TripZilla debuts in Malaysia, bullish about new market

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26/03/2013 by WiT

Singapore based online travel portal, TripZilla, which offers the simplest way for users to find and book their travels, launches in Malaysia with my.TripZilla.com.

Team Travelogy

The Malaysian portal made its debut in mid-March with 69 travel agencies on board and over 3,000 plus packages and itineraries. It is aggregating travel deals from 13 daily deals site, all low cost carriers, major airlines, credit card companies and hotel chains. With its curated localised content the portal not only make it simple for users in Malaysia to find and book their travels, but also save them time and money.

my,TripZilla.com came after the validation of TripZilla in Singapore, which was launched in November 2010. The latter was built and run byTravelogy.com Pte Ltd, a start-up that builds scalable online travel portals with a focus in Southeast Asia.

Winnie Tan, Travelogy co-founder and CEO, explained that when they started TripZilla it was with the intention of just aggregating tour packages and itineraries from travel agencies. “But over the last two years the product has grown quickly, and our vision now is to make TripZilla the first stop for anyone who is thinking of travelling.”

On its workings, she said if a user performed a search for a destination, like Taiwan, he would be able to find tour packages and itineraries, travel promotions and deals, discounted airfares and hotels to Taiwan, all in one site, thus simplifying the process.

Encouraging results in sales and user traffic propelled Travelogy to scale the product to other countries in the region, starting with Malaysia. Currently, TripZilla sees over 150,000 visits and half a million page views per month. Hundreds of enquiries and transactions are made via the site daily, and user registrations are growing at more than 15% monthly.

Winnie Tan

Eric Koh, Travelogy co-founder and CTO is confident the market will keep growing “as more businesses move their marketing dollars online, and more people perform their travel research and bookings via the web.”

It is with this conviction that the Malaysian portal was launched with postive expectations from this market. The portal has been in the works since October 2012, around the time when Travelogy secured S$250,000 in funding from Crystal Horse Investments and the Singapore Media Development Authority via the i.JAM Reload scheme (read Singapore start-up Travelogy gets funding boost).

In a Q+A session with WIT, Tan shares her views on the new Malaysian portal and the potential of Malaysia for start-ups. Below are excerpts from the interview.

Q: Why Malaysia? The country is somehow perceived as comparatively less IT savvy and (tech) sophisticated than countries such as Korea, Hong Kong or Singapore?

TripZilla’s users do not need to be very IT-savvy. In fact, they don’t even need to be travellers who will complete their bookings online. As long as they use the internet to search and browse for travel information, they are our target market. For example, they can use TripZilla to browse travel packages, and thereafter make a phone call to the travel agency to complete the purchase. This online-offline, multi-platform needs of buyers is rather unique to South East Asia, and is a niche that companies like TripZilla can fill better than the travel giants.

Statistically, Malaysia is an attractive market too with more than 17 million internet users currently. Web purchases are estimated to grow up to RM5 billion in 2014, with travel taking the biggest share of this spending (24%). With these trends and numbers in our favour, we are confident that Malaysia is a ready market for TripZilla.

Q: Your target markets?

Anyone in Malaysia who uses the internet for their travel research is our coveted target. But since the site is in English, the audience would need to be able to read English.

Q: Is there a ultimate to the number of travel agencies, packages/itineraries,and travel deals on the Malaysian portal?

For packages/ itineraries: In the very near-term, we hope to cover all travel agencies with a website. After that, we will try to bring on board all medium to big-sized travel agencies in the country’s key cities to get good coverage of the market.

For deals: We are already aggregating travel deals and promotions from all major group buy sites, credit card companies, airlines and hotel chains. So while the number of such tie-ups in this category will definitely continue to grow, it will not change drastically.

Q: Do you see a big takeup for deals from my.tripzilla.com? Any initial figures to show the direction it is going?

Group buy sites are thriving in Malaysia. We have done our research and have some data in this area. In February 2013 alone, RM$2.4 million worth of travel products were purchased from Group buy sites in the country.

TripZilla collates all travel deals and promotions in Malaysia. This means we act as an aggregator for, specifically, travel-related group buy deals. But besides group buy sites, users will also find deals from all other travel suppliers like the low-cost carriers and credit card companies.

Q: What is my.tripzilla.com’s competitive edge?

We attract people in Malaysia who want to travel by offering free, useful information and tools for their travel research. Our clients, that include the OTAs, can then reach these potential clients by advertising on our online media platform.

Q: How are you publicising the site to the public at large?

We will be doing search engine and email marketing for now. Given that we are an online media platform for travel ourselves, we are very comfortable with and fully believe in the effectiveness of online marketing, and that will be our main strategy for branding and user acquisition.

Q: Revenue stream: How much revenue do you see coming from the Malaysian portal i.e. the commission per successful transaction?

TripZilla’s revenue is from (1) media sales, (2) lead generation/transactions.Media sales revenue is based on the duration the ad or listing is up on our site. Transactions typically generate a commission of 5-8% of purchase for hotel bookings and group buy deals. Lesser for flight bookings.

Q: Your view of the technology scene in Malaysia? Is there scope for companies like Travelogy to make inroads?

We are bullish about the travel tech scene in Malaysia. With 60% of the population online, coupled with the growing affluence of Malaysians, and the increasing adoption of technology for all stages of travel, the travel tech scene is definitely going to be exciting.

Q: Travelogy’s future plans in Malaysia? Has it been difficult setting up the portal in terms of red tape and related?

We will be focusing fully on our vision to be the biggest online travel media player in Malaysia. So far, our inroad to Malaysia has not been too difficult in terms of regulations to meet. This is partially helped by the experience of our co-founder, Eric Koh, who has started an online career media portal in Malaysia before. Our investor, Crystal Horse Investment, also has a strong presence in the Malaysian startup ecosystem.

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