Is ChatGPT the only influencer we need?

OpenAI this week dropped a new browser called Atlas. They weren’t the first with this idea. Perplexity has one too but as ChatGPT is the hyper-scaler in the category, this could well be another moment in time where everything changes forever and predictions rain down as to who this means will DIE! (Remember when SEO died, Google died, the OTA’s died).

I think without knowing the timing would be so perfect, Sabre also dropped a new report letting us know that social media is soon to be dead, replaced by…………. a chatbot.

Sabre tells us “Social media now influences destination choices more than traditional media or even friends and family. But its ability to convert and monetize inspirations to actual bookings leaves something to be desired….. Sabre estimates that the conversion rate is under 10%.” Hmmm estimates you say…..

So did this huge % whittle down to 10%? Or did the consumers just take their time, assess their options, swan around in the middle funnel for a bit before starting to lock things in?

Most travel consumers move slowly from awareness to consideration to conversion. AI I doubt is going to change that. Fact is people like to consider their holiday options. Plenty of companies are trying to ram instantaneousness upon them - but the pesky humans are resisting that.

If we zoom out to the core premise, that a new blank white screen but one we can talk to, is about to dominate our lives, I think that is somewhat correct. But it is only replacing the current blank white screen we’ve started intentional search (that bit between consideration and conversion) on for 2 decades.

So does that mean social media is dead?

Try this exercise, next time you are on a bus or in an airport or at a cafeteria - look over people’s shoulders and see what they are doing on their phones. Are they chatting with a white screen? Or are they scrolling social media?

Yep. Thought so.

Videreo is the place where we can tell you exactly what is happening in the middle funnel from your social media investments, so these investments are never wasted. 5 new brands have joined us this week. We’d love to help you too.

Contact me to learn how we can make this happen for you.

This content is provided by the (interim) newsletter sponsor Videreo.com

Is ChatGPT any good?

According to Airbnb’s Brian Chesky, ChatGPT is OK…. but its not good enough for Airbnb.

On CNBC’s Squawk Box Chesky said they are knee deep in AI and again talked about their customer service AI which can now answer a query in 6 seconds.

The female anchor of the segment quickly cut Chesky off to make sure she could actually talk to a person - she didn’t seem to interested in talking to no chatbot….. ouch.

The segment started with a graphic that showed the stock is down and halfway through put up a graphic behind Chesky for Expedia……. who of course alongside Booking, is a launch partner for just about everything ChatGPT does.

An article by Simply Wall St. this week told the Booking tale thus: “After a sharp climb, the share price is now trading at $5,070.02, with a 1-year total shareholder return of 17.4% and a remarkable 182% over the past three years.” The reason for the growth? The investments in AI.

Maybe one of those days Brian wished he’d stayed in (air)bed.

Navan eyes $6B IPO fueled by AI tailwinds

Navan is working its way towards an IPO and what a ride it has been.

Reuters reported that after the companies last raise of $300M the company was valued at $9.2B.

“Its mooted price tag, however, is well below an earlier private valuation. Even achieving that much will probably depend on riding the artificial-intelligence hype train.” Reuters noted.

“Navan's $330 million of revenue in the six months through July 31 was a healthy 30% higher than a year earlier, while its net loss widened a bit, to $100 million. At the midpoint of the $24 to $26 price range disclosed in its latest prospectus, the company would be worth $6.2 billion, or 10 times its 2024 revenue.”

The venture game is all about throwing around big numbers and hoping when the music stops (and the retail investors are let in) you land on a big enough number that you’re satisfied.

It is hard to tell from the article whether Navan has lost $3B or the $6.2B would be a success. 🚂 

Expedia & Booking are “hijacking travel”

An impassioned article this week from Brad Brewer, the co-founder and chief AI officer of Agentic Hospitality that “A new AI duopoly is forming, and it’s happening faster than you think.”

The reason according to Brewer is the above-mentioned partnership with OpenAI.

“Just days into OpenAI’s new app marketplace, Booking.com and Expedia have seized a commanding lead. They’re not just experimenting with artificial intelligence (AI). They’re embedding themselves directly into the core of how travelers search, discover and book stays at your hotels. And because they’ve moved first—with no safeguards to stop them—they are about to become the default middlemen of the AI age.”

Brewer explains the European laws to stop monopolistic players from not playing fairly with everyone won’t cover this new AI centric reality. “But here’s where it gets tricky: the DMA doesn’t yet cover standalone AI assistants—like ChatGPT, Gemini or Perplexity—even though they are quickly becoming new gatekeepers.”

Google says get grounded with Maps

A more obscure announcement this week from Google, but one I expect we should all take heed from.

The announcement contains a video where a (somewhat impatient) Google dev interacts by voice asking some deep travel questions. The bot leverages the power of Google Maps and all its associated data to answer those questions (far more verbosely than the dev would’ve liked).

“Developers can use Grounding with Google Maps to create more intuitive and helpful experiences across travel, real estate, retail and logistics. The model automatically detects when a query has geographical context and uses Google Maps data to provide a grounded response. Google Maps uses data from places, and other related content like user reviews, as sources to help generate the response. You can provide latitude and longitude coordinates to localize search results to specific geographic locations.”

Travel is maps. Maps are travel. Something to pay attention to here.

AI is sprawling

Alan Brown this week warns us of the AI sprawl happening within companies.

“Executives and business leaders are grappling with a phenomenon that echoes the shadow IT crisis of the 2010s, but at a scale and speed never seen before. It is what we can call “AI sprawl” -- the uncontrolled proliferation of AI tools, applications, and implementations across organizations. There’s no doubt this has become one of today’s most urgent governance challenges.”

Brown tells us that data governance could be at risk and that their is a strategic cost to all this fragmentation.

“AI sprawl encompasses everything from employees using free consumer AI assistants for work tasks to teams building custom AI solutions using various cloud services, as well as departments purchasing specialized AI tools without IT involvement. Each decision may seem rational in isolation, but collectively they create an organizational landscape characterized by redundancy, inconsistency, and hidden risk.”

The whole article is worth a read if you have a C in your title or you sit on a board.

If you think someone (or everyone) you know or work with could grow from being more informed on the topic of ai + travel (or could use the training above) then please forward this email to them and they can click the button below:

Marketplace Spotlight: Propellic

Brennan Bliss this week did a deep dive into the new ChatGPT browser Atlas as a guinea pig for us all!

“I just downloaded ChatGPT Atlas and watched it book a flight for me.

Well, almost. Kind of.

Here's what happened: I asked it to check my TripIt, find a better connection flight from Chiang Mai to Bangkok (I'll be nerding out at SEO Chiang Mai next month) (my original layover was 10 hours), and keep me on the same airline to avoid loss of travel credit. It needed to give me at least 4 hours before my Abu Dhabi connection.

The thing opened tabs. Autofilled my passwords. Searched flight options. Used a booking site I didn't even know existed.

It timed out a few times, so I had to keep prompting it to continue. But it found the flight. When I asked it to make the change, it just edited my TripIt details instead of actually rebooking. It then said "you're all set."

I also am not a detail person... and I'm really glad I checked lol.”

If you have a B2B business underpinned by AI and looking for people to notice you, you can sign up to the marketplace for peanuts (top right corner, 5 mins, bring your logo).

I’ve priced for bootstrapped startups but also accepting larger companies too.

OMIO chooses Singapore for its AI transformation

OMIO the company that owns Rome2Rio and is the world’s leading multimodal travel booking platform has formed a partnership with EDBI & SG Growth Capital, the investment platform of the Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB) and Enterprise Singapore to launch a new hub in Singapore.

According to the announcement, “the new technology hub in Singapore, which opened its doors in July this year, is focused on exploring how artificial intelligence can transform global mobility. It will serve as the springboard for Omio's next chapter in travel innovation: building an AI-first platform that enables billions of people to travel seamlessly, anywhere and anyway.”

I was fortunate enough to be a judge at the recent Rome2Rio AI hack (and have the T-shirt to prove it). I hope this opens up some opportunities for some of the very talented team there to bring some of their ideas to production!

Slack Group!

Podcasts and Sponsors

Podcasts now on Spotify and Apple Podcasts:

New podcasts are now showing up on Spotify and Apple Podcasts for your easy listening pleasure!

This week I finally got the episode with Mennan Yalkenci from BookedAI about taking big swings at the B2C prize in travel with AI + UI. Thanks to the AWS meltdown and other technical meltdowns - this episode is a rare audio only episode ! A real collectors item, please listen whilst walking or driving.

Partner with Us

Most clicked last week was the Spotify link to the Brian Chesky interview.

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