The consumer conundrum: Why businesses must accept consumerization in B2B product development

We've thought a lot about how travelers view their trips and I think people want to be able to mash up content from lots of places. I think others in the market are thinking about it somewhat in a similar way, but when I think about my trip its a mash up of what I want to do for business and what I want to do for personal reasons. It's a philosophy that says you can do one of two things: build a white-labeled product and expect travelers to go directly to the agency for every different need they have, or you can create a product that's neutral and meet the traveler where they want to be: which is, I want to take my booking from my agency or TMC and I want to add stuff to it without being tethered to any particular brand. Frankly, it was a bet and I think it's paying off given how fast the product is growing.

We've partnered with the American Express team and synchronized with their Digital Travel Record system. We can then say we know the traveler, we know all the trips they take, we know where they're flying to and from, we know if they have a hotel or not. We know what card member benefits they are eligible for, whether they are platinum or gold, and so we'll tailor these custom offers for them and deliver them at the point in the trip that they need it. Whether it's at the airport and they need lounge access, or whatever other benefits that American Express can offer. When these travelers log in, we're delivering these messages directly to the traveler. That's pretty powerful.

It's about allowing travelers to identify which segments are business and which are not. If I've booked my hotel and car with my agency, and then book a flight with the airline direct, I can flag that segment as business and that gets shared back with my corporate travel manager. So the travel manager gets better insight into the program. It's fair to say those in the market making noise around open travel, this starts to solve for that because you know have insight from a duty-of-care perspective, from risk management, where the bookings are happening, how many are happening in that manner, how much travelers are spending outside of the program - and it doesn't require suppliers to participate. It requires the traveler to say, "yeah I'd like to share that information back with mu corporation." We think it's a nice blend. We're not going completely open, but we realize that travelers book outside of a managed program and we want a way to share that back with the corporate travel manager. As travel is continuing to evolve, as TMCs continue to evolve, it will give travelers flexibility - and agencies will have the ability to service travelers better.

This idea of consumerization is largely driven by the fact that people, over the last few years, have a different expectation as far as the experience. I think Apple and others have taught us that UI and UX and design matter. If its not simple and easy to use, people won't use it. Otherwise, they will migrate towards another product. I think it's fair to say that maybe 10 years ago, Sabre viewed other big companies in the travel space as our competitors. In the world we live in today, with technology as rampant as it is, competitors can be very small, nimble startups who can create a world-class experience and get to market fast with very little resources or capital. It's required us to think quite differently about how we build and design services for travelers. I think we've done a nice job with TripCase by creating a blend of "let's keep it corporate" and "let's keep it tied to the agencies and what they expect from Sabre." But trying to do that with a flair for what a traveler actually wants. We're fairly diligent to make sure to put the traveler first, and that's how we make our decisions. If the traveler is not going to us it or embrace it, it  doesn't matter what the corporate travel manager wants because the traveler inevitably is not going to use it. And that's not to say we dismiss or discount what a corporate travel manager or TMC, we just have to think first and foremost about the traveler. When you look at the history of TripCase, it actually had a business model tied to advertising. But we found our corporate travel managers loved TripCase, and they started embracing it. So we adapted the model to move away from advertising and towards a service. The [TripCase] business model is that its a function of Sabre. It's the way we allow agencies and TMCs and corporations to service their traveler. For us, consumerization is a cost of doing business. A very valuable one, given that we need to service travelers very well and hit the mark.

Unmanaged and managed travel will play into each other; they're not mutually exlcusive. THey have to live together, as it already happens today. Managed travel programs arleady allow for bookings to be made out of policy. There are always be exceptions to the rule. For example, if someone wants to fly on Thai Air, and that flight just isn't in the program. Or a meeting with a customer that has already negotiated a greatly discounted rate. People are going to book outside fo the program and it's the job of the corporate travel manager to figure out how to pull thsoe bookings back in so they can use it for negotiations, so they can use it for risk management and other back office reporting procedures. It's not that one is going to win and the other is going away. [Managed and unmanaged travel] have to find a better way to live together. But it's very hard to predict where this industry will be in 5 years!