Two almost simultaneous bits of news emerging today showing how traditional travel technology firms have turned to disciplines in media to establish new revenue streams.

At one end of the scale, GDS giant Travelport has announced it has created a global division to handle online display advertising for its airline, hotel and car hire customers on third party platforms in travel agencies.

The other end sees Avvio establish an affiliate marketing system of its own to run advertising campaigns on publisher sites identified as strong lead-gen contenders for small or independent hotels.

Travelport says ahead of its plan to roll out its Universal Desktop system to all customers later this year it is moving from “primarily a distribution vehicle to a strategic sales and marketing platform” for product suppliers.

Central to the Travelport move is allowing suppliers to build display advertising which showcases its additional product range through ancillaries, such as the upsell of baggage and seat positioning for airlines.

Travelport says the new department will have dedicated advertising account managers as well as a technology support team.

Officials say the company evaluated a number of third party media providers to do the same job but decided to build the system itself.

Avvio, which has created booking engines for hoteliers for around eight years, has built a model where hotel clients can hand over creative advertising duties to the firm and make use of the company’s relationships with publishing platforms not normally connected to a wider affiliate network.

Yannis Anastasakis, head of business development at Avvio, says smaller, independent hoteliers have traditionally shied away from working with affiliate networks as many are reluctant to hand over credit card details for a monthly subscription to a system that may not yield results.

The Avvio platform works by only charging the hotel a fee when a booking is made as a result of a click-through on their ad on the network.

The move by Travelport and Avvio is the latest in a line of decisions by technology firms to alter their traditional model to establish different forms of distribution for clients.

As the U.S. Travel Association gets ready to present a strategic plan to the U.S. Dept. of Commerce next week, in the wake of Thursday’s passage of the Travel Promotion Act by the Senate, USTA President and CEO Roger Dow says e-mail and online marketing will play “a good part” in the upcoming efforts to market the U.S. as an inbound travel destination.

Asked during a press conference today if the association’s vision was to have the 11-member Corporation for Travel Promotion stick to TV and radio ads around the globe in their marketing efforts, Dow said electronic marketing has proven effective and will be a substantial part of the plan.

Geoffrey Freeman, the association’s vice president of public affairs, says it will take 2-6 months for the Obama administration to fill the 11 slots on the Corporation for Travel Promotion, and 5-12 months to get the Dept. of Homeland Security Electronic System for Travel Authorization fee mechanism in place.

Dow says the goal is to fill the corporation’s 11 slots with marketing experts from inside and outside the travel industry.

The aim is for the $10 ESTA fees, payable every two years by some foreign visitors, to raise $100 million annually, and this would be matched by private-sector funding to give the corporation some $200 million annually to promote U.S. tourism.

The fee element of the plan is controversial as some business travel organizations argue that imposing a fee would dissuade, rather than promote, inbound travel.

However, Dow cites an Oxford Economics study,  which concluded that the Travel Promotion Act would attract $1.6 million additional visitors to the U.S. annually, and would trigger an additional $4 billion in new consumer spending.

Of the $100 million in private-sector funding, Dow says about 80% would be in the form of in-kind contributions — i.e. free advertising or fam trips to Florida, for example — and 20% would be in cash.

Dow characterizes the passage of the Travel Promotion Act, which was expected to be signed into law by President Obama within 10 days, “a landmark day for the travel community.”

He says it is not a panacea, but is the “biggest commitment” the goverment has shown to tourism promotion.

TripAdvisor has come up with a clever way of slicing and dicing its content for marketing purposes by naming its Top 10 movie hotels in the U.S., and leveraging its user-generated content to do so.

No, these aren’t the properties with the most-complete roster of on-demand videos for in-room entertainment, but are hotels where some well-known movies — or at least some scenes — were filmed.

So, for example, TripAdvisor, an online travel review site owned by Expedia Inc., recommends Mountain Lake Hotel in Pembroke, Va., where “Dirty Dancing” was filmed.

“Dirty Dancing fans might just have the time of their lives at this property, which featured as the fictitious Kellerman’s Resort in the cult classic movie,” says TripAdvisor. “Nestled in the New River Valley of the Appalachian Mountains, the hotel offers stunning scenery, as well as Dirty Dancing weekends featuring karaoke, dance lessons and a film location tour.”

And, TripAdvisor,without specifying the user’s screen name [we found it] in its press release, quotes hotel reviewer wish2travelmore2 as saying: “We are not Dirty Dancing fanatics, but enjoyed seeing the locations around the property that we recognized from the movie.”

TripAdvisor says travelers recommend Mountain Lake Hotel, with its $220 average nightly rate, for families and outdoor-adventure seekers.

So, for each property named, TripAdvisor leverages its user-generated content to indicate what types of vacations the hotels are suited for and it uses travelers’ reviews for marketing purposes.

Although TripAdvisor rates Mountain Lake Hotel #1 in Pembroke, Va. (population around 1,100), it is the only hotel in the town that’s reviewed and only 55% of TripAdvisor reviewers gave it a thumbs up.

Here is TripAdvisor’s Top 10:

1. The Fairmont San Francisco, (Vertigo, Towering Inferno, Sudden Impact,
   Junior and The Rock)
2. Bellagio Las Vegas, Nevada (Ocean’s Eleven, Ocean’s Thirteen)
3. The Plaza, New York City (North By Northwest, Crocodile Dundee,
The Way We Were, Home Alone 2 and Bride Wars)

4. Millennium Biltmore Hotel, Los Angeles, (Mission Impossible 3,
The Bodyguard, Spiderman, Wedding Crashers,
Dreamgirls and Pretty in Pink)

5. Beverly Wilshire Beverly Hills, Beverly Hills, Calif. (Pretty Woman,
Beverly Hills Cop I and III, and Bulworth)

6. Renaissance St. Louis Hotel Airport, Saint Louis (Up in the Air)
7. The Roosevelt Hotel, New York City (Maid in Manhattan and Wall Street)
8. Fountainebleau Miami Beach (The Bodyguard, Goldfinger, Scarface)
9. Timberline Lodge, Timberline Lodge, Oregon (The Shining)
10. Mountain Lake Hotel, Pembroke, Va. (Dirty Dancing)

So how did Carnival Cruise Lines and Travelocity manage to beef up the ranks of  unique visitors to their websites in January?

In addition to all of the marketplace trends impacting the entire cruise industry, Jim Berra, Carnival Cruise Lines’ chief marketing officer, says it was as easy as a dash of e-marketing, search engine optimization, some social media dabbling and website enhancements which contributed to the traffic upswing.

comScore says unique visitors to CCL websites increased 79% to 2.2 million in January, compared with December.

“We are investing more heavily in online marketing,” Berra says. “We moved money into display, search and site re-messaging and have overall a more aggressive plan versus 2009. We tested heavily last year and now are more focused on investing in the areas that generate the highest engagement.”

The line also took steps to reign in keyword bidding on CCL trademarks by its travel agency partners.

Berra points to CCL’s SEO efforts as “paying off,” noting that Carnival’s organic rankings on trademark and cruise/vacation queries “improved considerably in the past year.”

In the past, he says, a Google search of “Caribbean cruise” wouldn’t produce a CCL link in the first few pages of organic listings.

“Now, we are consistently coming up near the top,” Berra says.

I just tried a Google search of “Caribbean cruise” and the first CCL link was midway down the first page, well below several Royal Caribbean links in the natural results.

Berra says Carnival’s traffic numbers also benefitted by its integration of Carnival Connections, an online community, into the Funville channel on the cruise line’s website. Previously, unique visitors to Carnival Connections were not accruing to Carnival.com.

“We have also instituted a number of enhancements to Carnival.com,” Berra says. “Better and deeper content. Improved search functionality and research tools. This is driving higher repeat traffic as consumers find the site more engaging and easier to use, as well as download and share information with family and friends.”

Travelocity, too, saw a big increase in unique visitors to its websites in January, according to comScore. Travelocity’s numbers rose 38% to 10.1 million.

Travelocity spokesman Joel Frey points to an integrated TV, website and social media campaign as a factor behind the jump in website traffic.

Early in 2010, Travelocity introduced two TV spots featuring its Cure Cabin Fever sale and the Roaming Gnome and a social media campaign on Facebook.

Travelocity asked its Facebook fans to plot the Roaming Gnome’s journeys and provided the choices of Banff/Whistler; Tahoe/Utah; and Aspen/Vail, Frey says.

“The social element proved successful and we recently surpassed 50,000 fans on our Facebook page,” Frey says.

Hot on the heels of my Winning Airline Twitter Strategies post is a story hot off the Twitter feed.

Normally a complaint regarding an airline’s overweight policy wouldn’t really get much traction on Twitter, but when that passenger is Kevin Smith, actor, director and Tweeter with 1.6 million followers, then you’ve got a veritable Twitter war of words.

This is the kind of social media firestorm that every marketing manager dreads.

It seems the issue started when Smith was told he had to leave the plane because he is over-sized.

That resulted in a number of other tweets that describe the situation from Smith’s point of view.

Smith goes on a bit of rant (justified or not) about the way he feels he was treated by Southwest during the incident.  From the tweets, it appears that he got on to another Southwest flight without incident but because he was already in a bad mood, he continued to comment.

So now that the Southwest brand has been frontally assaulted on Twitter, what are the poor people behind the @southwestair twitter account to do? Well, what would you do if Smith came up to your counter and yelled at you?

In my opinion, @southwestair ’s response to the @kevinsmith comments on Twitter were timely and appropriate.

Will the way that @southwestair dealt with the situation on Twitter mitigate the potential damage caused by Smith’s tirade?  That remains to be seen.

The oversized passenger debate is current, hot, and highly controversial.  Smith’s incident on Southwest is probably not a singular event and there are probably many other passengers on many other airlines that have had similar experiences.

Whether he chose to or not, Smith is now a very vocal spokesperson for oversized passengers.  Unfortunately, it happened on Southwest and in front of over a million followers.

South African Tourism, anxious to promote the destination as more than a football venue in anticipation of the World Cup in June, entered into what it describes as “a six-figure” advertising deal with TripAdvisor on its English-language websites, the national tourism agency says.

The “South Africa: The Ultimate Experience” campaign combines TripAdvisor user reviews for places like Cango Wildlife Ranch with promotional videos, photos, forums and text ads from companies like Expedia.com, hotels.com and Booking.com.

South Africa Tourism says the campaign is targeting travelers from the U.K., U.S., Australia, France, Italy, Germany and the Netherlands. There are three tabs — Adventure and Wildlife, Culture and Nature, and Entertainment and Leisure — in the banner ad and each tab features user-generated content about the top-rated attractions in each category, the DMO says.

With co-branded banner ads throughout TripAdvisor’s English-language websites, the campaign drives trip-planning consumers to the South Africa Tourism website as well as to booking sites.

As part of the deal, the South Africa Tourism website has a TripAdvisor review widget on the DMO’s accommodation pages, and this drives traffic back to TripAdvisor. Here is what the widget, which has an ad on top touting a contest to win a trip to the World Cup,  looks like:

South Africa tourism says the deal with TripAdvisor meshes well with its global marketing strategy because it recognizes the value of user-generated content and the online environment for trip-planning.

There seems to be two very distinct types of airlines using Twitter – those who “get it” and those who don’t.

The difference doesn’t seem to be due to a lack of technical infrastructure, expertise, or even corporate policy.  The underlying difference seems to be cultural.

In a recent discussion with Greg Hounslow, Emerging Media Adviser for WestJet, I asked some pointed questions about why WestJet seemed to be having success with their Twitter strategy while so many other airlines seemed to be stumbling.

Having a Clear Strategy

There was a a time when WestJet didn’t have a strategy for Twitter or Social media in general for that matter.  This isn’t altogether surprising since most companies lack a cohesive strategy.

During this time of flux, a keen WestJetter took it upon themselves to be the keeper of Twitter.  Although this wasn’t their primary job, they did it anyway.

That seems to be the nature of many employees at WestJet, they tend to be brand advocates even when they are off duty.  Once the company as a whole identified that they needed to have a cohesive strategy, the Twitter account was left dormant until a policy could be developed.

According to Hounslow there is a six month period where the account sat idle.  This was a delicate time because six months of inactivity on any social network generally spells doom for a brand.  In the case of WestJet however, this was a necessary period of planning.

Clear Commitment to the Channel

Once the strategy was developed, the organization was committed to making the channel work for them.  This meant that resources were dedicated to social media, Hounslow was brought on board to manage it, and the team was tasked with ensuring it was successful.

This kind of commitment can be difficult to make for many organizations, especially those that don’t understand the requirements or impact.  Hounslow explains that Twitter is only one part of a cohesive strategy that includes reputation management and Facebook.

He goes on to say that Twitter and Facebook are just like any other communication medium.  A customer may call, email, DM through Twitter, or post a message on the Facebook wall.  It doesn’t matter which channel or medium they wish to use, the response from the company is the same.

Extension of the Customer Service Culture

Hounslow theorizes that the success of WestJet’s Twitter and Facebook strategies are largely due to the company’s focus on a customer first culture.

When a customer contacts WestJet, whether it is through Twitter or Facebook, the team responsible for Social media communications responds with the same care and attention that they would if it were a phone call.

Hounslow goes on to explain that most of the one on one communications with customers through Twitter are taken off-line or done through direct message.  He goes on to explain that followers are not interested in hearing where another passengers bags are.

Besides being a customer service channel, the Twitter and Facebook accounts are used to promote specials and last minute deals.

Keeping Followers Engaged

Hounslow explained that one of the most popular ongoing events on their Twitter account is “Winglet Wednesday” where passengers are encouraged to send photos of WestJet winglets as viewed from inside (or outside) the aircraft and post them on Twitter.

Encouraging brand interaction and rewarding followers by being responsive and personable can go a long way to building loyalty.  Although Houslow wouldn’t share details about the WestJet strategy, he did say that being responsive to followers and being aware of activity around the brand on both Twitter and Facebook is an important way of staying on top of potential problems.

So what can other airlines (and travel brands) learn from the WestJet experience? It would seem that the first thing an organization needs to understand is their customer service culture and how social media fits into the big picture.

Next, the organization needs to decide if social media and Twitter specifically is something the culture will support, commit to doing it if it is, and then put the resources behind it in order to make it a success.

You can follow WestJet on Twitter and you can also follow Greg Hounslow.

US TV executives will be delighted that the new and final season of trippy drama Lost is getting so much attention ahead of its premiere next week.

Not least is the expectation from the fanboys in forums as to how the sixth season will end but the ABC network looks to have done a cute marketing deal with metasearch engine Kayak.

Users searching for flights between Sydney and Los Angeles on 22 September 2010 (date of the original date Lost crash) on Kayak see a result for Oceanic Flight 815.

Click through to book and, hey presto, users find themselves on a Lost wiki page.

According to CNET, for the superfanboys Kayak has included taxes at $23.42, which when subtracted from the $4,839 total price leaves $4,815.16. Lost has constantly used the following sequence of numbers through the previous five series: 4-8-15-16-23-42.

A nice touch.

The level of detail and agreement with Kayak illustrates the lengths marketing execs will go to in order to create buzz around a product. In addition, Kayak also gets noticed.

Meanwhile, a fan has pieced together footage from the previous five series to produce a real time capture of the infamous Flight 815 in a Jack Bauer/24 style. Nerdy but very clever.

With Priceline releasing its new commercial featuring the omnipresent William Shatner as The Negotiator, metasearch engine Kayak is also in quickly with its latest for the US market.

The ad, known simply as Kissing, features two insatiable office workers who struggle to contain themselves during an important meeting.

Kayak’s release of the ad follows the launch of the its first TV advertising campaign at the back end of 2009.

One of the first 30-second clips caused a mild amount of controversy as it appeared to feature a war veteran reminiscing about dangerous beach landings whereas he was in fact remembering the wild spots of Cancun in Mexico.

The new ad also coincides with a move to profile some of the company’s senior execs in the wider business consumer media, such as an article this week about co-founder and CTO Paul English.

Exclusive to Tnooz and almost straight out of the cutting room, Travelocity has released a round of new Roaming Gnome-led TV adspots as the battle for OTA supremacy heats up.

The new collection – the first one of two is included here – comes as Expedia rebrands and unveils the first of its three new TV commercials.

Centred as always on the infamous Gnome and his bizarre adventures around the world, Cabin Fever is the latest episode and is targeting ski fans in North America.

Travelocity Roaming Gnome Goes Skiing from tnooz on Vimeo.

Fresh from hiring its first ever advertising agency for TV creative work, Skyscanner has unveiled the first 30-second spot to be aired in Scotland ahead of a possible wider roll-out across the UK.

The ad launched on Monday this week on a number of leading Scottish commercial channels in prime and off-peak time slots and will run until mid-February before officials at the metasearch site decide whether to extend elsewhere.

The agency behind the ad -- featuring two plane spotters discussing aircraft and fares at the end of a runway -- is Edinburgh-based Newhaven, with media buying by FeatherBrooksbank.

Skyscanner’s ad marks a return to TV advertising for the UK metasearch sector following the mammoth campaign from rival site TravelSupermarket in 2007, ahead of its floatation on the London Stock Exchange with parent company MoneySupermarket.

It is not the only metasearch to bring in a well-respected marketing guru and see a switch to TV advertising.

US site Kayak launched its controversial TV ads for the US market in October 2009, six months after hiring Robert Birge as its chief marketing officer.

UPDATE: Skyscanner probably decided not to use this experimental effort from September 2009.

The festive period in many countries is the calm before the storm in terms of major booking months for summer holidays in the Northern Hemisphere.

This doesn’t stop travel providers across the world throwing their efforts into major TV advertising campaigns to seduce wannabe travellers as they feast on their Christmas delights.

These days, however, the web often has the ads weeks before its TV counterpart does. Here is a selection of some of the new ads hitting the screens this Christmas -- and one classic.

Excellence in Flight Watch the ad…

In my post “Will destination marketers see the opportunities in mobile?” I discussed some of the opportunities that DMOs have when it comes to the mobile space.

I also discussed how destinations have the leg up when it comes to aggregating local and regional content.

It would seem that some DMOs are actually making some positive steps towards embracing and potentially leveraging the mobile space to market their destinations more effectively.

One such destination is British Columbia.  Yes, I live in BC, but that isn’t the reason why I am profiling them specifically.

The reason, quite simply, is because they have done a really nice job of building an app that most closely reflects my recommendations.

• Design: The interface is sterile and corporate, not at all inspiring or interesting.  But, as a first pass, it’s a good start focusing more on the important content then the look and feel.  Compare that to TripWolf’s app for example which has a really nice design and elegant interface but is lacking in the depth and breadth of content.  Once Tourism B.C. (or whatever they are called now) figure out how to combine the content they have with an inspiring interface, they will have a clear winner on their hands.
• Functionality: The app is very simple and easy to use providing quick access to listings and details about attractions, sites, and restaurants that are close to you.  You can search for items, find their location on a map, and get directions.  What is lacking is any form of social interactivity such as reviews and ratings, or recommendations based on category.  With some many choices, a visitor may not have any idea how good a particular restaurant really is.  Having reviews, whether provided by a third party review site like TripReviews or perhaps aggregated by a site like Uptake, may provide more context to the generic listings provided by the app.
• Content: Ah, this is where the app really shines.  The depth and breadth of the content is unmatched when compared to other B.C. travel guides.  Where TripWolf and LonelyPlanet have between nine and thirty restaurants listed for Vancouver, the Near Me B.C. app has over 400.  But there is a limit to how many choices you can provide a traveller before the ability to make a decision becomes next to impossible.  This is where some social tools or user generated ratings and reviews may help to sort out the wheat from the chaff.
• Overall: This is a really strong start for a destination like B.C. and provides a solid framework for future development.  The key with this app and all apps that are similar is that the features are great but the content is king.  You can do a lot in terms of narrowing choices for consumers and identifying the top restaurants or attractions if you have all the data to work with.  In this case, B.C. is in a good position to be able to provide a strong value add for visitors to the region by providing a tool that is both comprehensive and functional.  As I mentioned before, however, the app is not just an information tool but a way to inspire visitors to explore and experience B.C.  As an inspirational tool, the app still needs work.  The good news is, that building in the ability to inspire is no where as complex as trying to aggregate data from 4,000 suppliers across the province.

Coca-Cola has embraced social media with its Expedition 206 campaign, and the company has been getting lots of positive press from the likes of Advertising Age and Jaunted, for instance.

The idea behind the campaign is that three selected Happiness Ambassadors will galavant around the world to the 206 countries where Coca-Cola has a presence, and will tweet, blog and post videos and pics with the aim of presenting “that spirit of happiness, optimism and enthusiasm that we like to think is emblematic of Coca-Cola,” says Adam Brown, the company’s director of digital communications and social media.

So, this is the face of the new corporate social media marketing campaign and I applaud Coca-Cola for being smart enough to grasp the marketing requirements of the new era.

As Brown puts it: “One of our new philosophies here at Coca-Cola is to ‘fish where the fish are’ in the social media space. In other words, we’re moving from building big online properties (websites) and driving fans to them to developing compelling content and putting it ‘where the fish are.’  This means creating great content on our Facebook Coca-Cola Fan Page and allowing our 3.7 million fans there to experience, discuss and share it.”

Brown says the company seeks “genuine conversations” with consumers on Twitter and other online communities like Bebo, Orkut, hi5 and QQ.

But, Coca-Cola’s effort to give us a global pour of brand happiness sort of reminds me of 2004 when Bob Dylan appeared and sang in a Victoria’s Secret commercial.

Don’t get me wrong. I love Bob Dylan, like Victoria’s Secret and had a Diet Coke with lunch yesterday.

But, the whole Expedition 206 campaign strikes me as social media cooptation.

I won’t prejudge the social media efforts of Coca-Cola ambassadors Kelly, Antonio and Tony.

But, if they merely tweet about happiness and positive vibes as they travel around the developing world guzzling Coca-Cola, then I — and I suspect a lot of other folks — will just gag.

When the ambassadors arrive in Zimbabwe, which is wracked by civil war, corruption and AIDS, will they use all of the various social media platforms to inform us that happiness and the way forward involve people bonding over Coca-Cola bottles?

I wonder if they will blog about the fact that the foreign currency crisis has at times been so acute in Zimbabwe that Coca-Cola bottling plants there ran out of syrup in 2006 and couldn’t produce the soda. Food, incidentally, was hard to get, too.

It would be best for the ambassadors to address the country’s problems in a forthright manner and perhaps focus on any job creation or healthcare efforts that Coca-Cola may be involved with in Zimbabwe or in the other 206 countries.

Maybe that is the angle that the ambassadors will take — and we’ll only be able to judge the social media angle on the Expedition 206 campaign once it is under way in early 2010.

But, a lot of Coca-Cola happy talk just won’t be appropriate or effective.

My main point here is that major corporations’ social media efforts can’t be all Twitter bells and whistles.

These campaigns will also have to have substance.

Doubts continue over the long term relevancy of Twitter as a meaningful tool to promote product or engage customers – but travel firms across the world have embraced it with open arms.

So what happened when 50 of the world’s travel firms joined the Twitterati?

[With thanks to MyFirstTweet]

American Airlines – @AAirwaves

Air France – @air_france

Air New Zealand – @flyairnz

Air Asia – @airasiadotcom

British Airways – @britishairways

Best Western – @thebestwestern

Carnival Cruise Lines – @carnivalcruise

Cathay Pacific – @cathay_pacific

Cheapflights UK – @cheapflights_uk

Choice Hotels – @choicehotels

DealBase – @dealbase

Delta Airlines – @deltaairlines

Expedia – @expedia

Fareologist (Bing Travel) – @fareologist

The Gnome (Travelocity) – @roaminggnome

Google Travel – @googletravel

Hertz – @connectbyhertz

HomeAway – @homeaway

Hotwire – @hotwire

HouseTrip – @housetrip

JetBlue – @jetblue

Kayak – @kayak

Lastminute.com – @lastminute_com

Lonely Planet – @lonelyplanet

Marriott Hotels – @marriottintl

MetroTwin – @metrotwin

MSC Cruises – @mscruisesusa

The Negotiator (Priceline) – @thenegotiator

OffBeatGuides – @offbeatguides

OnTheBeach – @onthebeachuk

Qantas Airways – @qftravelinsider

Rough Guides – @roughguides

SouthWest Airlines – @southwestair

Starwood Hotels – @starwoodbuzz

Thomas Cook – @thomascookuk

Thomson Holidays – @thomsonholidays

TourAbout – @tourabout

Tourism Queensland – @queensland

TravellersPoint – @travellerspoint

Travelzoo – @travelzoo

TripAdvisor – @tripadvisor

TripIt – @tripit

US Airways – @usairways

Viator – @viatortravel

Virgin Atlantic – @virginatlantic

Virgin Cruises – @virgincruises

VisitBritain – @visitbritain

WestJet – @westjet

Wotif – @wotif

Zuji – @zujiaustralia