Akamai Technologies have released the findings of a report that studied consumer responses to travel website preformance. The general feedback from the research was that if your site is not fast enough, you will lose out on bookings BIG TIME.

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Google have recently been making a push to move into the online travel industry by making various travel related acquisitions. In their latest move, it was believed that Google had acquired a company called Ruba – a travel guide and tour review website. It appears, however, that this is not strictly true as Google dispelled the rumours by explaining that they are merely collaborating with the team behind Ruba.

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Priceline today reported its financial results for the 1st quarter 2010. Gross travel bookings for the 1st quarter, which refers to the total dollar value (generally inclusive of all taxes and fees) of all travel services purchased by consumers, were $3.0 billion, an increase of 52.5% over a year ago.

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Google Places (formerly known as ‘Google Local Business Center’) is a great tool for any business. This is especially true for the hotel industry where online consumers often consider location to be a priority over other factors. Google maps (mobile or otherwise) provides the consumer with the ability to search for all hotels within a certain area, but for your hotel to appear in the localised search results it has to have been registered with Google Places. Here’s how to make the most of this extremely useful feature…

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Destinations in Ireland have appeared multiple times in TripAdvisor’s most recent “Travelers’ Choice Destination Awards”. The most impressive of which comes from Ireland’s third largest city, Galway, which was voted to be the 23rd best destination in the world.

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The computer age is creating a generation of children who would rather explore the world virtually than take foreign holidays, according to a new report.

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As a regular feature we will be posting articles written by industry leaders with thought provoking ideas and tips. Journalist, editor and author Frank Corr, the first of our ‘guest bloggers’, posted our first guest blog post ‘What to do with Zombie Hotels’ which was extremely well received. This article is his second contribution and is sure to be equally as highly regarded. Keep an eye out for more ‘guest blogger’ posts in the future.

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Google are currently in discussions to aquire Travel Software maker ITA. It is thought the online giant could use ITA Software’s tools to compete with travel-search features offered by rivals Microsoft. ITA Software could request around $1 billion for their aquisition by Google, who have already announced 6 takeovers this year.

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Experience of many years has taught me to be wary of reports by consultants whose findings are identical to the agendas of their clients. So it was with some caution last November, that I leafed through the document from economist Peter Bacon which argued for the closure of 15,000 guestrooms in Irish hotels. It had been commissioned by the Irish Hotels Federation which had been arguing for exactly the same outcome for the best part of a year.

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