This week...Low Cost and Lastminute.com unite, avoid 3rd party apps for Facebook and Google makes another purchase

It’s Monday again and to get you back into work mode we have picked out our usual top selection of industry news. Here at CWT Digital we pride ourselves on being on top of all the latest trends in travel and technology so that we can provide our clients with the best information and technology possible. To make things even easier for you we’ve put it all in one handy article, we hope you enjoy!


CWT Digital News:

Still time to enter our Big 10- 12th September- You have just over a week to enter our Big 10 competition to win a free PPC Audit for your company. If you still want to be in with a chance of winning then you can enter here up to the 21st September

Travel News:

Lowcost and Lastminute.com sign exclusive deal- 9th September- Last week Lowcost and Lastminute.com signed a deal which gives Low Cost an exclusive partnership thus terminating all other existing contracts with Lastminute.com. The Low Cost Group will provide Last Minute with a white label solution with access to it’s bed bank and third party suppliers. The plan is that the deal increase Lastminute’s holiday offering and UK presence.

Cruise News: NCL offer commission bonus for UK agents- 12th September- Starting from the 18th September NCL are launching a week long event which will reward agents £50 for every booking that is made on any of the 11 cruise ships. The offer will coincide with the ‘Book Early- Cruise Happy’ campaign, which offers customers $500 on board spending money for 2012/2013 cruises.

Travel Republic considers IPO-6th September- Online travel giant Travel Republic has revealed that it would consider an IPO as part of their plans to expand in other European companies. This has come from advice from Travel Republic’s financial adviser's Rothschild. Altthough the plan to expand into Europe was intended to be organic, Travel Republic haven’t ruled out an IPO to help speed up the process.

Technology News:

Using 3rd party apps can reduce your visibility on Facebook by around 88%- 9th September- A recent study of over 1 million status updates on over 50,000 Facebook pages have revealed that 3rd party applications such as Hootsuite and Tweet Deck give an average of 88% less comments and likes. The study was carried out by Applum (creators of Edgerank Checker) who concluded that Facebook penalizes third party apps in it’s algorithm. These findings will in no doubt change the way a lot of business manage their Facebook page as well as decrease the amount of users on 3rd party apps.

Google buys Zagat to build out local deals- 8th September- Google announced it bought well know restaurant review platform Zagat last Friday. The acquisition is part of Google’s plan to expand it’s local product offering, enabling users to find restaurant reviews which are local to them. Zagat is the latest of Google’s purchases after they recently purchased Motorola Mobility last month. It seems that Google is expanding in every sector possible as the moment and it’s likely they will keep expanding.


That's all from us this week, we hope you enjoyed reading our top picks from all things travel and technology. As always you can keep up with us during the week by following us on Twitter or liking us on Facebook. Enjoy the rest of the week!