Distribution Strategies

Interactive Travel Services Association (ITSA), an online travel industry trade group, has stated that Google uses its monopoly power to distort the marketplace by steering consumers away from the natural search results available for travel online.

The Association made this statement as it chose to join FairSearch.org.

ITSA’s president Joseph Rubin added, “Further, the online travel companies are required to provide various consumer disclosures with their listings. Our members think consumers deserve the protection of those disclosures that we provide, and that Google Flight Search in many cases does not.”

The FairSearch.org coalition encourages the enforcement of existing laws to prevent anticompetitive behaviour that harms consumers and competition.

In April 2011, after a rare extended antitrust review, the Justice Department imposed strong conditions requiring Google to offer ITA to competitors, and created a five-year monitoring period of Google’s online travel business. The roll-out of Google Flight Search in fall 2011 excluded links to metasearch and online travel agency sites in its results. Google said in November that airlines demanded that Google Flight Search feature links to their sites exclusively.

FairSearch.org highlighted that during the lengthy antitrust review of Google’s acquisition of ITA Software, Google promised that “the acquisition will benefit passengers, airlines and online travel agents by making it easier for users to comparison shop for flights and airfares and by driving more potential customers to airlines and online travel agencies’ websites.”

“Needless to say, when Google announced the launch of its Google Flight Search product last September, we were eager to see if Google kept its word,” stated the coalition. “Benefit passengers, airlines and online travel agents? Despite its promises, Google excludes lower-priced fares that come from online travel agents or metasearch engines. These online travel sites often have special fares (like ones that combine multiple carriers) and offer other deals that save users money by packaging, for example, flights and hotel reservations together. Excluding links to non-airline sites is certainly not good for passengers.”

In November last year, looking at how Google approached the testing phase of vertical search offerings for both air and hotel, Jeffery H. Boyd, president and chief executive officer of the Priceline Group, said it’s clear that Google would like to have these platforms operate as an efficient vehicle for advertisers to get qualified leads because a customer will have seen more information on Google by the time they click on to an advertising link.

Boyd added, “And if you look at the hotel product, the online travel agents are very prominently featured in the display. With respect to the flight search, that’s not the case. And I believe …that’s principally because our limitations would have been placed on Google by the airlines.”

New members

In addition to the ITSA, FairSearch.org has added several new members to its coalition: New York City-based adMarketplace, which delivers pay-per-click advertising inventory to marketers from non-search engine sources; Paris, France-based Twenga, an online shopping site listing; and Mountain View, California-headquartered ShopCity.com.

The members join existing FairSearch.org members Expedia Inc., and its brands Expedia.com and Hotwire; Foundem; Kayak, and its brand SideStep; Microsoft; Level…com; Sabre Holdings, and its brands Travelocity and Zuji; and TripAdvisor.