Expedia 2008 Annual Report Download - page 11

center to provide consumers with consolidated travel information and the ability to make hotel reservations at
more than 7,000 hotels in over 400 cities across China. eLong also offers air ticketing and other travel related
services. Travelers can access eLong travel products and services through its websites, including www.elong.com
and www.elong.net.
Business Strategy
We play a fundamental role in facilitating travel, whether for leisure, unmanaged business or managed
business travelers. We are committed to providing travelers, travel suppliers and advertisers the world over
with the best set of resources to serve their travel needs by leveraging Expedia’s critical assets — our brand
portfolio, our technology and commitment to continuous innovation, our global reach and our breadth of
product offering. In addition, we intelligently utilize our growing base of knowledge about destinations,
activities, suppliers and travelers and our central position in the travel value chain to more effectively
merchandise our travel offerings.
A discussion of the critical assets that we leverage in achieving our business strategy follows:
Portfolio of Travel Brands. We seek to appeal to the broadest possible range of travelers, suppliers and
advertisers through our collection of industry-leading brands. We target several different demographics, from
the value-conscious traveler through our Hotwire»brand to luxury travelers seeking a high-touch, customized
vacation package through our Classic Vacations brand.
We believe our flagship Expedia brand appeals to the broadest range of travelers, with our extensive
product offering ranging from single item bookings of discounted product to dynamic bundling of higher-end
travel packages. Our hotels.com site and its international versions target travelers with premium hotel content
about lodging properties, such as 360 degree tours and hotel reviews. In the United States, hotels.com
generally appeals to travelers with shorter booking windows who prefer to drive to their destinations, and who
make a significant portion of their travel bookings over the telephone.
Through Egencia, we make travel products and services available on a managed basis to corporate
travelers in North America, Europe and the Asia Pacific region. Further, the TripAdvisor Media Network
allows us to reach a broad range of travelers with travel opinions and user-generated content.
We believe our appeal to suppliers and advertisers is further enhanced by our geographic breadth and
range of business models, allowing them to offer their products and services to the industry’s broadest range
of travelers using our various agency, merchant and advertising business models. We intend to continue
supporting and investing in our brand portfolio, geographic footprint and business models for the benefit of
our travelers, suppliers and advertisers.
Technology and Continuous Innovation. Expedia has an established tradition of technology innovation,
from Expedia.com’s inception as a division of Microsoft, to our introduction of more recent innovations such
as Expedia.com’s TravelAds
TM
sponsored search product for hotel advertisers, Hotwire’s Air Price Protection,
hotels.com’s slider tools for improving search results, hotels.com’s iPod and iPhone applications and the
TripAdvisor Media Network’s offering of travel applications for download on social media sites, including
Facebook.com and MySpace.com.
We intend to continue innovating on behalf of our travelers, suppliers and advertisers with particular
focus on improving the traveler experience, supplier integration and presentation, platform improvements,
search engine marketing and search engine optimization.
Global Reach. Our Expedia, hotels.com and TripAdvisor Media Network brands operate both in North
America and internationally. We also offer Chinese travelers an array of products and services through our
majority ownership in eLong, and we offer hotels to European-based travelers through our wholly-owned
subsidiary Venere, which we acquired in the third quarter of 2008. In 2008, our European segment accounted
for approximately 21% of worldwide gross bookings and 23% of worldwide revenue.
We intend to continue investing in and growing our international points of sale. We anticipate launching
points of sale in additional countries where we find large travel markets and rapid growth of online commerce.
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