According to online travel site Wego, the travel industry is growing due to the convenience of using meta search sites and the explosion of social media
THIS year saw a lot of shifting travel trends and people travelled more frequently and sought new destinations from traditionally popular routes, said chief executive officer Ross Veithc of online travel site Wego.
These conclusions were based from the flight search throughout the travel metasearch in Asia Pacific and Middle East regions throughout last year.
?The comfort and security of using our metasearch was clearly reflected in the increasing number of users across all our localised country sites, along with our rapidly growing inventory of airline, hotel and OTA partners that helped them to explore their travel options,? he said.
Core market observations are:
AUSTRALIA
Australia?s top 10 reflects its proximity to Asian capitals such as Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and Hong Kong, while Bali, Manila and Phuket remain jumping off points for popular holiday resort locations.
?With the drop in the Australian dollar towards the end of last year, one might expect Aussies to lean towards more domestic travel. However, popular short haul destinations like Phuket, Bali, Fiji and New Zealand still resonate among them,? said Matthew Varley, COO of Wego.
?The Qantas-Emirates alliance continues to provide connectivity to Dubai and onwards to Europe, a route that we expect will remain strong in 2014.?
SINGAPORE
?Bangkok has long been a top destination for Singaporeans because of its short travelling time, plenty of promotions on flights and accommodation for budget conscious travellers. It is also a food and shopping haven and the Singapore dollar has been consistently strong against the Thai baht,? observed Dave Lai, Wego?s market development manager for Singapore and Malaysia.
There?s also an increase in Singaporean holidays to Ho Chi Minh and Hanoi also due to close proximity and active LCC promotions. In recent years, Jetstar added a daily route to Ho Chi Minh and flies to Hanoi four times weekly.
?It?s interesting that Taipei and Seoul have been increasing in popularity for the past three years. I believe they will continue to do so as Singaporeans consider exploring other North Asia destinations aside from Hong Kong.?
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