MARK Warner is trying to prevent travel agencies from promoting their businesses by using its name on Internet search engines in an attempt to stop retail-led discounting.
The change means agents will no longer be able to pay to use Mark Warner’s name on search engines to promote their own websites. The ban is already effective on Google and should soon be web-wide.
If customers do search for Mark Warner on Google, it will only bring up the operator’s website.
Mark Warner head of marketing Nigel Ragg said 10% of the operator’s stock is sold online at knock-down prices by agents who take as little as 6% of their commission.
He said: “They’ve been undercutting prices from the web. That’s not on.”
He said the discounting was being done by a hard core of 15 agents and named Avant Garde Travel in Surrey as one of the offenders. Avant Garde Travel director Carolyn Szepietowski refused to comment.
Mark Warner head of online marketing Gill Black said the change would protect the operator’s brand as it increases its Internet marketing activity.
But she denied it would discourage agents from selling its holidays and insisted it would still aim for 30% of all sales through the trade.
Meanwhile, rumours persist that rival Club Med’s sales through agents have increased as affected agents switch-sold away from Mark Warner.
However, Mark Warner is not the only operator to safeguard its name in this way – First Choice, Thomas Cook and Thomson did the same last year.
Meanwhile, Black said affiliate advertising deals, allowing companies to feature banners on each others’ sites, should be in place by May.
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