AS the peak travel season approaches, holiday seekers are hunting for the latest last-minute deals but have found themselves deterred by the unpredictability and volatility of accommodation and flight prices. Much-needed help for customers planning their holiday comes from a growing number of travel fare comparison sites facilitated by web scraping technologies. Acquiring extensive pricing data in real-time, advanced web crawlers and scrapers are enabling consumers to identify and compare the best deals across the web.
Leading holiday travel websites, such as Hospitable and Trivago, are utilising web scraping technology to compare prices from hundreds of websites and pick the most cost-effective deals. As prices continue to fluctuate due to massive summer events, such as the European football championships and Olympic games, consumers are benefiting from web intelligence while seeking the cheapest deals possible.
“Travel price comparison websites serve specific data, such as flight or hospitality fares for comparison purposes or act as a “one-stop shop,” allowing users to rent cars and even book guided tours and events. Instead of consumers or businesses tediously gathering data by hand, web scraping tools automatically collect information in seconds, being customised to gather different types of information — prices, product descriptions, public reviews, out-of-stock data for digital shelf optimisation, and others.
“Thus, the benefits of web scraping, the automated process of collecting publicly available online data on a large scale, are reaped by millions of consumers worldwide every day,” says Gediminas Rickevicius, VP of Global Partnerships at Oxylabs,
Travel fare aggregators employ specialised tools to automate the collection and delivery of vast amounts of data in a consumer-friendly way. These tools include a vast network of ethically sourced proxies (i.e., IP addresses) that power a data scraping technology, such as an API. Travel comparison sites scan the internet to gather deals from airlines, short-term rental, and hotel websites in seconds. As a result, travellers can conveniently browse for travel deals from different airlines and hospitality providers, all in one place.
“The biggest challenge that travel search aggregators are facing is navigating complex pricing models of different travel service providers — geo-location-based pricing strategies create a lot of complexity. Restricted website accessibility and content often results in pricing discrepancies that consumers cannot notice,” added Rickevicius. “To combat this, leading travel fare aggregators use reliable residential proxy networks that help access data regardless of geo-location and host a low response time.”
Additionally, public web intelligence is benefiting organisations and businesses in the travel industry by enabling market research and competitive analysis. By gathering public data from various sites and biggest travel fare aggregators, travel service providers can gain insights into local competition, study pricing trends, and understand consumer preferences better by seeing which deals and products are more popular and when.
Rickevicius continued: “Not all airlines and travel service agents champion the business model that travel fare aggregators employ, as by making pricing more transparent to consumers, these digital engines diminish revenue streams. However, the essence of open internet and open data is to benefit all, not just major corporations. Pricing comparison sites allow consumers to speed up decision-making and get more transparency when buying flights and accommodation online.
“Web scraping is the technology behind the simplistic efficiency of finding the cheapest deals and optimal travel configurations, fundamentally changing the travel industry. Before web scraping technologies emerged, consumers faced the convoluted and time-consuming process of manually comparing prices across sites. However, in a competitive environment striving for seamless user experiences, digital businesses have quickly paved the way for widespread utilisation of publicly available web data. With the best deals at the click of a button, consumers can now browse hassle-free when planning their next holiday,” concluded Rickevicius.
