Travel companies must engage more with the next generation of web users if they are to grow their sales.
Bournemouth University established chairman in tourism Professor Dimitrios Buhalis said companies are still not fully engaging with the emergence of Web 2.0, which sees internet users generate content, often in the form of reviews.
Speaking at the Tourism Future debate at World Travel Market yesterday, he added: “We need some power to engage the power of the people and see how to engage with blogs and forums.”
Director of the Austrian National Tourist Office in London Oscar Hinteregger agreed that engaging consumers via social media would help drive business.
He added that destinations must look beyond focusing purely on the experiences they offer customers and push the inspirational message across, while adding travel businesses should not be afraid of going into partnership with goverments to market destinations.
Youtravel.com sales director Paul Riches agreed destinations were getting cannier in latching on to the zeitgeist to market themselves. He cited Kenya’s recent launch of Barrack Obama tours in the country as an excellent example of this.
Tourism Society executive director Flo Powell also urged the industry to keep in perspective the amount of CO2 emissions caused by aircraft and reminded listeners of the good tourism has done in bringing trade and cash to developing countries.
She added: “Tourism is the single biggest way of transferring money from developed countries to developing countries.”