Just got back from the Travel Distribution Summit Europe 2007 in London (Business Design Centre 23-24th May, organized by EyeforTravel). Overall quite a good conference experience, with some good keynote debates, especially the discussion on Consumer Empowerment and Venturing into new territory (emerging markets like India and China). David Scowsill did a particularly good job of Chairing the keynote debates and Dr.Dimitrios Buhalis of Chairing the Online Marketing Track. Great Speakers: Brian Pratt (VP eCommerce EMEA, Starwood Hotels & Resorts), Rod Cuthbert (CEO, Viator), Peter Ward (Founder, WAYN), Rohit Talwar (CEO, Fast Future), Steve Endacott (OnHoliday Group) and Chris Loughlin (MD, Travelzoo).

Focus: Some attendees who had attended past events complained that the conference had lost its unique focus on online marketing in the travel industry and diluted itself to multiple tracks. The three tracks run at the TDS 2007 Europe were Online Marketing, Revenue Management and CRM. It would have been quite beneficial to most participants if the tracks had been combined into one and offered together, perhaps with an extra day to the conference...this would've allowed people to attend a lot of interesting sessions they missed because they were taking place simultaneously.

Content: I would say about 30-40% of the conference content was a re-enforcement of trends and issues we already know are quite important in the industry like travel 2.0, the role of 3rd party retailers & merchants online, user reviews, etc. The rest was more or less a mixture of rhetoric and company sales pitches...with some hidden gems here and there. Rohit Talwar was one such gem...a few others included some interesting insight into customized SEM by IcelandAir and Qatar Airways. Nothing ground-breaking was revealed or discussed, but then again...like every other conference, for the informed segment of professionals they always tend to serve as a reminder and re-inforcement of whats important in terms of current and future focus, plus of course the change to meet others in the field and see what they've been upto!

Advertisers: There seemed quite an increased 'commercial' focus to the summit - the advertising was quite prominent...and so it should be, of course...but most attendees found the incorporation of speakers from advertising companies into the keynote and track discussions a bit much (esp since it was the 'paid conferences' part of the summit). Given, that there were a couple of decent contributions from advertisers when participating as such - but most seemed quite the sales pitch. Some mentioned that the incorporation of advertiser stalls into the summit was also something relatively new.



Attendees: A decent turnout - there were quite a few attendees also visiting the free talks and presentations. The opportunities to network were fair...with the new introduction of a 'speed networking session' where people moved from table to table swapping business cards and getting basic details - a good effort but it would have been nice to also be able to connect with industry colleagues and not just suppliers.

Venue: The Business Design Centre in Islington (Central London) seemed quite adequate and spacious for the event...a good choice and accessible too. Can't say much about the quality of the lunch offered at the event, except it was filling :)

Verdict: Overall a great effort with some great highlights and a few unexpected lows.

JJ

Download a recap of the important points mentioned in the keynote debates and the online marketing tracks, courtesy and (c) 2007 The Tourism & Hospitaltiy Diaries

The next few events being organized by eyefortravel:
> Travel Distribution Latin America and the Caribbean 2007, Caesar Park, Sao Paulo 13-14 June 2007
> Sales & Marketing in Travel Asia-Pacific 2007, Sydney Marriott, Australia 18 - 19th July 2007
> Travel Distribution China 2007, Shanghai Hilton, China 29-30 August
> Travel Distribution Summit North America 2007, Caesars Palace, Las Vegas 9-10 October 2007
> Revenue Management and Pricing in Travel USA 2007, Caesars Palace, Las Vegas 9-10 October 2007
> CRM Technology for Travel 2007, Caesars Palace, Las Vegas 9-10 October 2007
> Sales and Marketing in Travel Europe, Hotel Concorde Kurfurstendamm, Berlin 23 - 24 October 2007

tags: london, TDS, travel-distribution-summit, 2007, europe, eyefortravel, CRM, e-commerce, online-marketing, sales-marketing, revenue-management, review, critique, praise