Matt Goldberg travel tips

Hidden in Tripadvisor’s latest earnings from earlier this week was some updates on its AI-based trip planning feature that it launched in July, along with some concrete numbers on performance of AI-assisted travel planning.

This isn’t the old Tripadvisor, the one where the company was dependent on metasearch and chasing advertising clicks. At the new Tripadvisor, users can use generative AI for trip-planning and to book experiences, dining reservations and hotels.

The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) has announced its latest round of high-profile speakers for its upcoming Global Summit, featuring top leaders from the world’s leading Travel & Tourism businesses.

Viator unveiled its latest brand campaign with two new video ads on Monday. The online travel agency for travel experiences takes aim at common travel planning disasters and uses a catchphrase theme of “Regret Less. Do More.”

Glenn Fogel, the CEO of both Booking Holdings and its flagship brand, Booking.com, was the highest-paid travel CEO among the bosses of S&P 500 companies in 2023, with a total package of $46.7 million.

Tripadvisor stated this morning that a merger is not in the works for now.

It’s been two months since Liberty Tripadvisor announced it was exploring a potential sale of itself and Tripadvisor, which it controls. Tripadvisor, in turn, formed an independent committee to vet any deals.

Ever since Liberty Tripadvisor disclosed in early February that it was exploring a potential transaction in which itself and Tripadvisor would be acquired in an all-cash deal, speculation was rife that a private equity firm was behind the possible move.

The obituary for the Tripadvisor Plus subscription plan, which offered hotel and experiences discounts in exchange for a $99 annual fee, was all but written more than two years ago.

The prospect of a deal to acquire Tripadvisor hung over the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call Thursday and executives didn’t offer any further details.

How will the largest of the tours-and-activities marketplaces — Viator, GetYourGuide, and Klook — grow and compete in 2024? 

Tripadvisor’s national ad campaign touting its Viator tours and activities brand includes a spot called “Viator Makes Museum Tours Juicy Again.”

Further investments in Tripadvisor’s Viator tours and activities brand, as well as making Tripadvisor’s core hotel price-comparison feature more relevant to travelers will likely be key elements of the company’s turnaround strategy, executives hinted, although they plan on first laying out their complete vision to investors in 2023.

Tripadvisor is considering revamping its Tripadvisor Plus membership plan, turning it into a free service in its initial stages, and then figuring out a more meaningful path to monetize it at some point later.

It’s been eight years since Tripadvisor took over Viator. And while Tripadvisor at one point downplayed Viator as an acquired brand, Tripadvisor could now be changing tack with its current two-brand experiences strategy. 

Good morning from Skift. It’s Friday, May 5. Here’s what you need to know about the business of travel today.

What will the new Tripadvisor look like? CEO Matt Goldberg, on the job since July, laid out the vision and some of the early results as part of the company’s first quarter earnings announcement.

Tripadvisor is currently attempting a turnaround under a new CEO hired in 2022, and one of the reasons it needs one is Google had used its market power to divert users to sponsored ads and take back the free traffic Tripadvisor benefited from.

This story began with a promotion featured in an email from my credit card company, Capital One, and it took me aback: “Save up to 30% off on your Instant Book hotel with Tripadvisor.”

Tripadvisor and its Viator tours and activities brand compete against amply funded and privately held GetYourGuide as the largest players in this sector. So it was intriguing when the Tripadvisor’s CEO said at a recent investor conference that his experiences business “is larger and faster growing.”

Viator continues to be the star performer for Tripadvisor, accounting for 44% of the company’s total revenue in the second quarter of this year. But its parent company is spending nearly as much money as it generates to elevate Viator’s positioning as an experiences platform.