Content affiliates to drive future growth

Eleven travel suppliers, advertisers, agencies and affiliates, including Thomas Cook, TUI, British Airways, Agency.com, eConversions and Artemis8, gathered together recently to debate key industry issues, with a number of key findings on what they thought would drive growth in the travel sector. The meeting, organised by affiliate marketing company Commission Junction, concluded the future growth…

Eleven travel suppliers, advertisers, agencies and affiliates, including Thomas Cook, TUI, British Airways, Agency.com, eConversions and Artemis8, gathered together recently to debate key industry issues, with a number of key findings on what they thought would drive growth in the travel sector.

The meeting, organised by affiliate marketing company Commission Junction, concluded the future growth prospects for the online travel industry will come predominantly from content affiliates.
 
Among other findings, the attendees believe that search is saturated within the context of affiliate marketing, and that content will become even more critical to the growth of the industry

“We look at the saturation of search.  I think content is an important thing.  I know that personally we are getting involved in a lot more content rich sites than ever before.  Our hand has been forced by search engine quality changes and saturation in paid search.” said one affiliate.

Attendees also believe that, while mobile will eventually play an important role, it will not make a significant impact for another two to three years.

The group also saw reward and loyalty sites as an area that should see aggressive growth.
 
Commission structures, de-duplication, brand control, communication between advertisers and affiliates and user generated content were amongst other issues discussed during the meeting.