a meta search version?
• Tripchill – it’s like WorldMate but seems more robust – travel assistant including mobile – pretty cool
• Farepool – JABS – for travel agents – sourcing from multiple systems
• Sabre – Travelocity – JABS – puts the fragmentation of buying air (seat, bags, etc) back into a single price based on consumer option – consumer focused, thank you
• Clairvoyix – Database marketing and Business Intelligence tools for hotels – nothing innovative but refreshing to see a hotel specific solution
• TripTelevision – YouTube type video player with some added functionality – some of it pretty slick.
• Yapta – travel meta search with new features – alert system and award miles
• Interactive MOBILE @dvertising – JABS – on a mobile – includes a downloadable destination guide – ok it works on a mobile – but is the guide complete? – lot of focus on pushing ads

I have a few more videos to go. So check back.

I’ve always wanted to post while sitting on a panel. Done.