In the airline industry, "offer and order management" has been seriously talked about for some years now. But for many of the OTAs, tour operators and retail travel agencies that sell airline products, the concept remains largely unknown.
What exactly is offer and order management? Simply put, this emerging technological method of selling airline products – and perhaps one day other travel products such as accommodation – is essentially based on the principles of good, modern retail. What's the score? Once implemented, it allows airlines to create and distribute personalized offers to travelers.
Why is it important for distributors and sellers of airline products? As industry pressure for bid/ask adoption grows, we asked B2B travel tech industry experts how they think this will change the travel landscape and what to expect.
Vibe, a provider of booking technology for online travel sellers, believes bid-ask will allow new players to enter the travel space, perhaps through new retailer partnerships. "Travelers are currently faced with a limited choice when booking airline products, coupled with a complex and time-consuming booking process that is often carried out through multiple channels," said Martin Eade. "Request for offers will eliminate these frustrations by presenting travelers with a range of travel options that are relevant, easy to book and tailored to their needs. Removing complexity for travelers will likely translate into better conversion rates and open the doors to airlines to offer new services and therefore new players - B2C websites that may not sell travel products at the moment - to enter the market.
However, Trava's Maxim Sevastianov, whose technology is revolutionizing post-booking processes for online travel sellers, sees a big opportunity for existing retail operators: "Currently, airlines struggle to get useful information on the individual preferences of their travelers, so they cannot offer precisely personalized products. At the same time, airlines have the added difficulty of managing complex partnerships, since much of the technology they use to do so is outdated or isolated Adopting the principles. From retail, a bid-ask environment is likely to open up a whole new world of ancillary revenue for airlines that travel distributors and intermediaries will find highly valuable both in terms of additional revenue and, more generally, keeping them happy. to customers or increase sales conversions.
Artificial intelligence could be the boost the sector needs to make offer-to-order a reality, according to Sergio Sánchez, CIO of PriceTravel, one of the largest B2B and B2C travel sellers in Latin America: "Soon, air travelers will enjoy complete transparency on all air products and services, even if they have booked through multiple channels, thanks to AI that automates and collects this information Everything will be visible in one place for the passenger, and soon there will be no need to keep track of them. multiple reference numbers for each trip. This transition has been talked about for some time, but remains a pipe dream due in part to technical limitations. However, thanks to the evolving capabilities of artificial intelligence, 2024 may be the year we start to see it come to fruition."
Airnguru, a leading provider of fare management, pricing intelligence and pricing automation solutions for airlines, is excited about the potential of bid/ask to redefine air travel retail. “The real driving force of this change will be the widespread adoption of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence,” says CEO Sergio Mendoza. "For airlines, the ultimate vision of retailing revolves around the ability to create dynamic, personalized offers for travelers. However, this requires the implementation of robust Machine Learning models continuously trained on massive, unbiased data, capable of interpreting consumers' desires and predict their willingness to pay, and recommend the right set of products at the right set of prices. 2024-2025 could mark a major turning point in this transformation, with airlines increasingly harnessing the power of ML and AI to adjust their product offerings and prices in real time, based on supply, demand and purchasing data, as well as in various contextual variables."
As a final reflection, Gareth Matthews, from the global travel distribution provider Didatravel - which in recent years has begun to sell flights as well as accommodation - reminds us that there is still some way to go. "This will be a defining moment for airline distribution and will be welcomed by online travel sellers around the world, but we must remember that we have been hearing about similar plans for more than a decade. Some airlines are integrating little by little this technology, but it is still far from being standard practice. In other words, if you are an OTA or a tour operator in a home market dominated by one or two airlines and you don't have a plan for this, basically it is as if it didn't exist - and that is the case in many markets still. Hopefully this will change over time, but don't bet the future of your business on it.
Fuente: Belvera Partners.