Electronic business (e-business) and electronic commerce (e-commerce) describe the way people buy and sell goods and services through the use of the Internet (Anderson 2007). E-commerce also involves other transactions such as customer’s enquiries and requests about a particular product.
There are very many companies, which sell their products through the Internet. However, the most companies which deal in e-business are those which offer travelling services (Chaffey 2007). The traveling agencies include thomascook.com, lastminute.com and thomson.co.uk. This paper seeks to analyze the three websites under different aspects.
Some of these aspects include value proposition, market, revenue models, competitive environment, value chain and organizational structure among others (Afuah & Tucci 2003).
Value Proposition
Value proposition of the three travel agencies describes what they do in order to attract and retain customers (Chaffey 2007). Lastminute.com is one of the few travel agencies, which only charge fees on tickets and program changes. Lastminute’s customers are not required to pay for any other services.
This implies that the services of this travel agency are relatively cheaper. The agency deals in traditional reservations such as cruise, car, hotel and air. The fact that lastminute.com registers customers at the time they book ticket it is quite advantageous to these customers.
This gives the customers the easiest time to manage their itinerary programs at any time. This agency also offers a variety of booking options such as multiple air travel destinations (Critic 2012).
Just like the lastminute.com, Thomson.co.uk also offers a variety of services to its customers. However, the latter specializes much on travel money services. Its services include traveler’s check, purchase of back guarantee and the most important, Thomson travel money card and Thomson gift card.
Thomson gift cards are vital when it comes to special occasions such as birthdays, weddings and anniversaries. The gift cards can also be used for saving purposes. Thomson.co.uk travel agency does not charge commission and offers very attractive exchange rates. The agency operates offline and online and therefore, customers can order currency online or from their nearest Thomson shops (Robertson 2011).
Thomascook.com on the other hand offers holiday, tours and hotel accommodation bookings through someone’s stay abroad. It is the way this website promotes its services that attracts customers mostly. Thomas Cook has been in the existence for more than 170 years and therefore has a vast experience in the travel business.
It also offers eye-catching holiday charges online and customer services. The agency provides customers with a tool engine which assists the customers to effectively plan for their holidays. The tool engine is not complex in nature and therefore, any customer can use it (Conti, Caroland, Cook & Taylor 2011).
Target Market
The three travel agencies, lastminute.com, thomson.co.uk and thomascook.com target those individuals that are willing and able to afford their services. For Thomas Cook, young youths, working class single people and working class couples and their families form the bulk of their customers. The online agency also targets retirees who still get pensions and can afford to pay for the agency’s services with ease (Conti, Caroland, Cook & Taylor 2011).
Lastminute online agency on the hand has been receiving more than 1.65 million customers every week. The online agency targets mostly the aging population under pension’s schemes. Old people form the biggest percentage of the Europe’s population.
The lastminute.com experts have predicted that in the next 15 years, their customers aged 55 and above will have grown by about 60% while those under the age of 55 will remain stable. This implies that for lastminute.com management, targeting mostly the old customers is likely to widen the agency’s market (Critic 2012).
Thomson travel agency targets young youths as well as middle aged working class couples who are looking forward to spending their holidays in styles. In other words, the agency generally targets people who are seeking to spend summer, winter and cruise holidays, get accommodations in big hotels and individuals who want to fly out of the United Kingdom. It also targets customers with late deals (Robertson 2011).
Revenue Models
Revenue models refer to techniques, which a company employs in order to generate income. Most companies obtain their incomes by selling their products and services to people and other organizations (Chaffey 2009). For instance, thomascook.com travel agency majorly generates its revenues from the sales of its services.
The website provides customers with different cost options such as charitable donation, travel insurance and the option of choosing the seats which they desire. The booking procedures are not complicated and therefore, quite understandable to most of the customers. Card is the mode of payment in Thomas Cook travel agency (Yerkes 2007, p. 27).
Thomson too obtains its income through the sales of its services. The website sells more than one million holidays and flights every year. Thomson.co.uk has been in operation for more than thirty years. The vast experience that it management has, enables the agency to save close to 1.5 million sterling pounds each year. The agency also obtains some money from the exchange rates it imposes on foreign currencies (Thompson & Martin 2010, p. 460).
Just like Thomson and Thomas Cook, lastminute.com too obtains most of its incomes from the sales of its services. The website offers a wide range of attractive products. This implies that at least one product has to be purchased each day. Lastminute Company has very few employees, a fact which helps it to reduce its operational costs and other expenses. This is a very effective way that companies use to save (Greenspan 2011, p. 336).
Competitive Environment
The travel agency is a highly competitive market industry. It has very many website offering almost similar products. Thomas Cook has established a direct link with its customers thereby communicating with the customers directly. The main competitors of thomascook.com are Thompsons, Co-operative Travel and Expedia among others. These competitors provide cheaper prices for flight and hotel accommodation but their products are of lower quality (Yerkes 2007, p. 32).
Lastminute.com employs different strategies, which make it survive the competitive travel industry. It is the only vendor offering a wide variety of products. It only deals in products that are unique and accepted not only in the UK. The agency also offers very good customer services (Greenspan 2011, p. 339).
Thomson.co.uk operates almost like lastminute.com in the competitive environment. Thomson offers services that other companies do not. For instance, the agency offers services such as weddings, birthdays and anniversaries (Thompson & Martin 2010, p. 463).
Value Chain and Marketplace Positioning
A well developed supply chain is known to add value to the way a company’s products are delivered to the customers (Chaffey 2007). Lastminute.com was the first to enter travel industry. Lastminute.com was still surviving amidst the stiff competition of 2005. This travel agency offers products, which are suitable for Internet. Lasttminute.com offers a variety of products and is therefore ranked as one of the best e-travel agencies (Critic 2012).
Thomson too has well developed supply chain of activities that adds significant amount of value to its products. Its activities range from cruises, taking family holidays to ski holidays to negotiating package holidays of customers to various destinations in the world.
According Hitwise, thomson.co.uk takes the highest position in the travel company. In fact, the agency is currently position ten among the top UK e-retailers. The Thomson Company has included a practical social media on Twitter (Thompson & Martin 2010, p. 469).
Thomascook.com is one of the most trusted travel agencies and trip operators. This year, Thomas Cook was named as one of the companies with the most attractive brands in UK. This travel agency curries out several activities. For instance, it takes its customers to different destinations such as USA and Dominican Republic. Thomas Cook is currently ranked the second biggest among the leisure travel groups (Yerkes 2007, 27).
Representation in the Physical World
The main offices of the three travel agencies; lastminute.com, Thomson.co.uk and thomascook.com are located in the United Kingdom (Porter 2010). However, each one of these agencies has spread their operations into other countries. For instance, by the year 2000, lastminute.com had opened its branches in countries such as France, USA, Sweden and Germany. It currently operates in more than ten countries (Critic 2012).
Thomas Cook mostly operates in the United Kingdom and Ireland. The branches of the Thomas Cook located in the two areas specialize in taking their flight customers to far countries such as Dominican Republic. The travel agency also operates in Portugal where it offers Portugal package holidays. In Greece, Thomascook.com deals mainly in great Greek getaways (Conti, Caroland, Cook & Taylor 2011).
Thomson.co.uk on the hand conducts most of its activities in the UK and Mexico. The head office of this travel agency is located in Wigmore House in Luton. Most of the products of this travel agency are contained in Silver Villas in Kissimmee region.
Silver Villas has the most attractive facilities that someone would require for relaxation and comfort-ability. Sharm El Sheikh and Bellino Apartments offer the most conducive sites for people seeking to spend their holidays in the best way possible (Robertson 2011).
Organizational Structure
The three travel agencies have different organizational structures. Lastminute.com is run by a board of directors. The board consists of Peter Bouw, Linder Fayne, Bob Colliers and Allan Lighton among many others.
These individuals have vast experience in the travel industry since they have once in their lives worked in similar industries. Apart from the board, lastminute.com has more than 1200 employees and more than three million registered customers (Critic 2012).
Thomascook.com runs more than 815 high street stores and very many travel brands. Unlike lastminute.com, Thomas Cook is managed by Board of Governors. However, the Board delegates some of its responsibilities to its committees.
This implies that the board and the committees are the ones directly responsible for the management of Thomas Cook. Other stake holders in the management include the Non-Executive Directors, the Group Executive Board, Disclosure Committees and Finance and Administration Committee.
Every decision concerning the well-being of this company has to be approved by all the committees, the Group Executive Board and the Finance and Administration Department before it is reported in the next Board sitting (Conti, Caroland, Cook & Taylor 2011).
Amongst the three travel agencies, thomson.co.uk has the most complicated organizational structure. Thomson has five major branches. The branches are located in the United Kingdom and Ireland, North America, German Airlines, Continental Europe and Northern Europe. Each branch has its own chief financial officer (CFO). However, the CFO of UK and Ireland is mandated to supervise financial transaction in all the branches.
In addition, each branch has its own chief executive officer. Fontenla-Novoa is the general CEO of Thomson Company whereas James Jennings is the director of the group mergers and acquisitions (Robertson 2011).
In conclusion, thomson.co.uk, thomascook.com and lastminute.com travel agencies have all made significant achievements (Porter 2010). For instance, thomson.co.uk is currently ranked position ten among the best UK e-retailers. Thomson has made several adjustments such as the adoption of effective online marketing strategies. It has extended its adverts to Twitter.
Other improvements on its website include tailored banners, easy user experience and increased speed of loading (Robertson 2011). Lastminute.com too has improved the functionality of its website. The access speed is currently 10 times faster than when it was first established (Critic 2012).
Some of the steps that were involved in booking have been reduced hence making the booking process much easier. Thomascook.com has also improved the speed of its website. Thomas Cook website is now designed in such a way that it instantly provides links to thomascook.com partners (Conti, Caroland, Cook & Taylor 2011).
Even though the three travel agents have made significant improvements on their websites, the websites still have a few shortfalls. Thomson.co.uk website’s major problem is that the sections do not link together. That is, the sections do not have clear connections between the various templates, booking functionality and the navigation being used to access the different range of the products (Robertson 2011).
The lastminute.com on the hand has constant failings in the website making the browsing of unspecific stuff a difficult task (Critic 2012). Lastly, thomascook.com website at time looses the speed, making it difficult to access their products. Therefore, the three agencies need to address these problems to enhance the efficiency of their respective websites (Conti, Caroland, Cook & Taylor 2011).
References
Afuah, A & Tucci, CL 2003, Internet business models and strategies text and cases, 2nd edition, McGraw-Hill, Boston, Massachusetts.
Anderson, C 2007, The long tail: how endless choice is creating unlimited demand, Random House Business Books, London.
Chaffey, D 2007, E-business and e-commerce management, Prentice Hall, London.
Conti, G, Caroland, J, Cook, T, & Taylor, H 2011, Self development for cyber warriors. Web.
Critic, C 2012, Last minute cruises. Web.
Greenspan, E 2011, Frommer’s Ecuador & the Galapagos Islands, Wiley Publishing, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.
Porter, D 2010, Frommer’s London 2011, Wiley Publishing, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.
Robertson, E 2011, Retail review: Thomson review. Web.
Thomson, J, L & Martin, F 2010, Strategic management: Awareness & change, South-Western Cengage Learning, Andover.
Yerkes, L 2007, Fun works: Creating places where people love to work, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, San Francisco, California.