Azamara Cruises' new ads emphasize port stays

Azamara Club Cruises will launch a marketing campaign that for the first time will include television advertising. 

The multi-channel campaign is built around the theme “The Voyage for Those Who Love Travel.”

It continues to highlight Azamara’s competitive positioning as a destination-focused cruise line that features longer stays, more overnights and evening tours. In addition to television, the campaign will have print, social media, online, direct mail, e-marketing, website and brochure components, Azamara said.

Azamara TV advert below.

When Facebook gives way to face time

By Tom Stieghorst

Teens talk to each other on a cruise. My wife made that observation on a recent cruise we took with our two daughters.

I instantly knew what she meant. It wasn’t just that they were conversing, but that they were doing it without the constant reference to a mobile device, seemingly grafted to their hands.

It is very refreshing to see teens talking to each other unaided by devices. Call it one of the unintended benefits of a cruise vacation.

Internet access on a cruise is expensive. As the father of a teen, I say great. It provides me with an excuse to just say no to connecting online. I told my two girls on the cruise they could have the scrap minutes at the end of the cruise after I had used most of my package for work.

Once, telecommunications were so difficult at sea that disconnecting was a universal experience for cruise passengers. That has gone away as connections got more reliable and prices for service came down.

So adults can no longer hide from the office, take a break from clients or escape from everyday interactions by taking a cruise. That has its upsides, of course, but not a few of us would willingly trade them away.

As parents, however, one of the worries we have with our teens is whether they will squander the chance to see the world and experience new things because they’re glued to their phones 24/7.

Like the time a few years ago when I drove through Rocky Mountain National Park only to find my daughters’ eyes feasting on a 2- by 3-inch screen instead of the 12,000-foot vistas and overlooks.

My kids make friends with other kids from all over the world on a cruise. My older daughter spent the cruise comparing lives with new friends from England. My younger daughter is still in touch (via social media, of course) with a group from California she met last year on a Holland America cruise.

I like to think that one reason for that is that they are out of touch with old friends long enough to make new ones. Of course, the minute we make the dock, they’re eagerly scanning the waterfront for an Internet cafe.

So far cruise lines have focused on improving Internet quality, rather than reducing the price of a profitable service. But Royal Caribbean International is about to up the ante with the imminent debut of O3B on Allure of the Seas, which promises “land-like” connection speeds.

For now, access is expensive enough that I can keep my kids off the grid on a cruise. I hope it stays that way. Call me old-fashioned, but there should be some place where face-to-face communication thrives, and if it is on a ship, so much the better for cruising.

RCCL’s new Cruise Planner replaces outdated module

By Tom Stieghorst

Going on a cruise used to be as simple as booking a ticket and making a few choices about what to do. Guests often waited until they boarded to book shore excursions and spa treatments.

But the menu of cruise activities has expanded, as have the number of things that can be prearranged from shore.

Today, cruise lines are trying to make it as easy as possible to plan and book onboard activities in advance of departure. The proliferation of options has grown hand-in-hand with the technological capabilities that make selecting cruise activities easy.

The latest example comes from Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. (RCCL), which has retooled its planning function so guests can book everything from specialty dining reservations to beverage packages from the comfort of their couch.

“We been focused on letting our guests hit the ground running on day one, whereas in the past, sometimes day one was spent figuring out what you were going to do,” said Jeff DeKorte, vice president for Web and digital media at RCCL.

RCCL’s new tool, Cruise Planner, replaces an 8-year-old pre-cruise planning module that was increasingly outdated.

RCCL New Cruise Planner 

The old system had none of the new e-commerce functions, such as shopping carts and wish lists, things that consumers increasingly take for granted when buying things online.

“Every time you bought a new product during the session, you had to enter your credit card again,” DeKorte said. “It was very difficult.”

One of the big improvements in Cruise Planner is the ability to migrate between digital platforms without losing data. So, for example, someone might start researching shore excursions in the morning on their mobile phone, continue at lunch on their desktop PC, and finish after dinner on a tablet while watching TV.

Tablet functionality, which barely existed on the old platform, is now robust, DeKorte said. He hopes that moms that typically do a lot of the cruise planning can now share the load.

“Our vision was to create a product where … the family could lean back on the couch and literally she could hand the tablet to the kids and say, ‘You guys figure out what you want to do, watch the videos, look at the shore excursions, [select] swim with the dolphins and add it to the calendar or the wish list.’

“And then mom can come back later and she can organize,” DeKorte said.

Travel agents can use the tool to the extent that they do pre-cruise planning for clients, either as a service or for a fee.

“It really depends on the agency and the level of service they’re providing to their guests,” DeKorte said. “For those agents who choose not to provide that service to the guests, there’s a much easier tool for them to direct the guest to use.”

As the list of things to prearrange before a cruise grows longer, it threatens to take some of the serendipity out of a cruise vacation. Simply showing up at the ship without a sheet of activities selected in advance seems like a throwback to a simpler time.

But DeKorte said tools like Cruise Planner are meant to provide options, not become a burdensome requirement. “The beautiful thing is for guests who want to take their vacation one day at a time like that, they certainly can,” he said.

At least one other line is also making moves to make pre-cruise planning easier.

Norwegian Cruise Line recently opened its specialty restaurants to reservations 90 days before departure, up from 45 days previously. Guests can also book entertainment options such as Blue Man Group or Cirque Dreams on the Norwegian Epic, Breakaway and Getaway through their MyNCL accounts.

Spa treatments on the Norwegian Epic can now also be booked in advance. Vanessa Picariello, a spokeswoman for Norwegian, said the spa preregistration may be extended to other ships, but that Norwegian still doesn’t have a timetable for when that might happen. 

Cruise.co.uk partners with marketing specialist Tradedoubler

By Travolution

An affiliate marketing programme is being launched by Cruise.co.uk in partnership with performance marketing specialist Tradedoubler.

The online cruise agent will benefit from integrated tracking across desktop, mobile devices and landline in order to diversify its marketing channels and boost sales.

This will enable the company to capture and track all audiences, both online and offline.

Tradedoubler has also worked with Cruise.co.uk to produce a creative marketing and commercial model to help drive traffic and sales to the cruise aggregator’s website.

Tradedoubler already works with travel providers such as Royal Caribbean, DFDS and Expedia.

Cruise.co.uk head of strategic partnerships Brendon Collins said: “Prospective consumers often want to talk to a cruise agent, even if they’ve found a discounted deal online.

“With our previous affiliate marketing campaigns, we were unable to track [once the customer was on the phone] which online promotion the lead had generated from.

“However, we will be able to track the history of the consumer’s purchase journey from start to finish and the network of publishers accordingly, thanks to Tradedoubler’s seamlessly integrated tracking tool.”

Dan Cohen, regional director at Tradedoubler added: “Affiliate marketing programmes progressively need to be integrated through multiple channels and be tracked, to capture optimal audiences and maximise the return-on-investment for the advertiser.

“By being able to track the full purchase journey, advertisers will gain insight to keep re-modelling and evolving their affiliate marketing programmes, to further drive traffic and sales.”

Cruise holiday searches see 66% upsurge, finds study

By Travolution

Online searches for cruise holidays in August soared by 66% over levels in May, new research reveals.

Consumers made a total of 2.5 million searches on Google UK for cruises in August, compared to 1.5 million in May.

Cruises to specific destinations made up 12% (289,890) of overall queries.

Independent cruise agent Iglucruise.com was the most visible site for destination-specific queries, attaining a 45% share of visibility in the organic listings, through ranking for 419 keywords. Thomascook.com took second place with 44%.

Vivavoyage.co.uk was the most visible advertiser in the paid listings, achieving a 51% share of voice. Virginholidayscruises.co.uk followed with 37%.

For cruise-related searches overall, Iglucruise.com was also the most visible site in natural search, capturing a 62% share of visibility. In paid listings, cruisecritic.co.uk dominated with 50%.

The cruise sector report by digital marketing agency Greenlight found queries for tourist excursions on the River Thames saw the biggest increase compared to the Caribbean, Mediterranean and the Nile.

Queries for cruises on the Thames totalled 9,900, with searches rising 71% on May’s level, compared to 42% for the Nile and 37% for both the Caribbean and Mediterranean.

At 19,200, cumulative searches for cruises to the Caribbean accounted for the majority of destination-related queries (7%), with the term ‘caribbean cruises’ being the most popular.

The Mediterranean followed at 17,500 (6%), with the terms ‘mediterranean cruise’, and ‘med cruises’ featuring prominently.

In third place was the Nile. Collectively, ‘nile cruise’ and ‘nile cruises’ pulled in 16,500 queries.

Nexion enabling agents to ‘take control’ of social media efforts

By Laura Del Rosso

 New social media tools for Nexion agents, unveiled at the host agency’s CoNexion conference in Las Vegas last month, are designed to help agents “take control of their own marketing efforts and grow their customer base,” said Nexion President Jackie Friedman.

Home-based agents who are part of Nexion can now subscribe to automated social media posts to engage with their clients on a regular basis and promote themselves and their travel products.

Friedman said that the new social media tools, part of Nexion's OnTarget program, will be available to agents, allowing them to “opt in” to any or all of them.

“Nexion's agents are entrepreneurs and business owners,” she said in a statement. “It's important for us to continually provide them with the latest innovations.”

OnTarget was created by Passport Online, Nexion's website and social media technology partner. The tools include message delivery through email, Twitter, Facebook and blogs; access to educational, informative and promotional content; the ability to promote Nexion supplier offers; and email marketing integrated with ClientBase profiles.

The email tool will enable agents to select supplier content and create emails to send to their clients along with videos, articles and other content.

The automated social media tool allows posts to be automatically “published” to agents' Facebook pages on their behalf, with preapproval from Nexion agents.
Nexion also announced that is revamping its PowerUp training program with new and updated courses. New training will feature day-to-day tasks and communication to build relationships with clients, more preferred-supplier training programs and case study assignments which include qualifying clients, researching, closing the sale and following up.

In other news from CoNexion, the host agency honored Steve Lincoln from Bridgewater, Va., and Samantha Khalil from Palm Bay, Fla., with both Circle of Excellence and MillionAir awards, recognizing them as top producers for Nexion's preferred suppliers and their achievement of more than $1 million in airline sales in the previous year.

Nexion is a subsidiary of Tzell Travel Group, a Travel Leaders Group company, and has been a host agency since 1995.

Social media not driving transactions, says Expedia chief

The world's biggest online agency sees no sign of social media driving transactions, despite repeated assertions that Facebook has a big future in travel.

Expedia chief commercial officer Dhiren Fonseca told the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) Asia Summit: "Not a lot of transactional volume is driven by social networks. Maybe it [booking travel] is not applicable [to social media]. Maybe people on social media just want to talk.

"There is a lot of experimentation, but no one has really cracked this." At the same time, Fonseca described growth in mobile hotel bookings as dramatic. He said: "We have seen the booking window compressed dramatically ­- 98% of our mobile bookings come two days [or less] before arrival.

"The increase in mobile bookings is great for consumers but a challenge for hotels. Imagine running a 600-room hotel and having no idea how full you are going to be in two days' time." Fonseca argued Expedia is less a travel company than a tech company, and suggested consumers recognise that.

"At our core we're a technology company that happens to be in travel," he said. "Getting a cheap hotel room is more important than knowing you can call Expedia to get help.

"I can envisage a world where the device you have brings a virtual Expedia with you. It knows when you arrive at the airport. It directs you to the bus. It guides you to your hotel. It notifies the hotel of your arrival."

Min Fan, chief executive of China's leading online agency, Ctrip.com, agreed with Fonseca on the value of social media. Fan said: "You cannot anticipate you will get traffic from these channels."

Thomas Cook launches 24/7 social media 'listening lab'

By Phil Davies 

Thomas Cook’s move to embrace social media has taken a step forward with the introduction of a dedicated 24/7 social media monitoring facility.

A specially trained social media listening team will provide real-time global brand reputation management, listening in over 180 languages to “chatter” around their brands.

The ‘Thomas Cook Listening Lab’ will identify social ‘brand champions’ who the company should be interacting with socially to help increase sales.

Data will also be collected to be used for future marketing campaigns and to provide insight on how to heighten social brand awareness.

The Lab will aid in crisis management, provide real time comparison of competitor brands and listen to all customer feedback.

The facility also features tools to engage with customers directly through countless social media channels.

Chief executive Harriet Green said: “We were the first major high street travel agency in the UK to offer online bookings, last year we had 310 million visits to our websites, ThomasCook.com was labelled #5 travel/e-travel site in 2012 eDigital Research Best Site benchmark and just this month our new mobile website was said to ‘set the standard’ and received a 10 out of 10 by travel technology consultant Paul Richer.

“As we expand our digital capabilities, my vision for Thomas Cook is to be the leading online tour operator and to have the highest share of bookings online.

“Our Thomas Cook Listening Lab will allow us to better position Thomas Cook as the leading travel authority by listening and monitoring customer sentiment, enabling us to discovering useful and valued information about our customers. The Listening Lab will further help our customer services team to better engage with our customers in active dialogues, and provide relevant, fresh and valuable content to key audiences.”

Global head of social media Jonathan Roberts added: “Being proactive and having to monitor thousands of social mentions a day can be difficult and time consuming, but with the Thomas Cook Listening Lab, coupled with social media listing experts, we are able to see and resolve social concerns with our social media customer care team.

“Monitoring is also instrumental in Thomas Cook’s success, whereby the real-time data collected through social media is ‘key’ in all future marketing, PR and advertising campaigns.

“We can also quickly see what is being discussed in real time about any of our major competitors or our own marketing campaigns, television adverts or product launches, and within hours, our marketing teams can create additional sales messages, and then direct fans via social platforms to learn more about special offers or holiday packages.

“Through the Listening Lab we now have the ability to target a specific customer base, for example if we want to target people in London who have recently tweeted, ‘I need a holiday’, we now have the tools to reach out to those people and make an informed pitch based on their online social profile; revealing their age, gender and likes and dislikes.”

The Lab features six large monitors, contains specially designed computers, with speakers, and a video conferencing camera that allows for meetings with regional marketing teams and to help co-ordinate with teams at live-location events.

There are four additional desktop systems for the purpose of social engagement with customers. The larger monitors show real-time tracking with various data visualisations and dashboards, aided by a variety of software integrated into a platform ideal for social media listening and engagement needs.

Thomas Cook price parity sparks rise in indie agents' sales

By Juliet Dennis 

Independent agents have reported an increase in sales of Thomas Cook product following a move to single pricing across its in-house channels.

Cook introduced price parity across its shops, call centres and online in December. This allowed third-party agents to compete with the operator as the difference between Cook’s prices and independent agents’ narrowed.

In the coming weeks, the company plans to extend price parity to include sales through independents.

Hays Travel Independence Group has reported triple-digit percentage growth in sales of Thomas Cook holidays for summer 2013, while Advantage Travel Centres has reported a strong post-Christmas performance.

For years, online discounts have been a bugbear for independents because they could not compete on price and were forced to discount commission to win a sale.

Hays attributed its sales hike to Cook’s move towards price parity and the fact it had gained members who are strong sellers of Cook holidays.

Advantage head of commercial John Sullivan said consumers were shopping around less because prices differed “only by a few pounds”.

He added: “While price parity is not yet 100%, it’s now a lot easier for members to compete.”

It is understood Cook is also reviewing levels of commission to third-party agents.

A spokesman for Thomas Cook said: “Following the launch of price parity, we’ve received fantastic feedback and we’ve seen an increase in sales through our agent partners.

“Our commercial agreements remain confidential, but there is no intention to reduce income levels; we’re maintaining a level playing field so they can match our retail and online pricing.”

Research finds two thirds of holidaymakers will book online

By Ian Taylor 

The latest TNS consumer insight for Travel Weekly underlines the popularity of digital channels. Ian Taylor reports

Two thirds of UK adults planning an overseas holiday or break intend to book online this year, according to research for Travel Weekly.

A survey of more than 2,000 adults by TNS in early February suggests up to 20 million could book their travel online, compared with more than eight million with a high street agent or by phone.

Researchers found that 42% of respondents (including those not planning an overseas holiday) said they would book online, 12% on the high street and 5% by phone.

Of course, booking online does not have to mean going direct or buying from someone outside the trade. Few high street retailers fail to sell online; Tui Travel reported 37% of its summer 2013 bookings were made online up to early February and expects this proportion to increase this year.

However, the results confirm consumers are increasingly at ease booking all kinds of holidays – including package holidays – on the internet.

Young adults are clearly most at ease: 55% of 16 to 34-year-olds said they would book a holiday or break online, against 25% of over‑55s. The proportion of student online-travel bookers (60%) was three times higher than those of retired age (20%).

More than half (54%) of adults in better-off households expected to book online, as did a similar proportion (52%) of those with children living at home.

Londoners and those in the southeast showed a similar propensity to book on the internet (54%), while less than one-third did so in Yorkshire, the East Midlands and Scotland and just 36% across the north – suggesting a digital divide.

However, the greatest variation in the survey results was in the proportion planning to take an overseas holiday, rather than how they would book it.

TNS found more than one third (36%) of respondents did not expect to go overseas in 2013 and a further 4% were undecided.

That suggests 60% intend to have a holiday abroad – a healthy market in light of previous research showing less than half the adult population (44%) are likely to go away in any year.

It is important to note people often express an intention to go abroad at this time of year but subsequently fail to do so – the young being especially prone to this.

February’s TNS survey found three-quarters of 16 to 24-year-olds planned an overseas holiday (and 56% intended to book online). Yet previous TNS research which asked 16 to 24-year-olds whether they had a holiday abroad in the past 12 months found 60% had not.

Almost half (48%) of adults over 55 said they were not planning an overseas holiday this year; neither were half the adults in less well-off households (47%).

Most adults with children did plan a holiday (68%), compared with 56% of those with no children. But the former appear more dependent on finding a cheap holiday – 38% of those with children identifying price as an important factor in whether they go away, against 28% of those without children.

TNS group director of travel Tom Costley noted “significant age variations” in online booking habits but said: “The proportion choosing to book via a high street agent does not vary to any significant extent, irrespective of age.”

He added: “It’s evident that being able to access a cheap price allows some to go on a holiday which might otherwise not be available to them.”