San Francisco based Revinate, LLC which offers online reputation and social media management tools for hospitality brands,  says it has reached an agreement for use of TripAdvisor data from within their tools.

Revinate

In a press statement, Jay Ashton, co-founder and CEO of Revinate, said that “Our partnership with TripAdvisor allows us to analyze the most comprehensive source of hotel reviews and provide hoteliers with the insight and tools they need in order to act upon this rich source of feedback.”

Under this agreement, Revinate clients will now be able to monitor TA reviews, ratings and Popularity Index rankings through the Revinate service.

Revinate is a web-based software solution for online reputation management that gives hotels the ability to monitor and benefit from online feedback – reviews and social media mentions including Twitter, blogs, news, photo & video sites.

Revinate was one of the PhoCusWright innovators in 2010, and as Elliott explains here in his review, they provide a “mission control center” for reputation management and social media monitoring and response.

The tools offered by Revinate can come in extremely handy if used correctly. An example, which Revinate highlights as a success story, is the Hyatt Regency Chicago. The hotel’s social media marketing manager, Jennifer Kedinger, uses Revinate’s TweetConciege to monitor for guests checking into the hotel and tweeting about it.

One guest tweeted that he had just checked in to the hotel but forgotten to bring a toothbrush. The toothbrush was on its way up to his room within moments. Needless to say, guests are impressed when hotel staff contacts them in person at the hotel instantly after finding out on twitter or facebook about a guest who has an issue.

Revinate tools work on a Rackspace Cloud-based SaaS platform, and the business model is a monthly subscription offered to clients that range from single properties to brands and hospitality companies.

Their social media solution for hotels, launched in March 2010, includes a Reputation Dashboard to provide analysis of reviews, a social media scorecard that converts reviews into a guest satisfaction scorecard, competitor tracking with benchmarks to compare the client’s own data against competitors, and the aforementioned TweetConcierge Twitter client with multi-user management and campaign tracking.

More info: http://www.revinate.com/

Feature: When it cut off Orbitz from displaying its fares, AA probably did not expect the story to be quite so big in the mainstream media outside the travel industry.

AA Orbitz Distribution Update

But Delta’s decision to pull flights off CheapOAir, OneTravel and BookIt, followed by Expedia’s decision to bury AA fares (update Jan 1, 2011 – Expedia drops AA) in a preemptive strike ensured the story was bigger than just a fight between two companies. As a result, AA is feeling the heat and Derek DeCross, their Vice President and General Sales Manager,  was forced to issue a ‘business update’ that says:

“While the year-over-year increase in ticket sales is roughly comparable to that seen earlier in December, American has noted a shift in ticket sales to other channels, notably online travel agencies, such as Priceline.com, and referrals from metasearch engines, such as Kayak.com, as well as increased volume on its own website, AA.com.” – AA.com

(Note that AA successfully put Kayak through the same routine  - block fare listings, lawsuit, link only to AA.com – in 2008, and Priceline has reportedly agreed to be the first of the OTAs to join AA’s Direct Connect.)

The issue has generated lots of statements and analysis about what’s at the heart of the dispute, how it affects travel distribution and the impact on consumers.

“At its heart, the AA effort is more than simply another attempt at GDS bypass to lower distribution fees, but an attempt by the airline to reshape distribution allowing the airline to control the price and services offered on an individual transaction basis reflecting the true value of the customer.” – Norm Rose, PhoCusWright

“At its core, this dispute has nothing to do with business agreements, legal arguments, or distribution technologies. This is simply a heavy-handed attempt by American Airlines to prevent consumers from easily searching and comparing its fares against those of other airlines.” – CTA & BTC (ConsumerTravel.com)

“We oppose American’s efforts to impose a costly and unproven system on travel agents and travelers.” – Chris Kroeger, senior vice president, Sabre Travel Network (Press Release)

“Travel agencies would also be increasingly forced to use direct airline connections as surcharges levied through BSP (IATA’s Billing and Settlement Plan) become too expensive to maintain.” – David McCaig, president ACTA (TravelWeekly)

Here’s the rest of the week’s interesting news:-

Disney World’s high-tech underground command center under Cinderella Castle reduces wait times – NYT

How the Hawaii Tourism Authority markets paradise to the world – HawaiiBusiness.com

Travelocity vs Cleartrip data theft battle turns ugly – Business Standard

FITUR 2011 reflects tourism industry’s recovery, allows MASSIVEGOOD participation – IFEMA.es

Travel chaos and Twitter – Lessons for all crises – FastForward

A concierge in your pocket: app keeps guest, hotel connected - PacBizTimes

Photo – AA Distribution Blog