Future of Travel Portal Development: How it makes tourism business shine

Travel portal development remains the profitable sectors globally, which is expected to revive the travel and hospitality industry from the dark side of COVID19.

Obviously, travel portals are the gift of the internet revolution in the travel and tourism business. Accordingly, it is changing the way people perceive information online induces the rapid alter the paradigm. In which, travel portals give users to be more proactive in browsing and booking travel packages, while it also creates the new competitive advantages to travel-tech companies against the traditional business. In this article, we will discuss how to travel portal development create a new picture of the travel industry.

Why travel portal development important?

The travel portal software is commonly known as an online marketplace, which allows users to get information, comparing the trips and services of several companies in a single site. Currently, a travel portal development company offers the software in both mobile and web applications instead of only website form in the past.

An overview of travel portal software

Along with the rapid changes in the technology market, tons of information have published on the internet each day. Every second, one person is predicted to post averages of 1.7 megabytes of additional data by the end of 2020, contributing to an ocean of human knowledge. However, the overwhelming social media and information cause people to struggle with searching the best fitting one.

In the travel and tourism context, customers claimed that they got trouble browsing thousands of tour companies’ websites to plan their vacation. As a result, the travel portal solution was born to solve those problems. As the comprehensive travel marketplace, travelers and agencies could shop all they need in one place with competitive prices, from airfare search to hotel booking.

In practice, there are four popular types of travel portal software:

1. Air ticket, train, or coach ticket booking system: Skyscaner.com, Matrix ITA software, kayak.com, etc.
2. Holiday packages booking: Yatra.com, Trivago.com, Goibibo.com, etc.
3. Hotel and accommodations: Booking.com, airbnb.com, agoda.com, etc.
4. Car rental booking: Turo, Getaround, Zipcar, etc.

The most attractive side of travel portal software refers to provide a direct comparison of several options from many sellers in the market. Additionally, due to the competition in the marketplace, sellers have an incentive to offer promotions and discounts to catch customer attention. That is why users get to approach the more affordable price than booking in the original site.

Recently, many travel agencies and entrepreneurs demand to get travel portal software since the demand for the advance trip booking online is predicted to be on the rise even in post-COVID19. Whereas, many experts believe that the travel industry will recover at the beginning of 2021 that the travel portal will be seemingly the king.

Related article: Feature set for improving travel experience

However, finding the appropriate travel portal development company might not a walkover mission due to the overwhelming software development company being available in the market. The best travel portal development vendors will comprehensively perceive your expectations and requirements. Commonly, you can outsource the entire development process that the travel software developers will take charge of a full-stack process from design to deployment.

How travel portal development benefit tourism and hospitality industry

1. Cost efficiency  

The travel agent portal is believed to cut down the cost of adopting several tools to trip planning and booking. Additionally, the travel company has more chance to approach customer due to significant traffic volume to the portal site each month, which reduce the advertising and promotion costs.

In the business context, the travel marketplace appreciates the transparency of companies and services they offer. In which, customers rarely face with scam or financial risks. Then, they can enjoy a better product at lower prices. Instead of reducing the margin profit, travel companies still get growth due to the increase in numbers of orders.

2. Reducing the maintenance cost and effort  

As the virtual platform, the travel portal marketplace helps agencies save the amount invested in office facilities, printed flyers, and brochures. Due to the digital form of all materials, customers can handily access through their smartphones, while companies can save the effort of storing the hard format of those materials. Besides, the cost of running and maintaining travel portal software is the responsibility of the app owners and their software outsourcing vendors. In this case, a dedicated development team will take charge of helping the travel portal work smoothly.

3. Real-time access in travel portal development

Without manual control, customers and a travel agent can handily access the offers on a real-time basis. With the instant updates from independent vendors, offers in a travel portal app steadily renew with real-time prices, available slots, and promotions.

On the other hand, many travel portals allow travel and tourism businesses to access the database of customers to analyze customer behavior. In which, they can timely adjust the business strategies, which appropriately adapt to the current trends in the travel market.

4. Automation in customer support  

Chatbot and AI application technology can provide 24/7 customer support, which reduces the cost of hiring workers. The travel portal apps commonly develop solutions, which provide instant Q&A services. In which, customers immediately find their answers, leading to higher satisfaction and then increase in order rate.

Related article: What are the must-have features of a travel app 

What trends will shape the global travel portal development?

More potential follow by more competitive. Expressly, not all travel portal business performs successfully in the market. Apart from reasons related to the miss-control of the business, failure in up-to-date with the technology trends lead to the lagging behind several companies. Let us summarize what travel portal software will look like in the future.

Power of data, big data analytic

IoT and big data might not be the future technology anymore but a present gift. Travel portal software promises consisting of data collections from several sources, which is accessible via mobile devices apps. Most travel software solutions combine with machine learning, which provides instant data analysis, assisting travel companies in planning their future strategies. Besides, with a shared database, the business will get to access insights from other enterprises, making the market performances more clear. By which, travel experts handily design the fitting packages, which pursue customers need.

Virtual and Augmented reality (VR and AR)

Recently, VR and AR have started to develop as part of travel portal software, which will be expectedly the most innovative portion of the travel and tourism industry shortly. VR and AR allow users to experience the thrill of the chosen destination from home. Users can imagine how exciting tour packages are and get to order. In practice, experts propose that the mobile app development applied VR and AR technology will boost the curiosity of users, leading to rapid expansion in the using volume.

Focus on B2B trips

Luxury travel might suffer challenging in the approach a large group of customers due to the high cost beyond the affordability of the majority. However, company trips for both business and leisure is another side of the story that companies are more willing to pay for luxury tourism. Selling trips for the business sector help travel agencies selling a large package without effort.

On the other hand, a tremendous amount of travel packages come up with complicated management and promotion, cause the market is built-in credit and reputation. This decade is predicted to witness the booming of B2B travel agent portal, which require verified players and customer.

Enhancing security in travel portal development

Cybersecurity and privacies are till challenging travel software development companies. Reports calculate that every 40 seconds, there will be one cyber attract incident that happened in somewhere, while roundly 300 privacy data have stolen each second. The majority of cyber attract aimed at the payment system, causing portal business vulnerable.

Recently, travel portal development commonly integrates with payment gateway, allow customers to make a payment right on the portal without redirect to any other site. It undeniably provides convenience and motivation for retaining customers, but it also poses the threat of cyber securities to both business and customers. Whereas, travel portal development in the future would focus more on defying cyber attract by advancing security features.

Global vs. Local travel

The next trends in the travel market might be related to the changes in travel behavior after the coronavirus outbreak. Many countries plan to promote domestic tourism instead of encouraging people to book international trips. In this case, governments will put an effort to support travel companies in offering domestic packages to revive its travel industry. In the next five years, the selling local travels will take the crown.

Land and road travel take the crown of aviation

COVID-19 has revealed the hidden peril behind the booming of the airline industry. In which, airplane refers to the fundamental source of infection among countries, which rapidly spread the disease to Europe and America in a short period. In particular, many countries got struggling with the control of international air travel due to potential conflicts in the global relationship.

Since the coronavirus pandemic has a rare sign of ending this year, land travel seemingly enjoys strong support from the authority sector. In fact, regulators would handle the social conditions against the state of emergency much easily than manage aviation travel. Additionally, as the global economy suffered fierce depression, people tend to prefer affordable travel packages. In which, traveling by land is expected to attract the majority. As a result, the future strategies of the travel portal business will focus on providing traffic alteration schemes, on-travel information, and alternative route options.