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ABSTRACT
KEYWORDS: Internet, online travel, websites, travel intermediaries
This paper focuses on the marketing of tourism and hospitality operations online. It examines the current Internet marketing efforts of tourism operators from Banff in the Canadian Rockies, and
draws from website statistics and data for over 100 tourism operations. Doing so, it highlights the latest trends in the use of the Internet as a marketing tool for operators, tourism website development and the use of the Internet for travel planning.
INTRODUCTION
The pace of growth in e-commerce means that travel booked electronically increased by 25-35 per cent in 2001 in North America and Europe.1 In the USA online travel represents about 8 per cent of all travel dollars spent, and by 2004 that proportion will rise to about 20 per cent.2 The Travel Industry Association of America (TIA) says that travel made up 30 per cent of all online spending in 2000 - over $30bn was spent on airline tickets, hotel reservations and car rentals-- making travel the number one generator of online consumer revenues.3
In Europe, the European Travel Monitor (ETM) estimated that more than 5 million bookings were made by European travellers via the Internet in 1999, 300 per cent higher than in 1998.4 ETM's prognosis is for the number of Internet bookings in Europe to rise to approximately 12 million in 2000 and 21 million by 2003. Forrester Research5 predict that the UK online travel market will grow from L592m in 2000 to more than L3.7bn in 2005 and will represent more than 14 per cent of total travel sales.
Canadians too are turning in increasing numbers to the Internet to help them plan and book their travel.6 The dollar value of travel that Canadians book over the Internet is expected to increase to C$4.2bn by 2004 from C$662m in 1999, a sixfold increase in five years. Internet use overall has grown by 45 per cent in the last three years, and Canadians looking for travel packages are keen users of the Internet: 77 per cent of travellers are browsing the Internet for information, up 10 per cent from a year before, and more than two in three package travellers used the Internet to help plan summer trips.
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