Social Commerce takes Center Stage at our 3rd annual Travel Tech Summit

Social Commerce is one of those areas that is really easy to overlook; especially if you are closer to 45 years old than to 25. Even worse, Social Commerce can often feel like a term created by Baby Boomers who are trying to market to Zillennials. But over the past 18 months it has become clear to me that Social Commerce, and what my friends at Joyned call Social Revenue, is not a fad or new marketing craze but in reality, it is the way the next generation of travelers and consumers are engaging with and experiencing the Web.

I often use my friend Shir Ibgui as an example. I will never forget the conversation in which she told me that when she needs a recipe for dinner, new décor for her home, ideas for her next trip, or simply looking for entertainment - social is always the first, and usually only, stop. The way in which she spoke about Social Commerce made it immediately clear that this was not about humble brags or even about finding an easier path to shop or search but in reality Social Commerce goes much deeper.

Social Commerce is about trust, community, and connection. Every generation seeks trust and over the past 100 years consumers seeking trust and validation created the BBB (Better Business Bureau), elevated trusted sources (think of the dominance of the Sears catalog), and invented Tupperware parties where you can touch and feel before you buy. At their core, all of these novel approaches were about establishing trust, not dissimilar from Social Commerce.

Soon after learning all of this, I met Konrad Waliszewski of @hotel and my eyes were further opened to the reality that this Social Commerce trend is not only real and impactful but ready for scale. And of course, Social Commerce is not new to us at the Virtuoso Travel Tech Summit as last year we were fortunate to hear from my friend Stuart Greif about the topic during one of our Deep Dive Sessions.

So this is the Why. I decided to highlight Social Commerce at this year's Tech Summit because it's here, it's ready for prime time, and there is an enormous generation of travelers who seek social commerce solutions when building trust, shopping, and engaging with the web and your brands.

Thus, for the future of our businesses, we need to pay attention.

We kicked off each of our Deep Dive Sessions with a Q&A with one of our Main Stage presenters and I was fortunate to participate here. Most of our conversation at the Opening of this session was about the concept of the Connected Trip. This is a topic I have covered at length but I found both the passion and audible frustration at the lack of connectivity to be an inspiration to continue to push on this front.

One of our participants wisely pointed out that Travel Advisors and other travel professionals also need access to this data flow to enable them to excel at their jobs and care for their clients. This reinforces my belief that this really is the win win win we all seek.

Bryan London from Joyned kicked off our Startup Showcase with a great presentation. Bryan reminded us that when consumers make considered purchases they almost always collaborate and seek the input of others. Today, most brands force these natural conversations off of their platforms and sites and onto an endless number of social and communication platforms. This is a bad consumer experience as well as a poor way for a brand to engage customers and close a sale. This is the core of Joyned's innovation. They presented their B2B2C Group Buying Platform that is able to turn any company site or app into a social engaging and trust-building experience.

Joyned is a great example and lesson in how to think about bringing the best of Social Commerce onto your own site so you can build trust while maintaining the customer, while at the same time collecting invaluable data. This is the type of flywheel I love to speak about.

Vanessa Karel from Greether reminded us that for 50% of the population, women, there are additional concerns and areas in which trust must be earned. Vanessa showed us how her company is addressing the challenges and concerns many women face when traveling, such as safety and lack of local connections through the creation of the Greeter marketplace that connects female travelers with verified local "greeters" - women in the destination who can provide personalized guidance, recommendations, and companionship. Another perfect example of how we can use social connection to build trust and drive business.

Greether is of course also a great example of the growth in new agency models which is another one of my macro trends.

Up next was Robert Matsuoka speaking for Globe Thrivers . Bob, or Masa as I call him, spent many years as a senior leader at Trip advisor and brought with him the knowledge that Trip Advisor's Forums were the stickiest part of their business but one that Trip did not know how to properly monetize. These learnings from his time at Trip are what excites Masa about Globe Thrivers' community-driven approach to trip planning and discovery.

Masa also spoke about one of my AI predictions, the coming merging of knowledge graphs and LLMs, which is a killer combination to offer truly one-to-one personalization. It's this data, combined with insights from a like-minded community, that are part of the future of the personalized travel experience.

Next we heard from Andy Acs of @hotel . I love @hotel for many reasons but primarily because they opened my eyes to the reality that Social Commerce was ready for scale. Andy spoke eloquently about the importance of your brand being Omni present where ever the traveler is dreaming and discovering; which for many is on social media. As I used to tell all of our Utrip clients, when a traveler dreams you need to be part of that dream and this is where @hotel has excelled.

Andy also shared some invaluable advice with all of us, reminding us that in the social era content must be entertaining, fun, and informational all at once. And when it comes time for a booking it has to be integrated and streamlined to complete the transaction. The benefit is not only increased engagement and conversion today but a much easier path to repeat business.

Lastly, Andy shared a differentiated philosophy that we can all learn from. Before @hotel spends money on ads, marketing, or sales efforts, they ask themselves if that money could be better invested in entertaining and engaging their audience and thus creating something of value for their fans instead of just enriching the big ad platforms.

Lastly, we heard from Hannes Bos of TravelGenius Pte Ltd who joined us all the way from Dubai. There are several reasons why Travel Genius was a great presenter at our 3rd annual Virtuoso Travel Tech Summit including their focus on accessible travel and their technologys ability to help travel advisors and other travel sellers answer critical questions about the physical space with speed and ease like never before. Ultimately, Travel Genius is building a data and insight layer that will help all of us understand, optimize, and better utilize physical space.

Another important reason I wanted them at the Summit is that at this year's Summit one of my macro goals was to highlight many different use cases of AI beyond GenAI itinerary creation and Travel Genius's use of Computer Vision was a perfect addition to our conversation. ?

There were so many incredible insights and learnings shared during this Deep Dive Session that I could not be more grateful to all of our presenters and innovators who shared their learnings with us.

A few key themes that emerged across the various presentations include:

1. Leveraging social media and visuals to inspire and facilitate travel planning and booking, particularly for younger, digitally-native travelers.
2. Integrating human expertise and local connections to enhance the traveler experience, whether through collaborative trip planning, personalized destination guidance, or accessibility insights.
3. Employing AI and knowledge graphs to personalize the travel journey and streamline decision-making, from trip ideation to booking.
4. Focusing on underserved traveler segments, such as women, Gen Z/Millennials, and those with disabilities, to better address their unique needs and pain points.