Travel Infomediary

1

• Travel Infomediary
• Is a New Frontier
• In
• Service and Control

2
Control the Information

• What is an Infomediary?
• Information is more than Content
• Emerging and Converging Technology
• Three Cs
• Compute Supplier and GDS (processing)
• Content Supplier, GDS and Infomediary
• Communicate GDS (traditional), Telephone,
  Internet and Wireless
• Booking Channels will Evolve
• Information will Drives the Booking

3
A Travel Infomediary is ..

• A source of unbiased information
• A supplier of customized or segmented or targeted
  information
• An Enterprise who has has invested in technology
  to cleanse, quality control and deliver travel
  information across all media
• An Enterprise that is equally concerned about the
  value of their service to their data supplier and
  information distributor.

4
A Travel Infomediary is ..

• Not Dependent on
• Paid Listings
• Booking Fees
• Advertising Print or Electronic
• Not An Indexer of URLs
• Infospace.com, yahoo.com
• Not an Internet Link to a
• Travel Service Supplier
• Intermediary
• Travelocity.com, Expedia.com and TravelWeb.com
• GDS
• Not Dependent on
• Unauthorized WWW spiders
• Unauthorized screen scrapping

5
Emerging Converging Media

• Emerging Media
• Personal Digital Assistants (PDA)
• Corporate
• Wireless
• Corporate
• PDA/Telephone
• Interactive Voice
• Interactive Pagers
• Corporate
• WebTV
• Leisure

• Converging Media
• Internet
• Leisure
• Intranet
• Govt/Corporate
• Extranet
• Affinity Groups
• Buyers/Sellers
• Mutual Interest

6
Value

• Controlling the travel information that is
  integral to your travel service is key.
• Technology controls computing and communications.
• People control information
• A Content Consolidator
• specific data types/elements from the original
  source with the permission of the supplier.
• A Content Filter
• proofing, quality control and cleansing
• A Customizable Value Add
• consolidated or segmented data for custom
  internal applications and/or commercial products.
• A Source of Reliable Digital Content
• accountable for agreed data quality, update
  frequency, coverage etc.

7
Infomediary Value

• Above all Content control
• Content is customizable for innovative and unique
  applications
• Control the content and you control the
  converging media opportunities
• Information not bookings adds value to your
  service
• Information drives the booking process

8
Infomediary Benefits

• Information Drives Media Convergence
• Planning Information
• Trip Interruption Information/Notification
• Post Trip Information
• Information is the bridge between Business and
  Leisure business
• Permits separation of GDS/direct bookings
• Rich content makes a service stickier
• Track user preference on demand not purchase
• Content control facilitates customization

9
More Benefits

• Customized content enables product
  differentiation on converging media
• Establish your brand by controlling content
• Add integrity with content from a neutral brand
• Good information reduces the look-to-book ratio
  by offering all options and booking options
• Complete information enables search engines
• Outsourcing to an Infomediary adds value and
  saves operating costs

10
Business Assumptions

• There is value in providing complete and accurate
  trip planning information
• The better sources for additional content are not
  indexers, spider or screen scrapping
  applications.
• Good planning information builds stickiness and
  attracts new users
• Ultimately, the consumer will pay for a travel
  service, not the supplier
• High Look-to Book ratio is due in part to a lack
  of complete and accurate content
• Converging Media are demanding more information
  as well as easier booking tools