Load times: Your website homepage is the first glimpse many potential customers will have of your brand. Therefore, enticing them to stay on the site and have a look around is crucial to converting browsers into buyers.... Read More

It dawned on me recently that like so many other Google apps, Wave has the potential to disrupt the crowded trip planning site arena. It occurred to me that the tool would be particularly useful if I were planning a trip with a group of people. Here is how I imagine it would work:... Read More

Getting Started: You wouldn’t build a house without a blueprint, so don’t plunge headfirst into designing a website without a framework. With your website being the first place most prospective customers will go to find out more about your company, knowing your target audience and displaying content relevant to them will be vital.... Read More

Most popular travel websites in the UK for the week ending December 12 2009. Data includes Top Ten travel search terms and the Top Ten Agency, Airline and Destination/Accommodation sites.... Read More

Recently we have seen a spate of travel startups describing themselves as a GDS - Global Distribution System. I am intrigued by TourAbout, a social GDS. Then there is Kumutu, an adventure and activity tour GDS. So are they really a GDS? And what is a GDS anyway?... Read More

Tnooz’s ten-part series How to Build a Website, Not Just a User Experience concluded last week. Each day we featured a different approach to thinking about creating a website that incorporates principles of good user experience and not simply a flashy looking design.... Read More

Expedia Inc.'s corporate travel business has been a huge disappointment, and the company has failed to jump-start the business since acquiring French corporate travel agencia Egencia in 2004 and rebranding Expedia Corporate Travel as Egencia in 2008. Egencia -- i.e. Expedia's corporate travel business -- still isn't profitable, but Expedia believes there is huge potential in diversifying beyond its leisure brands and turning a corner with Egencia. With that in mind, Egencia announced a few days ago that it had signed a slew of global partnerships that will take its presence beyond its current 15 global points of sale and expand its services into Argentina, Hungary, Russia, Romania, United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Uruguay.... Read More

What you missed on Tnooz this week, Sunday 6 to Saturday 12 December 2009. Read on to see the most commented articles, every other article this week, and the most commented articles of all time...... Read More

The "indefinite break from professional golf" for Tiger Woods following recent dramatic revelations about his private life has put further pressure on his sponsors to stick with him or send him to the naughty step of the clubhouse. The big guns on his roster, Nike, Accenture, EA Sports and Tag Heuer, are obviously attracting the most attention by virtue of being global mega-brands, but Woods also has a suite of second tier commercial partners, including US-based plane "fractional ownership" website, NetJets. The company arranges business class segments on private jets for wealthy individuals or corporations who need transportation between 50 and 400 hours a year.... Read More

Hotwire, the Expedia company specializing in opaque and retail sales of air, car, hotel and also media, ran across something in September and October that the company had never seen before: Car rental companies had so downsized their fleets that they were totally sold out in some U.S. markets. Speaking during an investor conference call Dec. 10, Hotwire Group President Clem Bason said the company found that at times in September and October consumers couldn't find rental cars on an opaque basis -- where you don't know the identity of the car rental company up-front -- or on a retail basis on Hotwire.com in some markets. Bason said the company had never before seen something like this so staff phoned car rental call centers to confirm that the fleets indeed were sold out. The airlines have cut capacity to increase yields, but the car companies have apparently taken the downsizing to new heights -- or depths.... Read More

A little bit more meat on the bones of Kayak's news yesterday that it will be launching a significant new proposition in 2010 with booking functionality for users of its iPhone application. Reaction yesterday concentrated on a number of key themes, most of which chief marketing officer Robert Birge was happy to answer on a call today. One of the significant points raised yesterday is now Kayak's strategic difference from other metasearch players - or relative closeness to an online travel agency - given that it will be taking the credit cards details of customers and buying the product on their behalf.... Read More

Beleaguered UK carrier British Airways can add six-hours of lost online bookings and probably a heap of grumpy passengers looking for web check-in to its woes following a major website crash. The problems are understood to have started at around 6am GMT this morning (December 11) and hit the entire booking system across BA.com. Visitors were only able to search and book fares after midday today.... Read More

Jay Karen, the president and CEO of the 2000-member Professional Association of Innkeepers International, acknowledges that there are mixed feelings among bed & breakfast owners over the fees for TripAdvisor's new Business Listings, but he thinks owners should "throw $300 [the promotional rate] at this." For the first time, beginning Jan. 4, innkeepers and hotels can list their URLs, phone numbers and e-mails for a flat monthly fee within their property displays on TripAdvisor so consumers can navigate directly to the properties' websites. Karen, who has lobbied TripAdvisor since November 2008 for direct listings, thinks TripAdvisor may take in $1.5 million in the U.S. from the program in the first year if 3,000 of the roughly 16,000 U.S. B&Bs sign on at an average fee of $500. And, since the program is global, the revenue stream likely will be much larger for TripAdvisor.... Read More

One-stop B2B online booking service Hahn Air has introduced a global scheme to protect consumers against an airline going bust. The sales and interline e-ticket distribution provider for around 200 airlines around the world will launch the scheme on 1 January 2010 in a move it says is in response to what consumers associations around the world "have been demanding for many years". Hahn Air has signed an agreement with Swiss insurance giant Generali to protect every e-ticket bought through its system in the event of an airline ending operations.... Read More

Farelogix is "the last man standing" among the three alternative distribution systems -- including G2 SwitchWorks and ITA Software's distribution offering -- that major U.S. airlines used as leverage and then largely discarded in the carriers' GDS negotiations circa 2007. Yesterday, Dec. 9, Farelogix brought suppliers and press to Miami to talk up its new point of sale offering, SPRK [pronounced spark], which is geared to enable suppliers to take control of distribution, and give intermediaries the ability to offer -- hot, hot, hot -- merchandising and ancillary services to clients. But, in some ways Farelogix President and CEO Jim Davidson plays down the distribution angle and proclaims that Farelogix is "an XML pipe."... Read More