If there is one word that can be associated with the meta-search category it is growth. Yet in spite of this, players in this category are actively looking at new functionalities and platforms to grab emerging opportunities, both in the travel planning, research, and booking phase. EyeforTravel’s Ritesh Gupta investigates

When the entrepreneurs behind the launch of travel search engines, be they from the US, Europe or Asia Pacific, get talking you can be sure of one thing: the monetisation of online traffic will feature strongly in discussions. Indeed, the growth in travel search queries, app downloads and revenue-per-thousand queries have all been on an upward trajectory. As a result, strategic alliances, featuring heavyweight online travel agencies like Priceline and Expedia and travel meta-search engines, have been a major focal point over the past few months.

One thing seems clear: travellers increasingly want to be able to compare what is available and check prices across the board. Take the case of Kayak; the first time it achieved the milestone of one billion queries was in 2008. To get to that point took four years. After another three years, it had processed a further 2 billion queries. But then last year, in a mere 10 months, it processed 1 billion travel-related queries.

What meta-search has attempted so far has worked well, but there is more in the offing. Travel search engines are coming up with new features for both travel planning and booking. The game is getting interesting as some of the independent players are going for organic expansion, while also looking for a greater share in the booking funnel.

Tweaks to the model

Meta-search engines are tweaking their respective business models in two ways:

1.       Some are moving down the funnel and intend to control the booking path: the industry has witnessed meta-search players working out technology that lets a traveller book hotels, flights and so on directly through them.

“Travel search engines are focusing on improving on their interface and functionalities by working out free text search (voice too) and direct booking with suppliers on the search site,” says Ewan Gray, director – Asia Pacific, SkyScanner, who will be speaking at the Travel Distribution Summit, Asia in May. The option to book directly started predominantly with hotels and has gradually expanded to flights and car rental reservations. “It makes a lot of sense on mobile devices where the downstream experience is often poor. We will see more of this,” says Gray, who believes non-flights revenue will be key to success.  

2.       Others are moving up the funnel and helping consumers in the travel planning and research phase. The focus here is on offering a conversation experience. A traveller can write how to go from one place to another on some search engines, and the results would feature information such as distance, transport options, driving directions, accommodation-related info, nearby destinations and so on. All of this is presented in easy to assimilate user interface with capabilities to explore further on any aspect that a traveller intends to. In this case, the travel-search category has to be wary of travel research/ trip planning sites moving further down the funnel by launching and expanding meta-search offerings.

A lot depends on how suppliers and OTAs ‘play the meta game’. With Google’s entry in meta-search, a lot of OTAs and suppliers are intensifying their existing relationships with the larger meta-search players in their markets. This is to prevent the scenario of pricing power concentrating in the hands of a few, and to keep their customer acquisition costs predictable, says Aloke Bajpai, founder and chief executive of iXiGO.com.

New frontiers

The stakes are high and meta-search engines cannot rest on their laurels. They must continue to facilitate the easy ability for users to compare all available options.

Semantic search is a significant emerging opportunity area - natural-language queries have the scope of changing how we search for travel today. “So, the ability to ask ‘How do I go from Bangalore to Shimla?’ or ‘Delhi to London flights next week’ and getting a useful answer for them is really important,” says Bajpaj. iXiGO has launched a natural language search engine that understands travel queries on the site and on Facebook/ Twitter and responds automatically to them with a relevant answer. “Facebook Graph Search will build more familiarity for this cutting-edge tech in the social mainstream too - so eventually consumers will get more used to it,” he says.  

Bajpaj also believes that mobile will remain an important focus area in 2013 and there will be a lot more innovation around specific use-cases for finding travel information, deals and search.

“With the boundary lines of mobile and tablet blurring, the need for adaptive mobile apps [that work seamlessly across form factors / screen sizes and adapt functionality and design accordingly] will be more strongly felt,” says Bajpai.

When it comes to future developments in the category, Bajpai expect to see:

1.       Companies working hard to make travellers more confident: Meta-search engines have been trying to give more confidence to web searchers by focusing on expert and user-generated content. UGC does help build trust. What’s changing now is that the OpenGraph allows the social graph + interest graph to bring up more contextually relevant stuff, and that is opening up the possibilities for path-breaking innovation at the confluence of social and travel. “Also, with products such as Vine redefining the form that UGC will take, the implications for such new form factors of content for travel inspiration/ discovery/ reviews etc. is infinite,” says Bajpai.  

2.       Path-breaking work: Several startups are working on the cusp of social and travel, and there are no clear winners yet. Bajpai expects that in 2013 the industry might see a path-breaking leader in this area. “I am anticipating that Facebook will make some initial moves too,” he says.  

3.       More start-ups: There will continue to be explosive innovation on mobile/ tablet devices. “I’m expecting to see a lot more mobile-only/ mobile-first startups in the travel planning/ research/ inspiration/ UGC spaces,” he says.  

Ewan Gray, Director – Asia Pacific, SkyScanner and Aloke Bajpai, Founder and chief executive of iXiGO.com will be speaking at the EyeforTravel Travel Distribution Summit, Asia (May 28-29) alongside a wide cross section of other senior industry executives