Even more exciting and interesting is that these people will be entering the digital era through mobile handsets. This generation or base of consumers will leap over PCs and laptops, and will rely on handheld devices for a wide range of services.
In order to meet the anticipated demand for 3G services, the Indian market is flooded with touch-screen, multimedia-enabled devices, many with a price tag of US$100 or less. In spite of having somewhat restricted access to the iPhone, people from a variety of socio-economic classes carry touch-screen phones. If the world was taken aback by the $2,500 TATA Nano car, the country’s Human Resource Ministry turned heads when it showcased the $35 Android-powered tablet, albeit for education purposes.
Most definitely, the long-term key to tapping Indian consumers across many categories – including travel – will be through such touch-screen handheld devices (keep an eye out for the Notion Ink Adam tablet).
There’s no doubt that it will be a few more years before the mobile platform is flawless and customized to the Indian market’s needs in terms of languages, presentation and payment mechanisms. But this will only add to India’s e- and m-commerce growth. In 2009, the Indian travel marketplace totaled $15.8 billion and is estimated to grow to nearly $20 billion by 2011.
With a proliferation of new devices, nearly one third of all travel industry gross bookings will be transacted online by 2012, and this is just the beginning of a new wave.
The Indian Internet population is quite unique. On one hand, Internet penetration is abysmally low. However, India’s traffic to YouTube is the fourth highest globally! Given the growth of online travel bookings emerging from such a small base of Internet users, imagine the scope of online bookings as the nation overcomes constraints such as access to computers and the wired Internet, through the introduction of handheld devices.
Delving further into mobile, at a recent travel conference in India, Google India’s Business Head for Travel, Kiran Mani, shared some insights into consumers’ mobile Internet behavior. He noted that India has already crossed 50 million page views on mobile search, and by 2013-14 mobile searches will exceed PC searches. Furthermore, India’s mobile Internet market is set to be the second largest globally, behind only Japan.
As a new generation of consumers armed with handheld devices enters the online shopping funnel, both online and offline travel companies will have to engage beyond their point-and-click websites and evolve into being just a touch away from their consumers. Not only should their websites or apps be optimized for these devices, but content will be the key differentiator in this chaotic landscape.
Travel is inherently immersive, and developing content that is accessible, and incorporates rich media and audio-visual elements for the mobile platform will be the need of the hour. And if all this isn’t compelling enough, how does tapping half a billion wireless subscribers sound to your organization
Featured image credit (Happy young traditional woman): Ockra/iStock
