For quite some time now we’ve been hearing that most people choose to research their holidays online yet book them through a travel agent. For travel agents in our industry, it can almost be classified as an urban legend, one of those bits of news that you love to quote but are afraid to really research just in case it’s not true.
Well rest assured; it seems it is still true … to a degree.
Last week I came across some research from Forrester Research that helps us understand the reasons and most puzzling if technology is so quick to evolve, why consumers continue to resist booking online.
Forrester polled about 5,330 North American consumers in the last quarter of 2006 to determine exactly what prevents them from putting their faith in online travel sites and making the reservation. The top-three most common reasons include:
Credit Card Security
Specifically, the number of consumers concerned with submitting their credit card information online has doubled. About 9% cited this reason in Forrester’s 2005 poll and in 2006 16%. Bunch of red flags here because that number had been steadily dropping over the years but recently the media has been featuring more sophisticated identity theft attacks so the issue is back.
Limited Usability
Web travelers cited limited capabilities with the online reservation system as a reason for booking offline. About 25% in 2006 and 19% in 2005 cited “an inability to make a special request, such as asking for a particular type of room or model of a car.” This in my opinion is fixable to a point. Technology can and will continue to be developed to handle these non-standard requests but ‘travel’ is made up of myriad variations and choices so technology, in the foreseeable future, will never be able to capture the tiny nuances that only a human can understand or fulfil.
Poor Site Performance
According to Forrester’s survey, “one in five web travelers cites this as a reason for booking travel offline,” which is why the research firm recommends online sites make performance and usability a top priority in 2007.
Interestingly enough, the report went on to quote that one-third of respondents said, “They’d just prefer to deal with people when booking travel.”
So it seems that the death of the travel agent and its replacement by the booking engine is still a long way off, better technology may solve the top three reasons but never I suspect, the need for people to interact, receive and provide opinions.
But the thing is…technology is constantly improving…are you?
Behave,
Frank
