‘Ignore power of online communities at your peril’ – Lastminute.com boss
Travel companies on the web should ignore the power of communities at their peril, the boss of lastminute.com has warned.
Chief executive Ian McCaig, who was speaking about consumer empowerment at the Eye for Travel conference in London, said that online problems used to mean a dip in visitors followed by a peak, but not anymore.
“Now if you have a problem they go somewhere else. It does not matter how much they love you, they are less forgiving,” he said.
McCaig said it was all down to the increased connectivity and the birth of online network communities, which have given people “infinitely” more knowledge than ever before.
“The instant you have an issue it is known about, so underestimating the power of those communities can be extremely damaging,” he said.
McCaig also warned against pretending to know customers and what they like despite the current trend towards online personalisation.
“People are saying ‘don’t pretend to know me’, so we need subtlety and sophisticated thinking to make it work.”
Too much technology could also put customers off, according to McCaig who said the company had alienated customers by trying to cut costs and get them to do everything online. The number of contacts per booking went from four, three years ago, to the current 0.2 per booking.
“We made the mistake of providing them with loads of tools ready to answer every question but then people said they did not feel connected anymore so we had to retrench from that position,” he admitted. “It’s about a balance between dialogue and inspiration.”
by Linda Fox
Phil Davies
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