Daily Research News Online no. 2752 - Rankings for Hotel, Airline and Car Rental Sites

Rankings for Hotel, Airline and Car Rental Sites

November 19 2003

Measurement company Market Metrix, LLC have announced third quarter results from their Hospitality Index (the MMHI), measuring customer satisfaction with Web sites. JetBlue Airways and Enterprise Rent-A-Car each win their category for the fourth time in the last five quarters. Four Seasons were number one in the hotels category.

The MMHI is a quarterly report of customer satisfaction with hotel, airline and car rental companies based on 35,000 in-depth consumer interviews, ranking top hospitality brands by industry and, for hotels, by categories such as luxury, mid-price and economy. It covers 135 hotel brands, 25 airlines and 11 car rental companies.

This quarter, for the first time, satisfaction rankings are included for sites offering online hotel reservations. The top hotel brand site in this respect was Radisson Hotels & Resorts and the top travel Web site Yahoo! Travel. Consumers are using hotel brand web sites more often than the popular travel web sites like Orbitz or Expedia, according to Market Metrix, with 34% of consumers using the hotel site directly. Expedia.com was the most popular travel web site, with 15% of respondents choosing it for online hotel booking.

According to Jonathan Barsky, Ph.D., Market Metrix co-founder and partner, 'Travellers are increasingly using the Internet to book hotel reservations, making the online interface an important part of the guest's overall experience with that hotel. The quality of the experience with the web site can influence customers' decision making, ultimately reinforcing loyalty or losing customers for the brand. The information in MMHI will help hotel and travel web site executives determine if their online hotel reservation interface is effective'.

Winners of other categories and sub-categories are as follows: