Google not Planning to Book Hotels | EyeforTravel

Google: talking straight or skirting the issues? | Travel Industry News & Conferences – EyeforTravel.

Google says it not planning to be in the bookings business. Its facilitating people to book with who they want says Nigel Huddleston, Google’s UK Industry Head, Travel,

Google controls 67.5% of the US search market, and over 80% of the US mobile search market. The closest competition in search is Microsoft Bing with 18.4% market share.

Recently Google has licensed Room 77’s software to push mobile bookings and more hotels signing up for Google products, so we have to wonder what exactly the plan to do with its steady encroachment of the travel industry.

In this interview Google spokesperson says no to Bookings, but is that for now? What do you think Google plans are for the future, There is much speculation the Google like Amazon business plan and wants to be a shopping site.

What do you think?

See How small hotel are falling off search

Google+ Needs to reinvent as Cool

How to fix Google+ .

According to Mark Schaefer “The reason Google+ has never gone mainstream is because the world does not want a better social network, It wants a COOLER social network and Google+ is not cool with the young people who could move it into the mainstream. – See more at: http://www.businessesgrow.com/2014/05/06/fix-google/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter#sthash.4mTmWA0b.dpuf

Priceline Says Facebook Ads Don;t Drive Bookings- Bloomberg

Priceline Seeks Results From Facebook as Google Wins Ads – Bloomberg.

“For Facebook and Twitter, we have endless amounts of money. But we haven’t found anything there.” Chief Executive Officer Darren Huston said yesterday in an interview at Bloomberg’s New York headquarters.

The comments lead the discussion as to which digital marketing media are most effective. Facebook and Twitter have grappled with questions of whether their social media ads provide a substantial return on investment for marketers, particularly at travel and e-commerce companies.

Priceline’s online marketing confirms that Google, is the best source for delivering traffic. About 90 percent of Priceline’s digital ad spending is with Google, according to Mark Mahaney, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets in San Francisco.

Google shares 3 trends shaping travel

Google Exec Shares 3 Trends Shaping Travel

Rob Torres, head of Google’s travel industry practice, shared three key trends shaping the hotel industry during the Hotel Data Conference.

Here is my brief summary – its very brief so please read the article for all the details.

1. Hospitality  preceded the stay and extends beyond it. 

You must be be on every device and channel. Guests start with discovery and planning and switch from their smartphone to tablet to laptop and to the desktop seamlessly. If your online presence doesn’t follow them, you loose.

2. Relevance is reality.

People are inundated with choice. Make sure you are in channels that matter.

3. Experience matters.

If the online promise is not what you deliver, you will have unhappy guests who will express this online in ways that can kill business.

Torres closed the panel by summing up his key takeaways.

“personalization is key to winning this game. More and more folks are all about relevancy. … I want that personalized experience,” Torres said.

See entire article on Hotelnewsnow >>Google exec shares 3 trends shaping travel.

 

MY take:

Its not often that Google shares info that can help hospitality marketers, a lot of what I see today, is the big G positioning itself to take control of more and more. Some of their recent changes in search have really hurt small hotels as they move more to authority brands and list the Big OTA clients.

Go here for more on how Google Tightens it grip on travel

Also on that page is our Video showing hotels are falling off search results!