We've Expanded our HotelCalendars Service

Lodging Interactive, a leading provider of interactive marketing services to the hospitality, spa and restaurant industries, today announced its expanded HotelCalendars.com service for the lodging industry. HotelCalendars.com enables hoteliers to merchandise local events with hotel packages to drive online conversion rates from their websites.

Hoteliers are offered two management options for consideration: self-managed or managed. The self-managed calendar allows the hotelier to add their local events to the calendar, along with packages and special rates. The self-managed eCalendar is accessible from any web browser, allowing increased flexibility for hotel owners and operators. The managed program is handled by Lodging Interactive saving the hotelier time and resources. Lodging Interactive will research the hotel's market area and assemble the annual eCalendar of events. The hotel provides their packages and rate specials and Lodging Interactive incorporates the offers into the updated annual eCalendar.

Click here for more information on HotelCalendars.

Hitwise Intelligence - Heather Hopkins - US: Online Travel Query Content is Changing

Last week we published a report on the Travel sector looking at how consumer search behavior has changed. I will highlight a couple of interesting findings from the report on this blog. In this first of two posts, I want to talk about how query content is changing.

Link: Hitwise Intelligence - Heather Hopkins - US: Online Travel Query Content is Changing.

Google May Gain $1 Billion in Yahoo Ad Pact - Advertising Age - Digital

Link: Google May Gain $1 Billion in Yahoo Ad Pact - Advertising Age - Digital.

Somehow Google seems to have come out on top again, landing a search deal with Yahoo that by some estimates could boost its revenue by $1 billion -- and may leave some advertisers footing larger sums for their keyword buys.

Hotel Technology Resource

comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ:SCOR) , a leader in measuring the digital world, today released a study of the online travel industry, which showed that supplier websites account for 72 percent of online hotel spend as of first quarter 2008, a 3-percentage point increase in dollar share from the previous year.

Hotel market share through online travel agency sites (e.g. Expedia and Orbitz) is now 28 percent, 3-percentage points down from a year ago.

Link: Hotel Technology Resource.

Hitwise May 2008 Travel Category Report :: Hotel News Resource

Link: Hitwise May 2008 Travel Category Report :: Hotel News Resource.

The Hitwise Travel Report provides marketers an understanding of the competitive online travel landscape in terms of competitive clickstream, including traffic sources and referred destinations. It also outlines strategies to increase traffic from search engines through Hitwise Search Intelligence, which includes search term trends, keyword analysis, and keyword research.

 

Click here ( Adobe Acrobat PDF file) to download the complete article.

Social media's uphill advertising climb | Tech news blog - CNET News.com

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--Reality check: half of the social media start-ups at Tuesday's Under the Radar Conference won't exist next year.

That was the dour prediction of an advertising executive after a day of start-up presentations from a tongue-twisting list of tech companies--including Verismo, Mytopia, Loud3R, Jacked, Sometrics and PutPlace.

Link: Social media's uphill advertising climb | Tech news blog - CNET News.com.

The Humans Behind the Google Money Machine - NYTimes.com

If Google were the United States government, the data that streams onto Nicholas Fox’s laptop every day would be classified as top secret.

Link: The Humans Behind the Google Money Machine - NYTimes.com.

Google search ads rile its big customers - Online Extras - Myrtle Beach Sun News

As Google Inc. pushes to sell ads crucial to its revenue growth, some of its largest advertisers are growing angry with the way the company oversees its sponsored searches.

The problem is a tactic known as "piggybacking," in which smaller advertisers use major players' brand names, slogans or other trademarked words in the text of search ads to lure Web surfers to their own sites.

Link: Google search ads rile its big customers - Online Extras - Myrtle Beach Sun News.