Internet as a Strategy Tool for Development of E-Tourism in India

PATH Progressive Approach Tourism and Hospitality, Year : 2017, Volume : 1, Issue : 1, Online ISSN : 2455-8788.

Abstract

Use of internet is increasing day by day. Cheap broadband connections and smart phones gave much more motivation to online business. Travel and Tourism is one of fastest growing industry in India and we had seen positive growth in all areas of Tourism in last few years. Nowadays preference of customer has also changed everyone want maximum output with minimum wastage of time. Hence rather than visiting travel expert most of travelers, B2B consolidators prefer to plan their trip online. The ministry of Tourism, Govt. of India has also launched e-commerce platform (www.incredibleindia.org) where anyone can access contact information for registered Travel agents, Escorts, City guides, Tour operators. Fairs and festivals, culture, customs and booking/counseling assistance is also available on that single platform. Success story of leading online travel agencies like Makemytrip.com, Yatra.com, Travelguru.com etc also reflect the growth of e-commerce in tourism industry of India. Use of ICT equally play major role in success story of E-Tourism. Most of travelers prefer to read online reviews of previous travelers before booking that product (Hotel, Airlines, City tour etc) social media or travel aggregator websites allow customers to share their reviews online hence it become equally important to pay attention on analytical and database Customer Relationship Management (CRM) as well in order to maintain long term relationship with customers. This research paper is focused on E-Tourism in context to Indian market. E-Tourism is introducing new source of information, itinerary planning, booking platform for travelers who are planning to visit India or within India.

Keywords :

 E-Tourism,

E-Commerce

ICT

Online tourism of India

Digital Divide

Millennial Population

BPR

TPS

Background and Development

Travel industry has changed drastically over the years (1970s to 2015) and most synergized by the use of technology. Information technology has introduced many changes like: process reengineering, quality control, reduced service time and e-commerce through the development of the Internet. American airlines invested in their own computerized reservation system and launch Sabre in 1960 the success further encourage other airlines to develop their own reservation system which resulted into development of other GDS’s as well.

On parallel side Travel agencies also started using internet, intranet, extranet and CRS/ GDS. Multiple airline routes and complicated booking process help travel agents (TAs) to increase their business. Later Sabre also started offering hotel bookings which allow travel agents to access into airlines and hotels inventory worldwide through systems.

Till later 90’s there was no universally accepted forum to provide detailed information with comparisons and recommendations then in 2004 introduction of tripadvisor.com launched which allow customers to see standards, evaluations (feedbacks) from customers ( past and present) about the hotel, destination they are planning to visit further several aggregators like kayak and Sky scanner enter into market.

Further advent use of tourism/ travel technology resulted into vast increase in number of travel agents, airlines, tour operators which resulted into competition into market. Since consumers get plenty of supplier options to choose in market which give birth to competition among suppliers they got bound to use different marketing tactics like commercial advertisements, pay per click, social media advertisements in order to attract more and more customers.

Similarly distribution system also start becoming vast since in beginning period airlines use to focus on operations and rely on travel agents for sales part later airlines also started focusing on B2C sales further with development of technology they also started offering holiday packages, LTC packages along with air tickets. Airlines and hoteliers further started discriminating among consolidators and they use to offer commissions to them depending on the volume of business they offer to them which gave birth to vast competition.

The Intranet, Extranet and Internet and the multiple multi-media convergence among informatics, communication have provided both tourists and destinations new channels through which to empower their communication process while reducing search and distribution costs (Buhalis and Law 2008; Buhalis 2003).

Digital divide is an indicator of development of technology in any country. The OECD (2001) defines digital divide as “the communication gap between individuals, households, businesses and geographic areas at different socio-economic levels with regard both to their opportunities to access ICTs and to their use of the Internet for a wide variety of activities”   Tourists and destinations in developing and developed countries suffer from multiple digital divides at motivational, physical and social levels.

Millennial Population has become most popular generation to provide maximum online business to travel industry. Millennial are basically those who born between approximately 1978 and 1999 and who entered their teenage years after the Millennium (2000).

E-commerce has change the vision of doing business in every industry. Customers now a days focus on their comfort zone and look for convenient and easy options for their every needs and advent use of Internet and smart phones allow customers to choose from several options available in market in order to buy their preferred products. More than 66 million peoples of all age groups in India use internet and use of internet is also spreading its wings in non-metro cities as well.

Around 10 years ago it was so common to see that most of us visit travel agent or tour operators in order to seek expert guidance and book our trip but advent use of technology has change the trend of doing business. The online travel industry business of India started growing rapidly from 2005 onwards but still there is a lot more scope of improvement in this field. By the end of 2015, India online travel market is expected to hit gross online bookings number of $12.5 billion.

Initiative by Government

Policy and Planning – Ministry of tourism has come up with several new policies for the development of Indian tourism. Recent initiatives taken by MOT include E- booking for monuments and heritage sites, Visa on arrival scheme for multiple countries, Bed and Breakfast accommodations  and various other campaigns like Swach Bharat (Clean India), International yoga day  also support tourism campaign and campaigning is branded by MOT under tag line “ATITHI DEVO BHAVA” which means guest is like god for us and “Incredible India”

Further in order to attract international tourists MOT actively participates in international events like PATA, SATTE, ITB etc and also conduct several road shows under campaign “Incredible India”.

India include variety of geographical and historical variety varying from Himalayas, Monuments, Beaches, Wild life, Pilgrimage destinations, Back waters, Wellness destinations etc which is very difficult to find at a single place in other parts of the world. Hence it become important task for consolidator to know the potential of client since we have variety of themes to offer.

Tourism sector of India has shown immense growth in last 10 years peoples from foreign destinations prefer to visit India for multiple reasons beat Medical tourism, Wellness tourism, Rural tourism, Cultural tourism, Heritage tourism. Since the inception of information technology in tourism sector we have seen immense growth from in number of foreign arrivals in our country. Ministry of tourism under its campaign Incredible India also made use of technology which you can see on its website incredibleindia.org where you will find that all information regarding entire India is available beat customs, culture, fairs and festivals of all states and e-booking facility is also available for Air tickets, Train tickets, Hotel booking, Bus tickets and Holiday packages with the help of several government and private consolidators. Use of several web links is combined in a systematic way so that anyone can access entire any information related to entire Indian tourism with a single web address according to his convenient since web portal is active 24*7. (Incredibleindia.org)

Not just for the bookings. E-tourism can also be used as marketing and sales tool too since trend is changing now hardly peoples pay much attention on leaflets, newspaper or other form of media. But majority of peoples must access social networking sites on regular basis. Majority of online market players like makemytrip.com, yatra.com also flash their web links on several social networking and other regular sites in order to grab attention and increase traffic on their website.

Initiative by Private Sector

There are many online Travel Agencies working in India. Private sector is contributing in tourism and travel by facilitating operational part. There is great use of IT in this sector.

Private sector has also emerged and various efforts like establishment of Apollo health city, Establishment of theme resorts, hotels and Information provided by travel aggregator and online travel agency websites like www.tripadvisor.com, www.makemytrip.com etc help customers to plan their trip according to their theme and budget.

Further aggregator websites also allow customers to compare prices of different hotels so that they can plan and book their trip in advance according to their ease.

Operations include co-ordination among several groups like a travel agency based in united kingdom sell a escorted holiday package to India to their customers, further that agency require assistance from a tour operator based in India to assist their customers, similarly tour operator also require assistance of city guides in order to provide in depth details about particular city to his customers.

Role of content in E-Tourism

Similarly content of website also play a vital role in growth of website when peoples make search on search engines then content of your website allow search engines to pull up your name which help you to reach potential customers.

Always mention content relevant to your business only. You need to have clear vision / audience target in your mind before implementing marketing techniques. Since only potential customers will give you fruitful response hence it becomes very important to plan website content accordingly.

Keyword similarly play important role in content building as most of search engines are looking for relevant content to offer to their users so make sure that you use appropriate keywords while designing snippets, crawlers, index of website. Avoid using industry jargons while designing keywords focus on what customer think while looking for products offered by you. Suppose customer just type cheap flight and you had mention economical air tickets in your snippet, then you know the result.

Tools like Google webmaster tools, Firefox free tools can also guide you to improve crawling of your site on search engines.

Further Google’s pay per click option can also help you a lot in order to increase traffic on your website. Once the customer reach your website then probability of conversion completely depends on your Deals, Sales skills, Design of your website, your web reviews.

In order to create more and more conversion most of organizations have started asking for customer’s e-mail address the moment they reach on their website so that they can use their e-mail address for future campaigns.

Not just for booking conversions content of website also help organizations to improve their ranking hence it is worth it to provide useful information on your website.

(Internet marketing, Matt bailey, 2011)

ICT in E-Tourism

Engines like GDS, CRS or White label solution provided by consolidators allow travel agent to sell Air tickets, Holiday packages, Hotels, Bus/Train tickets on his website.

Use of information communication technology plays a vital role in development of E-tourism. Easy access to information, flexibility of time, less investment cost, No barriers allow customers to use online services according to the convenience of their workplace and home. Less transaction cost, abundance of information has motivated the travel industry to go online. The ICT work as a link between service providers and travelers. The introduction of CRS in 1970’s further followed by introduction of GDS and Internet gave birth to E-Commerce in travel industry.

Tourism products has less conversion rate as compare to other online products due to perishability of the product buying holiday package online is  just like buying dreams as customer cannot see or feel the service level of a resort or in flight service before  buying it. Customer can only imagine the service level by looking images or reading reviews online. Hence several studies had analyze that out of global online traffic only 40% travelers end their search with booking online in their first visit.

We can also see the role of ICT in online flight bookings since majority of worldwide airlines are based on multiple CRS while only few airlines operate through online portals. We had observe that leading online companies are directly connected CRS/GDS for flight and hotel bookings. Like Makemytrip.com use CRS Amadeus, Cheapoair.in use Amadeus and Sabre, Lufthansa airlines use Amadeus for their online transactions and their website portals are directly connected with CRS or GDS and are capable enough to produce auto-ticketing which minimize the role of manpower too.

Business analysis plays a crucial role in business growth regular analyzing of business is very important. Business can be analyzed by several ways like amount of revenue generated vs amount spend on marketing, search engines, toll free number etc. it is a team work where co-ordination among several departments – it, marketing, sales is must required. In other words we can say that ICT is the backbone of E-Tourism and we cannot even imagine E-Tourism without the existence of ICT.

(Mandeep kaur, International journal of tourism and travel, vol.6)

Development of E-Tourism and industry competition in India

Online travel portals are increasing in India day by day beat online travel agencies, Hotel suppliers (like Hotels.com, agoda.com, oyorooms.com) , Bus providers (like Redbus.in) , car rental suppliers (like carzonrent, zoomcar.com) which have created lot of competition in industry. These suppliers create end numbers of webpages on regular basis which create lot of chaos among customers.

Along with development of portals there is also a strong need of having product knowledge, proper marketing channel, supplier relations (to grab best deals), business forecasting since it is not that much easy task to beat market full of rivals. Example – A manager decide to spend lakhs of rupees on marketing and further he also succeed in generating leads his website also receive immense traffic but sales conversion was still not there because he fail to beat the price offer by his rival so later he realize that he was suppose to built good supplier relations with consolidators first in order to match or beat the price offer by his rival company. He was not just failed to generate sales instead he lost lakhs of money which he had spend on marketing.

Along with specialization organizations have also started focusing on cross sales like Nowadays Resorts, Hotels, State tourism boards or Cruise companies also provide tailor made or customized holiday packages, Airlines also provide holiday and LTC packages along with airline ticket.

Long time ago it was the job of travel agents and tour operators only to offer complete holiday packages moreover few airlines don’t even use to pay much attention on B2C sales they use to rely on travel agents or tour operators only for their sales which allow travel agents or tour operators to earn good amount of commissions but with the advent use of ICT and birth of E-Commerce consolidators have started spreading their wings which resulted into reduction of commissions for travel agents and tour operators.

Hence after analyzing above mention examples we can conclude that proper planning is equally important in E-Tourism before taking any step.

Internet based value chain method

(Werthner and Klein. 1999)

ICT work as a linkage between different cultures, regions, service providers. Better partnership between government and private sector (Like incredibleindia.org) and government support can help India to enhance the benefits from E-Tourism.

E-Tourism in development of Ecology & customs

Rural and Eco tourism can be promoted through ICT. Development of rural tourism may bring ancient historical museums, theaters, galleries, Indian customs and festivals into mainstream tourism. Similarly Eco-tourism equally play important role in development of tourism since lot of reserve forests and trees have already destroyed and majority of tourism spots have to face environment pollution hence there is a strong need to literate host population and tourists about importance of ecology since most of popular Indian tourism spots have lost their natural beauty example – Dal lake has lost its natural beauty what it had in 1970’s, the size of lake has shrink to almost half as compare to what it had 50 years ago.

E-Tourism for competitive advantage

Product Strategy

Consumer can easily access information related to hotel, airline, cruise or any other travel product without physically visiting consolidator and similarly he can compare prices on a single platform too.

 As a result, consumers rely on product suppliers and retailers to aid them in the search and the suppliers and retailers take advantage of this situation by charging higher prices ( Viswanathan 2000).

But visa versa customer cannot be cheated in case of e-commerce since he can see price and services offer by other suppliers too.

Price Strategy

E-Tourism also allow customers to compare price online with the help of several travel aggregators like tripadvisor.in, kayak.com etc here customer just have to make a single search of flight, hotel or whatever product he is looking for then aggregator portal offer him prices offer by all major suppliers on a single screen. Hence he can simply opt for the cheapest one or one he is looking for since aggregator website will direct him to supplier’s website too but in return aggregators charge the supplier directly.

Promotion Strategy

Marketing of strategy of 4p’s is not enough in case of E-Tourism. Most of companies had spend lot of money on marketing using social networking sites, trade shows, discount coupons, e-mail marketing without even realizing their business potential and some of them succeed and some of them  end up with heavy loss.

When the promotions are over, customers evidently believe the regular prices are excessive and turn to rival products (Sinha, 2000).

Customer will easily get to know if your rival is selling same product even few rupees lesser than you and customer don’t even hesitate in buying from him. Here your customer relationship management skills will work customer don’t hesitate if you charge him little bit of extra in return with excellent customer service. Example – While purchasing train tickets online majority of peoples don’t hesitate in paying couple of extra service fees to consolidator (like makemytrip.com) just because that portal is giving him personalized service and 24*7 customer service backup through several channels like webchat, toll free numbers, call back assistance etc while if customer has to cancel the booking consolidator can cancel for him anytime whereas government system provide him service for limited hours and moreover customer has to walk up to reservation counter for every amendments in case of physical ticket.

Active participation on social networking sites, distributing e-newsletters or promotional offers through e-mail, SEO, PPC play a vital role in development of organization.

Now a day’s suppliers are equally focusing to capture mobile market as well. Majority of peoples today use smart mobile phones in order to access any information, so designing mobile website or application has become equally important. Almost every big organization have introduced Android or windows application for their customers so that customers can easily access  their services and moreover installation of application increase probability of repeat bookings since organizations can ask customers preferences while installing application hence that information help sales and marketing team to understand the needs of customer and allow them to share only relevant promotional messages with customer. And that’s the reason most of the organizations offer special offers for first or first few transactions because they want more and more customer s to use their application as it create more probability of repeat business.

Online Communities and E-Tourism

Along with vast growth in number of internet users in both metro and non-metro cities.

There are 2 types of online Communities – Commercial ( .com) and Non-Commercial ( .org)

But E-Tourism is linked with both communities since customer can book online and share feedback of service in the form of a blog on aggregator website like a customer book a hotel on hotels.com and share its review on tripadvisor.in. Similarly most of the organizations including Hotels, Resorts, Travel agents, Restaurants have their webpage on social networking sites like facebook.com and twitter.com etc hence customer is free to write a good or bad review on social networking sites as well.

In above case Hotels.com and Tripadvisor.in is commercial website whereas facebook.com and Twitter.com is meant for non-commercial use but social networking sites can also be used as a mode to express views among friends and family.

Anyone can access reviews in above mention networking sites hence it become the core key deliverable area of service provider to listen to customer and revert him back with a resolution and request customer to remove that blog if that is negative as it create negative image of organization. Organization is also required to train their staff so that they can handle such cases professionally.

E-Tourism

While purchasing online peoples sometimes feel spectical about the trust worthiness of online transaction. Along with growth of E-Commerce , cyber crime has also increased hence it is quite obvious that a normal man will think twice before spending his hard earn money.

According to Kramer (1999), trust is a complex statement because individuals do not know what the motives and intentions of others are.

Kimery and McCard (2002) define trust as customer’s willingness to accept weakness in an online transaction based on their positive expectations regarding future online store behaviour.

Hence most of the peoples prefer to book with brand names because of the trust they have created in the market.

It also becomes equally important for the finance department of the organizations to keep a track of all transactions. Organization is liable to immediately inform customer about the fail or pending transactions since a single bad review or bad online blog of customer can hamper the image of organization. It cost 10 times to attract a new customer as compare to retain a existing one hence customer relationship management equally play a important role in development of organization and can also help to reduce marketing and promotions budget.

Conclusion

India is among fastest growing E-Commerce market in Asia-Pacific region.  E-Tourism has made life simple since today’s consumer is looking for maximum output with minimum wastage of time and E-Tourism platform allow customer to access all travel related information on a single webpage. E-Tourism has developed along with help of ICT and E-Commerce and can be used to sell, promote all tourism related products. The convenience of service and 24*7 accessibility allow customer to use service according to his convenience. Content/Crawlers of the website allow customer to search you in the mob hence website development and maintenance also play a vital role in E-Tourism. ICT work as a bridge between service providers and customers since technology created the link between CRS and Online portals which allow portals to easily process transactions through automation. E-Tourism also helps to promote Indian tourism and aware tourists about do’s and don’ts. Various techniques like google pay per click, search engine optimization, social media, e-mail marketing, working with travel aggregator websites, mobile applications can be used in order to increase website traffic. Organizations are also required to make sure that they are using trustworthy merchant and there payment gateway is smooth so that they can assure customers that their money is in safe hands.

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