Tourico Holidays tasks ‘elite’ team to find cause of travel behaviour shifts

An ‘elite’ team of computer scientists has been formed by Tourico Holidays to identify the origin and cause of shifts in travel booking behaviour.

An ‘elite’ team of computer scientists has been formed by Tourico Holidays to identify the origin and cause of shifts in travel booking behaviour.

The aim is provide insights that enable distributors to optimise their marketing and sales, according to the global travel distributor.

The data mining initiative will examine more than 200 million daily travel searches and cross-reference them with travel market data available from nSight and other sources for a comprehensive analysis of industry trends.

This will ultimately allow Tourico to customise its travel solutions for clients and partners to help them build individual product offers based on regional travel trends, booking behaviour and customer profiles.

By tailoring its offerings – including hotel, air, car rental and attractions – Tourico’s partners and agents can improve conversion rates and significantly enhance bottom-line revenues, the company claims.

Tourico already uses more than 50 business intelligence modules – automating everything from ordering product listings on the Tourico website and weighing risks versus rewards on prospective partnerships to managing the company’s “ExclusiveDeals”, or pre-purchased hotel room block.

Sister company Travel Global Systems is overseeing the data mining initiative and will manage a team of 10 data scientists.

TGS was established in 2002 and serves as Tourico’s technical arm, working to design and build innovative travel technology solutions for its network of clients and partners.

Data mining team leader, Einat Aviv, said: “Our system sees billions of searches each week – providing massive piles of data on all different types of travel offerings – from air and hotel, to cruises and vacation homes.

“By combining this intelligence with the data that’s currently available in the travel ecosystem, we’re able to capture a 360 degree view of the industry – and gain a much better understanding of supplier trends and client demand. To our knowledge, this type of effort has been unprecedented in our sector of travel.

“This new initiative is huge for our business – and our industry. This is the beginning of a new chapter in travel intelligence – and the first page turns today.”