Google and Travel "Good Together"?

This past October I had the pleasure of attending Google's Think Travel symposium in Madrid where the future of travel was discussed, and challenged by over 400 attendees.

 Google's think travel symposium Travel Think Madrid was well attended and Google’s travel tools were the highlight of the presentation. Let’s face it, Google is not designing a tool to sell travel, it is designing a tool to sell advertising, so if they accomplish what many in the industry have not been able to do.  Which is eliminate the need for a middleman while replacing that channel with another, then there will be a fundamental change in our industry, and we need to take notice.

The travel industry as we know it is probably one of the most fragmented businesses in the world, and probably the most misunderstood. We sell an expectation of someone’s dream; it is as complicated, as the individual experiencing it.  That experience is not so simple to convey to a large audience, and thus we need to design our services to satisfy segments. Suppliers and distributors alike will need to concentrate on our strengths as travel providers, and work together to increase, and deliver our services as seamlessly as possible. Leaner and more efficient will be the order of the day for companies of the future. This may entail cooperative marketing, joint operations, or simply choosing the right partner to work with in order to get your product through the maze, that is the world wide web. This may be self serving, but there is still no better way to do this, than to work with tour operators.   

Tools for travel are wonderful for research and planning, but there is nothing like destination knowledge to design an experience, that will fit the needs of todays travelers.  This is what tour operator do very well, and one would be hard pressed to match this on their own with an OTA.