Expedia and Lastminute announce digital agency deals

Expedia and lastminute.com have announced deals with digital agencies.

Expedia and

London-based Essence has won a three-way competitive pitch for a pan-European online advertising account for Expedia, covering display, partnerships, social media and mobile.

There will be a focus on “forging new strategic European and local partnerships with key media players across the various territories”. Essence will also be responsible for a major push in the Nordic region.

Alex Gisbert, director, online partner marketing, EMEA, Expedia, commented on Essence’s “innovative technological expertise”.

Multi-channel analytics  provided by Essence’s proprietary media management platform Olive will be a key part of the relationship.

Towards the end of last year, Essence was selected to handle display and social networking for Holiday Cottages. The account, which also saw Efficient Frontier pick up the search advertising brief, is worth £8million.

The OTA is getting “a managed solution that enables marketers to compare and analyse customers by leisure interests, purchasing behaviour and history,” according to a press release.

Lastminute.com’s European marketing director Mark Newton added: “We have to get even better at using data to improve our customer marketing and make it core to what we do as a business.”

SmartFocus’ other travel clients include Holidaybreak.