The Rise of the Silent Traveler:

Skift is proposing a new model to look at

the mobile-first travel consumer. The silent

traveler is the travel consumer who turns

to their mobile devices first, seeking a

solution to in-trip challenges that used to

be the primary domain of customer- service

staff. In this report, we examine the changes

that these customers are creating across

numerous verticals in the industry — and

we look at the important opportunities they

now present to travel brands that can adapt

to their dynamic and evolving expectations.

SKIFT REPORT #20

2014

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By James O’Brien + Skift Team

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Sponsored by

Reaching Out to the Mobile-First Travel Consumer

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Available now for iPhone and Android.

The Rise of the Silent Traveler SKIFT REPORT #20 2014

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Egencia® is a leading global travel management company (TMC) and part of the Expedia® group – one of the world’s largest travel companies. Egencia helps companies increase the productivity of their business travel by delivering inno-vative, intuitive online and mobile solutions and expert travel consultant services for both travelers and travel managers. With Egencia, business travel is more efficient and easier to manage making it a more cost-effective investment for 10,000 Egencia customer enterprises in over 60 countries worldwide.

Bringing Consumer-inspired Innovation to Corporate Travel

Egencia develops and deploys its own global technology, infusing it with insights into the user experience from its parent company, Expedia. Egencia seamlessly integrates consumer-grade usability, robust inventory and expert customer ser-vice into a global corporate travel management system. This system makes the business travel experience better – from planning, to booking, to completing the trip – while giving corporations what they need in terms of policy control, reporting, and duty of care.

Mobile Solutions for Modern and Future Travelers

Egencia’s mobile application, Egencia® TripNavigator, dramatically improves the in-trip experience of business travelers, provides step-by-step naviga-tion, last-minute mobile hotel booking and integrated access to Egencia corporate travel consultants. Using technology developed for Expedia’s con-sumer travel mobile apps, among the most popular apps in the world, Trip-Navigator offers business travelers smart, state-of-the-art features that are perfectly aligned with their companies’ travel management requirements.

For more information, please visit www.egencia.com or email hello@egencia.com.

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Trends Report

The implications of an increasingly independent, mobile-equipped consumer are far-reaching for every vertical in the travel industry. Even as airlines, hotels, and in-destination attractions and offerings continue to rely upon meaningful interactions with their customer, a significant segment of travelers are turning first, in new and pow-erful ways, to their devices to solve trip-related challenges that have historically been resolved by in-person experiences.

From booking to getting there, to what the consumer does in-destination, this silent traveler, as we have termed the model of their behavior and choices, is typically both young and possessed of significant spending power in the marketplace. And while their move to mobile as a first choice in solving travel problems is driving a range of changes for brands, these consumers are simultaneously creating new emphases on more complex and highly personalized experiences at the times when they do turn to on-site staff.

Emerging from this mix of pulling away and drawing close, for the silent traveler and travel brands, are new models and approaches for both customer relations and local discovery. As brands and third-party developers seek to capture the attention of the self-reliant, digitally savvy traveler on mobile screens — bringing about a spectrum of opportunities in the realm of apps, ad tech, and hybrid approaches — the conversation is turning to how the very devices that stand to take some tasks away from the human-to-human ex-perience can perhaps ultimately more intimately connect the travel industry to its customers throughout every trip.

Executive summary

The Rise of the Silent Traveler SKIFT REPORT #20 2014

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Table of contents

About Skift

Skift is a travel intel-ligence company that offers news, data, and services to professionals in travel and professional travelers, to help them make smart decisions about travel.

Skift is the business of travel.

Executive Summary 5

Introduction 6

Defining the silent traveler 9

Reaching the silent traveler 11

Terminal matters: the silent traveler and airlines 11

Hotels and the silent traveler 13

Discovery: the silent traveler in-destination 14

Additional avenues to the silent traveler 16

Outreach: ad tech and the silent traveler 16

Hybrid service iterations 17

The Rise of the Silent Traveler: What

does it mean for Travel Buyers? 18

Insights and Strategies 20

About Skift 21

Endnotes 22

The Rise of the Silent Traveler SKIFT REPORT #20 2014

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