Comments on: Interview with Brian Barth, Former CEO and current Board member, SideStep http://comparisonengines.com/2005/05/14/interview-with-brian-barth-ceo-of-sidestep/ Just another WordPress.com weblog Fri, 09 Dec 2011 18:27:04 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: VerticalSearch.net » Blog Archive » Past Posts about Mobissimo, Kayak, and SideStep http://comparisonengines.com/2005/05/14/interview-with-brian-barth-ceo-of-sidestep/#comment-11 Fri, 17 Feb 2006 22:32:33 +0000 http://www.comparisonengines.com/?p=17#comment-11 [...] figured it would be smart to at least link to them so you could catch up on the industry: Interview with Brian Barth, Former CEO and current Board member, SideStep – May 14, 2005 (My first interv [...]

]]> By: Craig Sherman http://comparisonengines.com/2005/05/14/interview-with-brian-barth-ceo-of-sidestep/#comment-10 Thu, 19 May 2005 02:07:47 +0000 http://www.comparisonengines.com/?p=17#comment-10 Recently, I did a thorough comparison of expedia and sidestep. In theory, expedia and the other OLTAs are a form of search engine themselves, so I was sceptical that a meta-search would be more effective. Results: consistently better pricing on Sidestep. Not coincidentally, as the chief operating officer of MyFamily.com (until March, 2005), I found our executive assistants naturally gravitated towards sidestep for corporate travel because they consistently got better prices.

In addition, Sidestep produces better results than Kayak. Kayak’s strengths appear to be site User Interface and Consumer/Corporate PR. Kayak must be weak on either a) the technology or b) the supplier relationships because Kayak doesn’t generate good pricing.

In short, Sidestep has the best value-proposition for consumers. But Sidestep doesn’t make as much money per transaction as the OLTAs – and thus they will get way outspent by the OLTAs. Seems like that’ll be the company’s biggest challenge: how to communicate their value proposition to consumers in a very crowded space.

]]>