Consumer Response to Travel Site Performance

White Paper Published By: Akamai

Looking back to the first iterations of travel Web sites, we can appreciate just how far technology has come. As advancements like high-speed connections began to replace the now archaic dial-up experience, consumers adjusted their expectations and demands of the companies they patronized. To gain a deeper understanding of the status of travelers' current online expectations, Akamai commissioned PhoCusWright to conduct a study examining key elements of the online consumer experience. This paper will examine five aspects of online travel-satisfaction levels, speed expectations and tolerance, activities during page loading, reasons for abandonment and reactions to technical issues.

Tags :

akamai, travel, site performance, phocuswright, customer experience, usability, travel ecommerce, web load

Published:	Jun 14, 2010
Type:	White Paper
Length:	13 pages

A PhoCusWright WHITEPAPER
Consumer Response to
Travel Site Performance
Written by Carroll Rheem Edited by Colie Homan
Sponsored by:
Š2010 PhoCusWright Inc. All Rights Reserved.Consumer Response to Travel Site Performance April 2010
is whitepaper was sponsored by:
EXPERIENCE THE AKAMAI DIFFERENCE FOR ONLINE TRAVEL
Whether enabling a richer shopping experience, building brand loyalty, or ensuring a secure transaction, Akamai provides comprehensive solutions for online travel companies to deliver dynamic content and applications - anywhere. Akamai helps travel companies locate online consumers who are in-market for travel related items, deliver an optimized shopping experience, and drive qualied shoppers through the purchase funnel for higher conversion rates and booking ratios.
Akamai solutions help leading global travel companies including Cathay Pacic Airways, InterContinental Hotels Group, Expedia and Kayak to drive measur-ably higher conversion rates and more sales per second - making the Internet a reliable and eective channel for conducting business.
www.akamai.com
Š2010 PhoCusWright Inc. All Rights Reserved. Consumer Response to Travel Site Performance April 2010
About PhoCusWright
PhoCusWright is the travel industry research authority on how travelers, suppliers and intermediaries connect. Independent, rigorous and unbiased, PhoCusWright fosters smart strategic planning and tactical decision-making.
PhoCusWright delivers qualitative and quantitative research on the evolving dynamics that influence travel, tourism and hospitality distribution. Our marketplace intelligence is the industry standard for segmentation, sizing, forecasting, trends, analysis and consumer travel planning behavior. Every day around the world, senior executives, marketers, strategists and research professionals from all segments of the industry value chain use PhoCusWright research for competitive advantage.
To complement its primary research in North and Latin America, Europe and Asia, PhoCusWright produces several high-profile conferences and trade shows in the U.S. and Germany, and partners with conferences in Canada, China and Singapore. Industry leaders and company analysts bring this intelligence to life by debating issues, sharing ideas and defining the ever-evolving reality of travel commerce.
The company is headquartered in the United States with Asia Pacific operations based in India and local analysts on five continents.
www.phocuswright.com
Š2010 PhoCusWright Inc. All Rights Reserved.Consumer Response to Travel Site Performance April 2010
Consumer Response to Travel Site Performance
Pioneering travel companies made olds expect a site to load in two percentage of very satisfied online their first tentative steps into the brave seconds or less. shoppers at 67% (please note that this new Internet world over a decade ago. . Prevention is key result is somewhat directional due to Looking back to the first iterations -- A third of travelers would be less the small sample of respondents who of travel Web sites, we can appreciate likely to visit a site after experi- took a cruise in the past year). Notably, just how far technology has come. As encing problems. none of the travel products generated advancements like high-speed connec- -- Business travelers are slightly a substantial amount of dissatisfac-tions began to replace the now archaic more likely to have a negative tion-the maximum was just 4% dial-up experience, consumers adjust- reaction. across the group.ed their expectations and demands . Loyalty is not forgiveness As part of a mature e-commerce of the companies they patronized. -- Active loyalty program members industry, travel Web sites have evolved Every year, functionality, speed, and are somewhat polarized in their largely to satisfy the primary demands usability standards move forward and tolerance levels. While they are of online consumers. However, rough-companies must continually invest in more likely than other travelers ly a quarter of online shoppers are only these fundamentals to stay competi- to be unaffected by temporary somewhat satisfied. This indicates tive. To gain a deeper understanding site problems, they are also more there is still plenty of room for prog-of... [download for more]