TUI UK Provides Own Websites with High-Tech Look, Gizmos

Over the last year, TUI UK has focused on providing rich media across its websites, from broadband videos to high-resolution images, 360 IPIX images, customers reviews to maps mash up like Google Earth.

“We firmly believe that content is king,” says Graham Donoghue, director of New Media, TUI UK. “Customers love to browse and be inspired and content plays a large part in this. We have focused heavily on rich content and tried out lots of different ideas in blogs, podcasts and mobile offerings.”

Broadband and the falling price of PCs have driven the consumer online and increased their desire to interact and indeed their expectations.

Mr. Donoghue says rich media content is very effective when it comes to marketing as it allows the company to “stand out and create a modern and fresh appeal to our site and often a “wow” factor, which is what we are always searching for. “

“Out data shows that video and improved content search using technologies like Ajax are converting at around 25 percent better than our control samples,” he says.

When it comes to choosing the type of content, Mr. Donoghue believes a lot of it is trial and error, and it’s difficult to tell because trends are moving so fast.

“We like to be early adopters and jump on the curve at the grass roots level, not everything works but the barrier of entry is sometimes small so we give it a go and let our customers decide,” he concluded.