Archive | November, 2007

30 November 2007 ~ 2 Comments

Connecting with Eric Bjorndahl, CEO TravBuddy.com @ PhoCusWright Orlando

I had a chance to talk to Eric Bjorndahl, CEO of TravBuddy.com at the Google Moonlight party at the PhoCusWright Conference in Orlando. Travbuddy.com is a popular user generated travel content site that allows people to review, read reviews, and connect with other people or TravBuddies. The site boasts an Alexa ranking of about 30,000 [...]

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28 November 2007 ~ 0 Comments

Hospitality Managers Pay Attention! The Truth Doesn't Have to Hurt

A big part of both the Canada-e-connect and the PhoCusWright Conferences revolved around user generated content and the effect that online review sites have on a companies reputation. The TripAdvisor presentation, which I reviewed earlier, pointed out that hoteliers and destination marketers don’t need to fear public opinion and that feedback in the form of [...]

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21 November 2007 ~ 3 Comments

Canada-E-Connect video interview with Jeremy Gutsche, Trendhunter.com

I had a chance to catch up with Jeremy Gutsche from Trendhunter.com Magazine, after his presentation at the Canada-e-connect Conference in Vancouver. I asked him what small activity and tour operators could do to increase the popularity of their activities. Jeremy re-iterated that if you want to make your story and brand more compelling, you [...]

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18 November 2007 ~ 0 Comments

Activity, Event, and Local Tour Operators… Pay Attention – Part 1

Kevin May at the Travolution Blog posted a great little factoid about business travel. In a nutshell, Johnson & Johnson’s business travel budget was $915 Million of which $643 Million was spent on Long tail products like events, tours, taxis, airport shuttles, and rental cars. On top of that, 64% of business travelers purchased event [...]

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18 November 2007 ~ 0 Comments

Canada-E-Connect video interview with Darren Johner

This is a interview Darren Johner, the webmaster for Tourism Vancouver. I was introduced to Darren through Phil Caines, who works for me at Rezgo.com. Phil used to work with Tourism Vancouver before working at Rezgo. According to Darren, the biggest take away from the Canada-e-connect conference is the sense of collaboration and community.

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14 November 2007 ~ 6 Comments

Truth is Online Gold Dust -President & CEO, Stephen Kaufer

Stephen Kaufer, CEO of Tripadvisor provided an engaging presentation about truth online and the effect that Tripadvisor has had of the travel industry. He discussed how products like TripAdvisor are promoting long tail products by allowing users to rate and comment on all types of accommodations and activities, not just those that are popular or [...]

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14 November 2007 ~ 0 Comments

First Ever Major Travel Industry Blogger Workshop @ PhoCusWright

From Left to Right: Ram Badrinathan (not in photo), William Bakker, Jens Thraenhart, Stephen Joyce, Kevin May, and Phil Caines. Photo Credit: Vicky Brock The Blogger Workshop at the PhoCusWright Conference in Orlando was a huge success. Phil and I, miraculously, arrived at the conference a mere forty-five minutes before the workshop was to begin. [...]

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14 November 2007 ~ 0 Comments

Canada-E-Connect video interview with William Bakker

This is a great little vignette with William Bakker, the head of E-Commerce for Tourism BC. William is also one of the contributors to the “Tips from the T-List” book and an all round great guy. He is also one of the expert panelists at the the first ever blogger workshop and summit at the [...]

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14 November 2007 ~ 0 Comments

Mr. Al Lenza – VP Distribution & E-Commerce North West Airlines

Paypal and billmelater technologies are being accepted by airlines now. Internet has been focused on low fares. Mandate is to focus on revenue and provide access to low fare information as it pertains to specific traveler requirements, for example the lowest direct fare, or the lowest first class fare, etc. Meta search and vertical search [...]

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13 November 2007 ~ 4 Comments

What makes a Blog? A Summary of the Blogger Summit @ PhoCusWright

The blogger summit at The 2007 PhoCusWright Conference in Orlando, Florida was a huge success, at least in my opinion. The room was filled to capacity with approximately sixteen delegates around the tables and another twenty or so sitting in chairs and on counter tops around the room. The discussion was lively and at one [...]

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