My friend Everett Potter asked for a few predictions for 2010.   Have a look at his post and what other industry folks think is ahead.

Kathy’s Travel Industry Predictions for 2010

Customerc-entric: the customer will become the sales force, product developers, service centers and resolution managers for companies. Those companies who offer creative tools to enable this will see success. This will occur both online and offline.

Social Media: will be a game changer. Tour providers will invest in developing and implementing social media strategies. Those who embrace, interact, listen and share will see significant changes in customer retention, referral bookings, and resolution/customer satisfaction. Facebook will lead the consumer interaction, twitter will lead the pr, mobile devices will lead content sharing. Get Satisfaction and Trip Advsior will continue to navigate reviews and resolution.

Curators will Rule: too much noise, too much information, and too many people talking become increasingly overwhelming. In order to make decisions people will rely on people/sites they trust in the travel space (and in all decision making). Blogs, travel bloggers, twitter leaders and niche vertical sites will gain exposure and influence as they turn down the volume.

Technology will Enable: Live content, original, interesting, authentic content, interactive maps, new mobile apps, and rich media will be king.

The sandbox will be broken:  new technology and innovation will break the old sandbox where companies that do business in a certain way are thought of as leaders. Authentic, agile, innovative individuals will trump large companies and years in business.

Specialization vs Expansion: Niche Tour Operators will gain exposure and success.  Consumers will be looking and able to find smaller companies who offer exactly what they are looking for.

Distribution: Niche Tour providers will increasingly distributed their products and content across new platforms and to new sites. The egocentric silos of personal websites and brochures will become only part of the real-estate content and data live on. There will be a consistent data structure and understanding of API and data feeds.

Collaboration vs Exclusivity: success will come through working together between multiple entities travelers, tour operators, destination management companies, tourism boards

Transparency vs Selective Sharing:  Information, links and reviews of hotels, routes, guides, restaurants will all be open.  Consumers will know who is actually operating tours and what levels/values are involved. The line between incoming tour operators and outgoing will continue to blur.

The online travel industry falls for a second straight year, dropping 1.3 percent to 75. The three major online travel sites all suffered drops in satisfaction. Expedia remains the highest-scoring company, but its score plummets 3.8 percent to 75. Travelocity and Orbitz both drop to 73, as the three companies continue to have difficulty differentiating their services. “For the last 10 years, the technology that online travel aggregators use has essentially remained unchanged, but competition continues to innovate,” said Freed. “Standing still is not an option. As the smaller players change the game, satisfaction with the big players will decline if they just tread water.

“For the last 10 years, the technology that online travel aggregators use has essentially remained unchanged, but competition continues to innovate,” said Freed. “Standing still is not an option. As the smaller players change the game, satisfaction with the big players will decline if they just tread water.” 

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