Marketing on the Smart Web

in this article Making sense of the ’semantic Web’ and presents a very innovative example by a German company of the kind of tools we will see being introduced over the coming years. The impact will be felt across all industries including travel. The huge amount of data about travel produced by so many sources and available is just waiting to be mined and better interpreted for improved results.

For an easy visual explanation, take a look at this video which I found very informative:

as John Markoff reports in this article Slipstream – A Software Secretary That Takes Charge on NYTimes.com about web based intelligent assistants. The company mentioned – Rearden Commerce – is a leader in providing this kind of advanced services mostly to business travelers today that we will see more of in future and that will be deployed in leisure travel as well.

DARPA – the original developer of the internet – is investing huge amounts in artificial intelligence development and although mainly intended for military use, there will be an inevitable spill over effect into the commercial world. The implications for the travel industry are huge and the changes in how travel is researched, planned and booked will undergo significant improvement over how it is done today. The circle of the pre- during and post travel phases will be completed with tools for each totally integrated and easy to use. It will be an exciting time in travel as we enter the next decade of the web. Who will be next the winners?

OK, web 2.0 is now officially part of the mainstream, as the Wall Street Journal reveals The Secrets of Marketing in a Web 2.0 World!

So, the CMOs in companies of all sizes will now embrace social media, social networks, blogs etc. and know how to effectively deal with all things 2.0? Not so fast, I still have my doubts that this is the reality. There is still too much one way communication going on and attempts to control the message rather than enter the conversation, too many calls for traditional bottom line measurements of ROI and effectiveness when engaging in the social sphere. The recent stories about disappointing results of social media advertising have shown that the old yard sticks don’t apply in this new web 2.0 environment of customer empowerment, combine with low tolerance for marketing speak. One old marketing principle still applies – present the right message, to the right audience at the right moment. When people are engaged in social networks and social media that is usually not the right moment. Those are not secrets, just comment sense marketing.

The innovators have been using web 2.0 effectively for a number of years now and while the mainstream of corporate marketers are catching up, these companies, usually small and nimble, are already moving to the next phase of the web – the smart web, where semantics are added into the mix, data talks to data and the web becomes an ever more useful tool making it easier for the empowered and connected consumer to stay informed about products and services that are relevant to them and to make smart decisions about them. While web 2.0 is now established, welcome to web 3.0

People don’t trust company blogs. What you should do about it reads the headline of post in Groundswell, based on a survey Forrester conducted in Q2 this year with over 5000 people that according to their note, are as representative as possible of the US online adult population.

Company blogs came in last with only 16% who read them saying they trust them as an information source. At the other end, in first place with 77% trusting them, are “email from people you know”. This shows, that the personal or social network has become the most trusted source of advice and information for a large number of people on the web. It also shows a high level of resistance to the attempts by companies to use these networks as marketing tools. Any attempt at trying to control or influence the conversation is suspect and likely ineffective.

On a more positive note, the trust level increases to 24% among people who regularly read blogs, and 39% among those who blog themselves.

What this tells me, is that the more familiar people are with blogs and the various types that exist and are able to distinguish among them the higher the credibility gets. It’s also telling that a large number of the general public are probably still not as familiar with the whole blogosphere as those of us who are very close to the subject and personally involved in it. For marketers, the challenge to reach their audience in this new world remains as complex as ever.

it seems, reading that Anderson downgrades Long Tail to Chocolate Teapot status according to Andrew Orlowski writing in The Register.

Orlowski has written about this topic in previous articles with the provocative titles Chopping the Long Tail down to size and The Long Fail: Web 2.0’s faith meets the facts

Now, that should stimulate a lively debate among the many who are basing their business proposition on this by now famous theory, developed by  Chris Anderson, the Editor of WIRED, a
number of years ago using the music industry as an example. The data quoted in these articles is certainly worth closer examination and study before making a final judgment but at first sight it makes a lot of sense. Just shows that once again grand new theories must be proven by facts before becoming reality and it might just be too early to come to a definite conclusion.

During the recent conference I had the opportunity to talk to some companies that were not presenting at the Travel Innovation Summit or on Center Stage but offer innovative solutions that have already, or will in future, appear on our radar screens:

Is a site that offers a trip planning tool based on personal preferences. This is the direction sites have to go as the attention clearly shifts to the process that takes place prior to the actual booking and where the experience still too often disappoints. Tripbase takes a shot at improving this. It’s not perfect as the results often don’t change enough when preferences are adjusted but no site I’ve come across so far offers the perfect solution.

Another one is

Founded by former Expedia Europe executives, TVtrip provide professionally produced hotel videos which are by now an essential part of any trip decision, especially for leisure trips with an extended stay. Who wants to end up in a dump for the most precious days of the year? They are expanding rapidly across with properties across the globe and with the right partnerships to drive traffic could become a player in this segment.

The tag line of

is “Empowering the frequent flyer” and expertflyer certainly delivers on that, based on a demo I received from their CEO, Chris Lopinto. This is a very useful tool for the road – or should we say Air – warriors out there who hold a gazillion frequent flyer miles and want to make the best use of them for upgrades and flights. The site has real time tracking of seat availability for miles upgrades and live seat maps so you can view which seats remain available. Of course, the data can also be accessed and viewed on mobile phones, essential when you’re on the road. Looks like worth the price of admission to me, although I no longer really qualify based on my limited flying nowadays!

Last but by no means least there is

they have morphed from what initially was a restaurant booking service to a technology provider for all kinds of ancillary services that provide incremental revenue to a range of companies as diverse as Amtrak, KLM, Air Canada, Mastercard and Priceline. With major companies focusing on their core business, this seems the type of solution that has a strong position in the marketplace by delivering the platform necessary to maximize customer value.

These companies are just a few more examples of how the travel industry is undergoing constant change by having innovators adding value, or eliminating friction in what still is often an inefficient market full of complexities in the access to and distribution of services to a huge audience of increasingly savvy travelers. Exciting to be part of it and observe who will be the winners in the next phase of the web.

might be a future reality according to this Real Time column in WSJ.com by Jason Fry. He raises a number of interesting points that will indeed make this a general reality as it is already for a fast increasing number of people who can easily be found on the web today. In the networked world we live in today, where radical transparency is another fact of life I can imagine this scenario.

I found this quote by Curt Monash particularly poignant: “The Internet WILL tell stories about you, true or otherwise. Make sure your own version is out there too.” It’s a necessity for companies today and might become one for everybody in future, who knows.

One thing seems obvious to me, this new reality will have a profound impact on how to market products and services effectively.

is their entry into the virtual world until now the pretty much limited to Second Life. Although I’ve never been a fan of Second Life and their numbers haven’t shown strong growth lately, the Google effort might renew the interest.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YbwfOucET8[/youtube]

How it will affect the way businesses are marketing themselves remains to be seen. Seems to me at least another medium competing for people’s already limited time and attention.

This is a great video by Nova Spivack of Radar Networks on this topic still often misunderstood. I agree with his definition of the terms web 1.0 / 2.0 / 3.0 being about time periods in the development of the web. We’re now just about at the end of the second decade (2.0) and will enter the next (3.0) around 2010.

There will be definite implications on travel and the customer experience of researching, planning and purchasing travel. Before there will be dramatic changes, however, the pendulum will have to swing back to the front end or user experience focus, which he predicts will be the case in web 4.0 or more than ten years out, as web 3.0 deals more with the back end or the data.

In the meantime there will be new initiatives that will introduce semantic web tools into travel as we have seen with Uptake and TripIt. The latter is actually shown in one of his slides.

One of his comments I liked a lot is that we should talk about “artificial stupidity” rather than “artificial intelligence” that is required to eliminate humans from having to deal with the mundane, or stupid tasks, and let us focus on the intelligent ones. Couldn’t agree more.

Nova Spivack at The Next Web Conference 2008 from Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten on Vimeo.