Online travel continues to grow
Article written by David Dalgety, VisitEarth.com, E-Business in Travel and Tourism.
Internet travel traffic
Travel and tourism during 2001 was one of the few industries to continue investment and expansion on the Internet against a background of overcorrection in the high-tech stocks. According to comScore and Double Click global Internet traffic dropped by 1% back in June 2001 to 296.5 million unique visitors down from 299.7 million unique visitors in May 2001. However travel was one of the few sectors to experience growth during June 2001 up to 2% from May to 84.5 million unique visitors worldwide.
As a whole traffic to travel web sites in Europe increased by 4 million between November 2000 and April 2001 (Jupiter MMXI). According to NetValue visitors to UK travel sites increased from August to September 2001 by 155,000 up to 4.8 million.
Global online sales
Globally the World Tourism Organisation Business Council (WTOBC) suggest that the “Internet may account for one in every four travel purchases in the main generating markets within the next five years”. Three factors are driving this tremendous growth. Firstly the technological improvements. Secondly cultural change with greater sophistication among Internet and wireless users. Thirdly the rapidly developing online travel services. E-commerce transactions will continue to rise as availability and booking tools become increasingly widespread.
Top 10 Travel Web Sites (Worldwide, Jan. 2002)
Source: comScore
|
Rank |
Site |
Unique Visitors (000) |
Change vs. |
|
1. |
expedia.com |
16,069 |
15% |
|
2. |
orbitz.com |
11,827 |
1% |
|
3. |
travelocity.com |
10,922 |
32% |
|
4. |
travelzoo.com |
6,567 |
-10% |
|
5. |
priceline.com |
5,518 |
11% |
|
6. |
southwest.com |
4,832 |
13% |
|
7. |
milesource.com |
4,692 |
5% |
|
8. |
cheaptickets.com |
4,557 |
27% |
|
9. |
hotwire.com |
4,506 |
25% |
|
10. |
travelnow.com |
4,053 |
40% |
US online sales
US Internet travel sales had already reached US $5 billion by the end o
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