What is online travel?

Online travel refers to consulting and booking travel products through the Internet, and sharing travel or travel experience through the Internet, rather than traveling or traveling online. There is no difference between online travel and traditional travel except for information consultation and booking methods. The characteristic of online travel is that it is convenient for everyone through the network. Online travel is only a means of service, not an end. Therefore, online tourism not only does not deviate from "tourism", but further enriches tourism, facilitates tourism and promotes industrial development. Numerically, the online travel booking market in China will be 6160 billion yuan in 20 10, and it is expected to approach10 billion yuan in 2010; In terms of enterprise scale, it will form an online travel enterprise with a scale of billions of dollars, so that tourists can enjoy more professional, comprehensive and high-quality services;

As a representative of modern service industry, tourism has developed rapidly in recent years. According to the latest statistics released by the National Tourism Administration, the total national tourism revenue in the first half of the year was 20 1 1 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 18%, far exceeding the growth rate of1%predicted at the beginning of the year. At the same time, online travel has been given a greater mission. Shao Qiwei, director of the National Tourism Administration, publicly stated that China will strive to realize the comprehensive informationization of tourism enterprises' business activities in about 10 years, basically develop tourism into a modern service industry with high information content and knowledge-intensive, and initially realize "smart tourism" based on information technology in this emerging world tourism power.

According to the latest results of Google Double Click Ad Planner in April 2010, although only two online travel companies, China-Qunar.com and Ctrip, entered the global website TOP 1000 list, far less than the US 14, among the top ten most popular online travel companies in the world, China Legion occupied two seats, namely Ctrip.com ranked third and the first.

At present, the vast majority of online travel companies in the TOP 1000 list are listed companies. Among the top five companies in terms of market value, Ctrip.com ranks second in the list of online travel listed companies with a market value of US$ 6.255 billion, which is nearly/kloc-0.5 times that of Orbitz, a similar trading company. In terms of independent users, the difference between them is less than 50%.

According to the forecast of China National Tourism Administration, by 20 15, China will become the largest domestic tourism market in the world. Ian Consulting believes that with the rapid development of China's tourism market, media websites that mainly provide travel search, travel comments and recommendations will highlight their huge market value. In 20 10, the scale of tourism search market will increase to 1 13%. At the same time, domestic online travel websites including Qunar. It will trigger a new wave of listing of Internet companies in China.