Online Revealed 2007 took place May 27-28 at the Sheraton Centre in Toronto, Ontario. It was nice to return ‘home’ and I was happy to tie in a visit with my family.
Monday morning opened up with a lively debate titled “Selling Complex Travel Products Online”. Speakers included Sean Shannon, Managing Director of Expedia Canada, Amber Hayes, CEO of Adventure Engine, Krista La Riviere from Hot Banana, and Eric Barber, Senior Director of Operations at Realstar Hospitality (Starwood Resorts). They debated a topic I am very interested in with my new position at Brewster Inc. since many of our vacation packages are comprised of more than 30 components.
Eric, who was a lively and intelligent speaker and had us laughing at times, pointed out that OTA’s (Online Travel Agencies) will need to put a great deal more effort into keeping customers (providing more value and better service). As soon as the intermediary’s customer walks into that hotel lobby, it’s obvious that the hotel (and suppliers in general) will do their best to acquire that customer direct and avoid paying margins to intermediaries. Sean felt that while the online travel purchaser might only be comfortable with purchasing the basics (for now, Flights, Hotel, Rental Car), he forsees that consumers will have no problem booking packages with numerous components in the very near future.
Dr. Hunter Madsen, Director of PR for Yahoo! Canada discussed the “Impact of Social Media”. His presentation was very interesting and re-enforced what many of us already know related to ‘web 2.0′ and it’s impact on the web. He reminded us that consumers are already writing about our products and brand on the web (Trip Advisor for example) and that we need to embrace that to enhance our credibility and allow our brand to stand out from the competition. We need to enable and empower our advocates as well tolerate and learn from negative feedback. This is something I feel could be difficult to implement simply due to fear and concerns within an organization, as much as it makes sense.
I attended a seminar called “Multiple Websites, Multiple Gains” which I found interesting from my experience with private labels and my days with Reslogic. Greg Smith of Ecotarget provided a very intriguing presentation on behavioural targeting and how many companies are using it effectively to increase conversion.
A student research paper was presented to the crowd on the “Ubiquitous World – The Shift from E-marketing to U-Marketing”. Hai Yen Nguyen provided fantastic insight as to what the world will be like in just a short time. A world where our cellphone is essentially the link to everything, from paying the parking meter, to receiving opt-in specials as you walk by your favourite shoe store. The implications were far-reaching and are in the not-so-distant future. In fact, many of these ideas are already a reality in some Asian countries.
All in all, a very good conference. I met some fantastic personalities and enjoyed my time throughout. It didn’t hurt that the weather was warm, but I learned I couldn’t move back to the hectic pace of Toronto anytime soon – I was glad to see the mountains of the Canadian Rockies again.
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