Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Direct Supplier Booking vs Online Travel Agency

In December 2008, PhoCusWright, the travel industry’s research authority and annual presenter of The PhoCusWright Conference released a study that identifies the most popular type of online booking methods used by today’s traveler.



As you can see from the graph below Business travelers and vacationers tend to book with direct suppliers rather than through online travel agencies. This information matches perfectly with the data that I am getting from my web analytics. The fact is that wealthy travelers want to get exactly what they are looking for. Because of this they tend to book directly with the hotel/resort/outfitter, rather than going to Expedia, Priceline, or a directory site.



All of the available data seems to point to the fact that buyers who are looking for common vacation travel, or are very price sensitive are more likely to use online travel agencies like priceline, expedia, etc. Conversely people who travel often prefer to work directly with the supplier of the recreation activity. Our proprietary data shows that people who purchase luxury trips spend less time researching prices and more time deciding whether or not a particular travel destination will suit their desires.

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