Have you seen all the articles about people, fed up with online booking engines, moving away from OTA – online travel agencies – and headed back to their traditional travel agent?  See the end of the post for a link to CNN and New York Times articles.

Since the launch of Tripology, just about two years ago, we’ve processed over 100,000 detailed trip requests from high-intent online travelers.  This doesn’t include all the people we turn away who are really better off with an OTA. 

I make sure I speak to as many consumers as I can each week and what I hear, over and over again, is “there’s too much information out there and I’d like to speak with a human being that knows what they’re talking about.”  See? There’s the rub, as we say, “someone who knows what they’re talking about.”

People want to speak with an expert, a real, live human being who knows the answers. This, in our opinion, is a travel specialist. Not your typical travel agent who is a master gatherer of information.  Not some call center person who has, at their disposal, the very same online booking engine and information that didn’t help the consumer in the first place.  They want a travel professional that specializes in the exact trip they’re looking to take.

By the way, adding to consumer frustration is the plethora of deals (half of which are underwhelming) being offered by every supplier on the planet right now.

Consumers are frazzled and they want someone to make it simple for them. Some will do fine with an OTA and some will not. The folks that won’t do well with an OTA are realizing they’re likely better off with a travel specialist.  Many believe this is because there hasn’t been much innovation coming out of the OTAs. One thing for sure; this is not because OTAs don’t offer good deals.  They do, for commodity trips. It is, in my opinion, because some people simply need human interaction and they likely shouldn’t have been searching on an OTA to begin with.  These are the folks who ask questions at Home Depot of the person in the orange apron about their preference in doorknob.  These are the people who call DELL to order a computer instead of simply ordering online without asking a single question. These are the people who want someone to thank if all goes well and someone to blame if it doesn’t. I can be somewhat obnoxious and critical about those people because that’s the type of person I am.  I like to make informed decisions. I have questions.  It might be about doorknobs with electronic keypads or about the performance of a particular computer operating system, but I will have questions.  By the way, I’m happy to order online…once my questions are answered.  

Do the OTAs need more innovation? Yes.  But they deserve some credit too.  They’ve made the world a smaller place and we all owe them a bit of gratitude for the millions they spend promoting travel.

As for me and as it pertains to travel, I like www.Tripology.com, but hey, I’m biased.

So, my dear partners in travel, at Tripology, we’ve been saying this all along; Travel Specialists will thrive. Hang in there!

Happy selling,

John

 ————————  Articles  ——————————————————

“Are travel agents making a comeback?” CNN article – see: http://bit.ly/28Klc1

“Worst Part of a Trip May Be Booking It on the Web”  New York Times article – see

http://bit.ly/26PPwz