The Internet has done wonders
making travel agents obsolete, but flight-booking sites still haven’t managed
to replace the one-on-one human interaction that was once a keystone of vacation
planning.
This week, Orbitz may have found a
way around that. The Chicago-based online travel company announced a service
that lets users help each other. The Traveler Update system collects and posts
user-generated tips on a range of topics, including security lines and the best
places to get a snack, at more than 40 major U.S. airports. Consumers don’t have to
buy tickets through Orbitz to use the service, and they can access the Traveler Update
through the Orbitz site or its mobile web browser.
Orbitz Chief Marketing Officer
Randy Wagner said the idea for the service “sprang from our customer insight
that people value information from others in the same situation and our
business insight that, at any point in time, Orbitz has thousands of customers
moving through major airports and travel destinations.”
Traveler Update also includes information
from the Federal Aviation Administration, the Transportation Security Administration,
and Weather.com, and Orbitz adds some of its own info, including lists of airport
Wi-Fi hubs.
Travel analyst Kate Rice described the concept as
“not a bad little experiment in viral marketing,” because the tool likely will drive
traffic to the Orbitz site.
Ms. Rice
said Orbitz is the first of the major online travel sites to introduce such a service
and added that Orbitz has long targeted the infrequent traveler with email
updates and mobile features.
Though the
newbie traveler is seen as the company’s intended audience, Ms. Rice said it’s actually
the frequent business traveler who is most likely to take advantage of the new
service. Business travelers tend to have more leeway to change their routes or
flight schedules to minimize the number of hours they’ll need to wile away in
an overcrowded terminal.
As for the infrequent travelers, she said, “If security
lines are long at an airport what are you going to do? Go to another airport?”