More and more major companies in the travel industry are signalling the fact that metasearch is indeed becoming a major thing in the travel industry. Unlike other similar ideas, metasearch didn’t really have a glamorous beginning but the concept is sound.
The idea here is very simple, you will need to compare a multitude of searchers in an independent fashion, all so that the consumer has a much better understanding of the market. Otherwise fragmented and consuming, the market becomes more cohesive and professional with the help of metasearch. This was pioneered as a great model in 1999, but at that particular time the idea was rather limited and without a great functionality, which was quite a challenge and problem at that particular time.
This particular trend has managed to influence the travel world quite a lot, offering some very interesting ideas in regards to how businesses can run and how they are made in order to bring in the best possible results.
The one that actually takes the booking is very important, because metasearch makes the entire search process a lot simpler, faster and more convenient. This means that a much better focus is made on the quality of the results, which does benefit the end user.
You can find some companies though that are more focused on blending the meta and OTA model. While this might not be the best way to go, it’s something real that truly happens and which does bring in some interesting results.
When it comes to the mobile world, metasearch does have an early lead on that as well, because it manages to further improve the usage experience of the mobile users, while also offering them with the options they need in order to find a good hotel and book the travel faster.
The interesting factor that appears for rising companies such as SkyScanner for example, which has managed to grow a lot in America and Asia, comes from the fact that the company focuses a lot on using metasearch as a great way to differentiate itself from the OTAs which are trying to dominate the market in a very general fashion.
Despite being a global phenomenon, metasearch does come with its own sort of challenges along the way. The competition intensifies a lot and all the players on the market need to optimize the best way they can in order to optimize for the age that’s coming in right now. One of the main concerns that appears is that the tour operators are actually publishing rates on the metasearch sites. This is a bad practice that has to be stopped, mainly because they are leading towards a complete undercutting of the entire market. It’s something that’s very hard to achieve and which might not be able to give you the results you want.
Yet another metasearch trend comes from the fact that the user gets an even broader range of hotel choices, which means that brands can become diluted.
In the end though, metasearch is a trend that quickly catches on, and which does help the end user a lot. How it will actually evolve in the future it remains to be seen, but one thing is certain, the results will be well worth it and this is all that matters in the end!
