European Tourism Destination Portal Hradec Králové 3 -4

European Tourism Destination Portal Hradec Králové, 3. -4. 4. 2006 O. Fodor, Econsulting, Bratislava I. Smolák, Siemens PSE, Bratislava

Content § Visiteurope. com Background & History § Services § Technical Architecture § Operation § Concepts for new cooperations § Future vision

Aim of the portal • The aim of the EU Commission funded 'European Tourism Destinations (ETD) Portal' is to develop an unique access point under European Travel Commission (ETC) owned URL www. Visit. Europe. com to promote European destinations. • The portal will address needs of both tourists originating form outside and within Europe. For the tourists, it must contribute to make European destinations more attractive and desirable.

Main objectives • A unique access point to all NTO web sites with common user interface in En, Fr, Ge, It, Sp and Pt for better visibility and quicker search to select the most suitable information • Pan European joint content and content from NTOs • Drive more traffic to NTO sites • Joint strong marketing of one access point • Architecture for further ICT developments (mobile, B 2 B, Intranet. . )

Steps to the project § A result of a political will of Commission with Council Resolution in May 2002 `to reflect to strengthen position of Europe as a destination by using ICT´ § Tourism Advisory Committee (TAC) & EC/DG ENTR: Tourism Unit Action Plan ´Modern online public services´ adopted by the EU Council as part of the e. Europe Action plan, June 2002 § A tender of the program Interchange of Data between Administrations, June 2003

The Portal – What is it? Create an attractive, efficient doorway. . . Places • Access to National Web sites • Search cities, etc Experiences • Search for Culture, Adventure, Events, etc Practical Help • Travel planning, Money, Security, etc

Portal responsibilities European Commission 2 -stage contract (€ 2 m) Agree Business Plan Agree Portal specification E-Commerce Competency Center via EC Portal Steering Group

ETC member countries

The consortium • • • EC 3, Vienna Siemens, Vienna & Bratislava Tiscover, Innsbruck Lixto, Vienna ITC-irst, Trento

More services for customers § Delivery in 7 languages, adaptable to different world markets : – 1 st Phase : US (English), Canada (English & French) & Brazil (Portuguese) – 2 nd Phase : Latin America (Spanish) China (Traditional Chinese), Japan (Japanese), Russia (Russian) – 3 rd Phase : Possible Hispanic, simplified Chinese, Global versions for English… § Support richer content and more ‘experiential’ imagery – Experience section for pan European offers on various themes among which Culture, Nature or Activities… § Access to NTO data, e. g. , events – Most relevant events in Europe… § Intelligent search and innovative ‘recommendation’ services § … and other services such as flights search, weather reports, etc

Selection of portal services

Sitemap Home • Introductory Text • Map • 2 -3 current reports • NTO List. Link • Flash Slide. Show • Banners • Hot Deals • Top 5 events • Newsletter registration • Currency Converter • Weather & Climate • Access to Travel Planner • Quick Poll Experience Where To Go Site Map Accommodation Countries How to Travel Countries Nature Cities By Train Culture Pan European Regions By Car By Plane By Boat / Ship Routes To Explore Special For Copyright Imprint Feedback FAQ Credits About ETC ETD Portal Activities Events Search Useful Information • Accommodation Categories • Airport • Bank and Public Holidays • Blood Alcohol Concentration Limit for Drivers • Camping & Caravanning • Climate • Credit Cards • Crime Rate • Currency, Foreign Exchange • Customs Regulations • Drinking Age • Electricity • Emergency # • European Languages • Food & Drink • Gas • Gifts to Buy • Health Tips & Medical Aid • Motor Vehicle Regulations • National Recipes • Opening Hours • Pet Imports • Postal Service & Telephone • Speed Limits • Tap Water Quality • Taxes • Time Zone • Tipping Tradition • Toll Sticker Virtual Europe Tools Image Galleries Search Livecams Travel Planner e. Cards Yellow Pages Weather & Climate Newsletters Currency Converter Calendar Downloads Directory

Innovation • Quality informations • well structured - rich (networked) – focused • Directory system (manually/semi-automatically maintained) • Domain focused search engine (working in preset pool of info sources) • Semantic extensions (reasoning over search results based on domain ontology) • Recommendation engines (advanced algorithms, suggesting items of interests) • SEO (improving visibility of the portal)

Data extraction with Lixto - rapidly creation of services with automated processed data from web from any Web site, personalized, in real-time, automatically, and deliver data on visiteurope. com

Flight search

Portal architecture Portal Software (Java, J 2 EE, Red Hat) CMS External Data Sources Content Feeder NTO Data Sources

Software packages of the ETD portal

Three pillars of portal operations Marketing ETD Portal Content Administration

Three pillars of portal operations • Administration • Operational (management) • Technical (HW & SW) • Content • NTO and ETC contribution • other resources • Marketing • e. Marketing (sponsors, banners) • Traffic management (bringing traffic to the portal, e. g. domain networking, SEO, classical marketing activities, … )

Focus at Europe • Pan-European region (new tourism marketing brands) • European experience (cross-border attractions, interests) • Allowing countries to freely unite (creating tourist unions in Europe)

Playground for cooperations Business layer Process layer Infrastructure layer • co-opetition on all levels

Subsites • Dedicated for specific needs of Countries, Regions and other domain partners • loose integration of subsites with local portals • New chances for European Regions

… and the Future • First universal access point into the electronic tourism domain • Hub in the e. Tourism network • not only European … • major tourism portals worldwide (NTOs privileged) • creation of virtual organizations ? • Collaboration (co-opetition) • content level • service level

… and the Future • Integration of GIS • projection of entire portal content on geographic coordinates • => Mobile based services • Recommendations based on current position of the tourist • Projection on electronic maps used in GPS device • Local travel bag • Enhanced marketing of tourism services (e. g. via SMS)

… and the Future • Platform for publishing in “exotic” languages • for those countries, that do not have local support • Directly integrated support for translation services • optimising effort and publishing time • reducing costs • serving • internal administrators • internet visitors

Thank you for your attention ! Oliver Fodor EConsulting/EC 3 fodor@econsulting. sk Ivan Smolák Siemens PSE ivan. smolak@siemens. com