Search and Rescue

28 April 2009

Strand Palace Hotel – London

Some analysts are predicting that this will turn out to be the worst recession since World War II. The trading environment is extraordinarily tough and, as yet, there are no signs of recovery.

Encouragingly, research has shown that consumers are not prepared to completely sacrifice their holidays. However, they are clearly cutting back on the amount they are prepared to spend, either by taking fewer breaks, shorter holidays or trading down. Undoubtedly, this will put travel company profits under pressure.

There is one major difference now compared to previous recessionary periods. This is that the online world has matured to become a major sales channel. Most travel companies are now selling online although with varying degrees of success. Those that are doing well have had to work hard for their success.

The online channel gives businesses the opportunity to not only extend their reach beyond their traditional markets, but also to increase efficiency through a greater degree of automation.

At the TTI Spring Conference there was a team of experts giving real world experiences of recent trading conditions and their outlook over the coming months.

If you were not able to attend then you missed an excellent series of sessions and the all important question and answer sessions that teased out some extra insight into the future of the sector.

However, the next best thing to being there is to be able to see the presentations which can be downloaded by clicking on the presentation title:

An Industry in Flux
Paul Evans, Chief Executive, Lowcost Travel Group

What’s new in SEO?
Neil McCarthy, Chief Sales & Marketing Officer, Latitude Group

Online Travel during the recession
Robin Goad, Director of Research, Hitwise

Capitalising on the trends in the UK travel market
Robin Devlin, Industry Manager Travel, Google UK

Multilingual SEO/PPC: The Opportunities
Greig Holbrook, Director, OBAN Multilingual

Online initiation and beyond
Mark Walker, Chief Executive Officer, Visit Huelva

Tips for building an online business
Ray Mason, ex-Managing Director, travel.co.uk

Using Mobile in the Travel Industry
Daniel Cuffley, Partnership Director, Yahoo!

Embracing Mobile
Gareth Pugh, Director, Handy Group

Digital @ TUI Travel PLC
Sandra Leonhard, Director Web Strategy & Business Development, TUI Travel plc

Developing a Digital Strategy
Steve Dunne, Chief Executive Officer, Digital Drums

This event was kindly sponsored by:

Find out more in the report by Linda Fox in our Newsletter – May 2009