Travel Weekly Blog

Travel trade association ABTA has unveiled a new website, and it's a vast improvement - though the old one hardly had it goin' on, as I'm sure even ABTA would admit.

It's a more consumer-focused affair, with centre stage taken by a member directory. Users can search the database by destination and activity, giving them a pretty good way of tracking down reliable travel specialists.

I, for example, found a list of agencies that could do me a cricket holiday in Belgium. (I was just testing it.)

Specialist business is likely to be important to agents as straightforward bookings migrate to online retailers, so this is a good move from ABTA. The question is whether the association can raise its consumer profile sufficiently to drive traffic to the resource.

There's also some iffy usability under the 'Find a Holiday' menu item - this ought to take you directly to a search form, but brings up two lines of text that direct you elsewhere.

The new site also features prominent offers on the homepage, and a nice events page with a calendar widget.

Nathan Midgley, web producer