Have you noticed the revolution in the way that people research their holidays?
Before the entire cosmos turned cyber, holiday brochures were the mainstay of most vacationers; glossy pages filled with impossibly blue skies, golden beaches peopled by happy families with perfect tans and blindingly white teeth; and resorts that sounded like they were constructed to your individual design specification. If you were lucky, your high street travel agent may have been to the resort and could give you some first hand knowledge, otherwise, you hoped the brochure wasn’t too far short of accurate.
‘serious” travellers shunned holiday brochures in favour of travel guides. Reams and reams of in-depth history and political analysis; endless accommodation and restaurant listings; sometimes written by someone who’d spent less time in the resort than the two weeks you were planning.
Travel magazines and the newspaper weekend supplements provided both information and inspiration for travel destinations; travel writers covered the globe from the well-trodden to off-the-beaten track locations and filled their pages with beautiful images that cried out to be seen in the flesh.
Then came the Internet and suddenly everyone was a travel writer. From blogs to travel advisory forums, personal holiday experiences became available in their millions creating a massive information overload. With the growth of Internet-based information, printed travel publications and newspapers have been forced to reduce costs; travel supplements are thin and features are often compiled from behind a desk.
But unless you’re clued in to research techniques and know enough to separate the real from the copycats, ploughing through the mass of information available online is time-consuming and fraught with pitfalls.
Well now there’s a new kid on the travel block to help the consumer make informed decisions before they book their hard-earned holiday ““ the insider expert. The insider is someone who not only lives in the destination, but spends their time travelling and researching it; providing first hand, up to the minute information ““ warts and all.
One company who’ve already recognised the strength of the insider expert is the online holiday website, tenerife.co.uk
Newly launched and specialising in Tenerife, tenerife.co.uk provide two views for every resort on their site; the travel agent view, and the insider view ““side by side, so you can see at a glance if the resort is right for you. It’s an interesting and brave approach from the people behind tenerife.co.uk and it provides some telling comparisons such as “small, purpose built resort”- Travel Agent vs “housing estates in the sun” – Insider. Of course, deciding if it’s right for you is still your decision; but there are no punches pulled in giving you the facts with which to do that.
Adding value to the Internet by giving discerning consumers the best information available for them to make their choices is the way of the holiday company future.
And how do I know that the insider information tenerife.co.uk are giving is “˜the best’? That’s easy; because it comes from me 🙂
Comments are closed.