Business Travel Tips

A survey sponsored by Egencia(TM), an Expedia, Inc. company, shows the vast majority of business travelers enjoy business trips. 66 percent stated they enjoy their business travel experience and 85 percent said that traveling is a key reason why they like their current job.

The study was conducted by Strategy One surveying a sample of 2400 business travelers between May and July 2008 across USA, Canada, France, Germany and England.

Concerning the different priorities for business travelers, the research identified some key groups or tribes. Below the three largest groups of corporate travelers.

- The largest group, is the ‘experience-hungry‘ travelers, accounting for 39 percent of respondents. These travelers, try to leave as much time as possible for exploring new destinations.
44 percent of French business travelers belongs to this group. 41 percent of employees are ‘experience-hungry’ travelers, but just 29 percent of top management is represented in this group.

- The ‘hyper-connected‘ group comprises of 23 percent of business travelers. They are those who take advantage of business trips to develop business network. 30 percent of top managers fall in this group vs. 19 percent of employees.
Hyper-connected travelers tends to carry BlackBerry, WiFi-ready laptop and other mobile devices to stay in touch with work as well as with friends and family while on the road. They prefer functional hotel with WiFi rather than a charming one without.
The United States is the country best represented in this group, with 28 percent of U.S. corporate travelers who belong to this tribe.

- The ‘cost-conscious‘ travelers is third largest group. It accounted for 14 percent of surveyed. In this group fall travelers working for small companies — with less than 50 employees. Value for money is their key priority in every business trip.
The best represented country in this tribe is UK.

The survey also identified three smaller tribes: ‘seasoned travelers‘ (6 percent) — the most frequent travelers making around 25 business trips a year, ‘home-focused‘ (7 percent) — those who don’t enjoy business trip, and ‘green travelers‘ (4 percent).
(source)