| Follow the Herd ... and Fail! |
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Copyright SitePoint.com - With the business part of my overseas trip done with, my wife and I had a little holiday. We were in Paris and stopped in at a travel agent to enquire about getting a flight to Venice late that afternoon. After much umming and aaaaaring they found a flight for us, for 680 Euro (that's $810 US) each.
Two minutes later, in an Internet cafe, I bought the tickets for 45 Euro each ($53 US), and saved myself $1,500 US. The question I asked myself is "How can travel agents compete with that?" The answer is easy -- they don't. Most research reports indicate that the Internet has overtaken (or is rapidly overtaking) travel agents as the preferred method of booking travel and accommodation. I see the travel agents' predicament as being similar to that of offline music retailers. There doesn't seem to be any offering coming forward that makes me want to buy music in a store. There's no incentive -- no added value. In business, we all need constantly to adapt to our market's changing needs. For instance:
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