Travel Technology - Missing Link
Over years we have seen a lot of changes and development in the travel technology. Once we entered the new millennium; we have seen various Travel/Technology companies coming out with Travel Portals and the growth of online travel agents (OTAs). Over the years we have seen various companies investing Millions into travel technology to get an edge over competition. Initial days one could only book Air tickets on OTA platforms; this has changed over a period of years. Today most OTAs offer Booking of Domestic and International air tickets, rail tickets, bus tickets, Hotel Bookings, Car Rentals, Activities and Ready packages. Aspect to customize and create a completely tailor made holiday is missing with all OTAs online, most OTAs and agents offer this service offline. They display ready packages online and to make changes to the same, one needs to call their call center or office to get a customized quote. Getting a custom quote takes anything between few hours to 2-4 days depending on the agent and the complexity of the inquiry.
Missing Link
To take the online platforms to the next level one needs to create a tool to ‘create your holiday’. Using this tool one should be able to start with their flight, add hotels, airport transfers, sight seeing, activities and guide services and get a complete customized package as per clients inputs. The client can review the package and later share with family/friends or make changes to suit their preferences and requirements.
Tool to ‘create your holiday’ will involve certain complexities. We have over 200 countries in the world and each country is unique in the way it would function. If we talk of India, we have 29 states and seven union territories, though majority of parameters with regards to hotels would be similar, we have different parameters in vehicle cost, entrance fees, interstate vehicular taxes where applicable etc. When we consider creating a backend for several countries, multiple parameters will have to be considered to ensure that the platform gives desired results. The Back office
operations team can verify the program created by the user and give the users suggestions in case they feel that the user has planned a wrong itinerary using the tool.
Adding to this concept, we also have guides that are a part of travel planning, some prefer a local guide while travelling and some opt to explore on their own. So if have a tool to link the guides with technology, this would complete the entire user experience.
One can also consider adding a module to cover monument entrance fees for various monuments across the cities to give the user exact information on costs and prepay where possible. This can also get complex as lot of countries have different rates for citizens, neighboring countries and rest of the world.
One will have the user to keep interface simplistic to create an attractive user experience. To work on adding several countries, the backend will have to be flexible and should be able to adapt to different probabilities. There would be several challenges in creating this tool.
Technology companies should also develop user friendly mobile apps which can give richer travel experiences whilst the customer is on a tour. They can start with creating ‘Pass’ concept so that they do away with voucher system and the pass would as a voucher and give all necessary information to the traveler. The pass can be generated with a unique QR code to be genuine and partners can have the tool to verify the authenticity of the QR code. The same app can be used to for client feedback and updating clients.
Ideally one will have to initially study a few countries and work on developing this platform which can be used across some of the countries and after implementing the initial phase, work on expanding to different countries after making necessary changes in the backend. One will have to ensure that the front and giving user experience stays uniform.
We also need to keep in mind that today the OTAs are offering so many options to the customers and have plenty of information on their portals that the user gets lost to what he should be choosing. So one needs to concentrate and work on a simplistic user interface giving a fabulous user experience.
Offline travel companies today depend on DMC for International travel or local partners/hotels to create respond to their customers. Development of ‘create your holiday’ technology will also assist offline travel companies to improve their offerings and guide their customers in a better way and give prompt responses. They can also function extremely well in the business to business (B2B) segment.
If one can find a solution and crack the concept of ‘creating a holiday’ on their platform, this will be a start of a new era in the travel technology and complete one of the missing links in the technology and offer support to offline travel companies as well OTAs.
Development of 'create your holiday'technology will also assist offline travel companies to improve their offerings and guide their customers in a better way and give prompt responses
Adding to this concept, we also have guides that are a part of travel planning, some prefer a local guide while travelling and some opt to explore on their own. So if have a tool to link the guides with technology, this would complete the entire user experience.
One can also consider adding a module to cover monument entrance fees for various monuments across the cities to give the user exact information on costs and prepay where possible. This can also get complex as lot of countries have different rates for citizens, neighboring countries and rest of the world.
One will have the user to keep interface simplistic to create an attractive user experience. To work on adding several countries, the backend will have to be flexible and should be able to adapt to different probabilities. There would be several challenges in creating this tool.
Technology companies should also develop user friendly mobile apps which can give richer travel experiences whilst the customer is on a tour. They can start with creating ‘Pass’ concept so that they do away with voucher system and the pass would as a voucher and give all necessary information to the traveler. The pass can be generated with a unique QR code to be genuine and partners can have the tool to verify the authenticity of the QR code. The same app can be used to for client feedback and updating clients.
Ideally one will have to initially study a few countries and work on developing this platform which can be used across some of the countries and after implementing the initial phase, work on expanding to different countries after making necessary changes in the backend. One will have to ensure that the front and giving user experience stays uniform.
We also need to keep in mind that today the OTAs are offering so many options to the customers and have plenty of information on their portals that the user gets lost to what he should be choosing. So one needs to concentrate and work on a simplistic user interface giving a fabulous user experience.
Offline travel companies today depend on DMC for International travel or local partners/hotels to create respond to their customers. Development of ‘create your holiday’ technology will also assist offline travel companies to improve their offerings and guide their customers in a better way and give prompt responses. They can also function extremely well in the business to business (B2B) segment.
If one can find a solution and crack the concept of ‘creating a holiday’ on their platform, this will be a start of a new era in the travel technology and complete one of the missing links in the technology and offer support to offline travel companies as well OTAs.
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