| Journal: TWUK | Section: |
| Title: | Issue Date: 19/06/00 |
| Author: | Page Number: 29 |
| Copyright: Other |
Abtanet
ABTA pilots holiday deals section on Web site
Report by TANYAJEFFERIES
ABTA is testing a new holiday offers section aimed at visitors browsing its Web site.The service allows ABTA’s travel agent and tour operator members to create their own special offers pages on the site and edit them when they wish.
Three companies are piloting the service – Club Med, The Flight Shop and the Algarve Agency. ABTA plans to charge members £50 for each 1,000 visits to an offer page.
The new addition to the site follows the introduction of brochure ordering and holiday request services earlier this year.
Chief executive Ian Reynolds said: “It shows the power of the Web and the advantages ABTA can deliver to its members through it. Many of our members are too small to have a significant presence on the Internet. This gives them terrific exposure.”
ABTA received 29,000 visits to its site in May, a 120% increase on the same month last year. Of these, 30% were company searches and 44% were destination searches.
ABTA also managed to channel 14,600 of its visitors through to members’ own sites.
The most popular of these belonged to Kuoni, Instant Holidays and Club Med.
“In relative terms the figures are still low,” admitted Reynolds. “We haven’t advertised the site yet. Customers have been finding it on their own initiative.”
He said ABTA was planning a press advertising campaign to promote the site from this autumn.
A £200,000 budget has been earmarked for the financial year beginning July 1 but Reynolds declined to reveal exact details of the proposed expenditure.
www.abtanet.com
Reynolds: plans to advertise the site