September 16, 2008: Travelocity has been selected as a 2008 Gold Magellan Award Winner in the Online Travel Services/Trip Planning category of Travel Weekly’s Magellan awards. Travelocity won for its travel dreaming and planning platform of travel tools, ExperienceFinder.
The 2008 Magellan Awards look to recognize the best of the best in the travel industry, in categories such as online travel services, cruise lines, hotels and resorts and car rental companies. This year, Travel Weekly received entries from top travel organizations and professionals worldwide. The ExperienceFinder platform of planning tools won for showing the tremendous impact it is having on travelers and the way it is reshaping the travel industry.
“We are thrilled that the ExperienceFinder platform is being recognized with some of the best and brightest players in the travel industry,” said Troy Whitsett, vice president of design and innovation for Travelocity. “This platform gives people a chance to shop in a way they may never have shopped before, and so far the response has been overwhelmingly positive. This award will help us get the word out to more travelers about how it can open up their imaginations to entirely new travel wishes.”
“This year’s Magellan Award Winners represent the best in travel from design to marketing to services,” said Arnie Weissmann, editor-in-chief of Travel Weekly.
The Magellan Awards are judged and overseen by a panel of top travel professionals representing the best names and most accomplished leaders from the industry. In determining winners, entries do not compete with one another, instead they are judged against a standard of excellence. To uphold this high standard of excellence, a category may have multiple winners, or may have no winners at all.
The ExperienceFinder platform won after showing the great impact it is having on travelers, including:
- The ExperienceFinder platform turns the premise for online shopping on its head by changing the focus from just shopping, to dreaming, planning, shopping and booking.
- Page views per session are nearly three times greater than Travelocity.com.
- People using the platform are able to find all the tools they need to make an informed decision, which is why the session duration on ExperienceFinder is two times greater than Travelocity.com.
