08 July 2008

Social networking trend for business travel

Social networking tools aimed at business travelers are still in an early stage of development but are expected to come on strong in the next few years, reports the International Herald Tribune.

They are "in the very, very early stages" of development, said Jean-Pierre Remy, president of Egencia, the new name of Expedia Corporate Travel. He said that while the lines between leisure travelers and first-time business travelers were blurring, frequent business travelers heading to the same places on each trip had very different needs.

For them, "it's about how to repeat the trip and be more efficient in planning and booking," Mr Remy said.

Egencia, which is one of the largest corporate travel companies in the world, counts Starbucks and Washington Mutual among its clients.

Cindy Estis Green, author of "Travel Marketers' Guide to Social Media and Social Networks," said she thought the surge of interest in social networking was mainly due to the time saving.

"Some people ask me, 'Who has time for this? Aren't we busy?Ã¢â¬â¢Ã¢â¬~ she said. "But when you need information about a job or a trip to China, it opens up tools that weren't available to put a message out. Somebody will come back to you. It's a utility and it saves you time."

American Express Business Travel said it would team up with the corporate booking company, Sabre Travel Networks, which has been developing its own social networking system called Cubeless. The idea is to help clients' employees share their travel knowledge with each other and potentially generate cost savings, said the newspaper.

American Express officials said that they were also creating a social community for buyers in business travel management, but they declined to give further details.

Report by David Wilkening

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Your Comments (2)

Re:

There is another portal called HostelWalker.com, where normal users and travel business can use as a way of promoting their hotels and experience.

By Manuel Blanco, Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Why do Amex et all need to provide this?

Surely much of the value to travellers would come from getting OUTSIDE the walled garden of their corporate travel provider? Hence agnostic sites like Dopplr http://www.dopplr.com/ have merit. Or..... within the "walled garden" of a single corporation internal social networking tools can take on this purpose without involvement of the corporate travel provider. Where is the specific value add?

By David Dingley, Thursday, July 10, 2008