How Social Media Has Changed Business Travel: Before You Leave

Let’s face it: Social networking influences the way we travel, whether on business or for pleasure. Here’s how you can make the most of your trip by using the networks you’re a part of.

Social networks have changed the way we work—and live. For example, 18 percent of consumers use social networking sites before even getting out of bed, according to a May 2011 Ericsson ConsumerLab study. They have also changed the way we travel, morphing business trips from a mundane experience into a data-rich opportunity to make new connections and discover or strengthen relationships.

Before you ever book your trip, social networks allow you to research, interact, and enhance the experience.

Get the Best Airfare Deals

Airfarewatchdog is one of the best websites to filter through the madness and get the best deals on your next business trip.

Booking air travel on the Internet used to be a simplified process. You went to Travelocity, Expedia, or relied on your internal business travel coordinators to set it all up. There wasn’t much thinking involved: you entered a date and time, saw the available flights, and likely booked a package deal including hotels, car rentals, and more.

As the Internet and mobile apps continue to evolve, new companies have continued that disrupt that process, providing consumers a myriad of information on best times to buy, fare deals, and more. But how do you sift through that information and simplify the process?

There are a lot of airfare websites including Kayak, TripAdvisor, Yapta, Bing, Orbitz, Dohop, Vayama, and Momondo. All are very good options and a good place to start, but what do they all have in common? They all use specific algorithms to find the best deals based on the details you input. So what’s the problem? As George Hobica, the founder of Airfarewatchdog, notes, “fares fluctuate just like the stock market,” often lasting only a few hours or mere minutes at that rate after it initially announced. Moreover, computer algorithms don’t always pick that up, so the fares found are only a partial listing. That’s where Airfarewatchdog, this year’s Business Travel 50 pick for the best airfare alerts site, simplifies the process. Unlike fare alerts that might hit your e-mail inbox once a day or once a week (delayed by filters and more), Airfarewatchdog’s updates to Twitter, Facebook, and its blog, are instant information.

By Lou Dubois for http://www.inc.com

Сколько стоят апартаменты заграницей?

Традиционно стоимость аренды жилья начинается от 100-400 евро в месяц. Речь идет о жилье эконом-класса в Таиланде, Турции, Болгарии, Черногории, Германии, Египте. Более качественные предложения оцениваются в 700-1500 евро. Как правило, за такую сумму арендуются квартиры и дома на Кипре, Испании, на севере Италии.

Арендные ставки в меньшем по объему и более дорогом сегменте начинаются от 3 тыс. евро и выше. Как правило, это элитные апартаменты на Лазурном берегу Франции, на горнолыжных курортах Австрии, Франции, Канады, апартаменты в Нью-Йорке, Париже, Лондоне и других мировых столицах.

«Стоимость апартаментов в Болгарии или Черногории начинается от 45-50 евро с человека в сутки, но в пик сезона (июль-август) сложно найти жилье менее чем за 60 или даже 80 евро, – рассказала BFM.ru генеральный директор компании «Миэль-DPM» Наталья Завалишина. – На виллы в разных странах цены разные, но если она расположена близко к морю и недалеко от аэропорта, а регион имеет хорошую инфраструктуру, то в сезон цены на небольшую виллу начинаются от €150-200».

Four Ways to Save on Calling When Abroad (part 4 of 4)

Follow these tips to help ensure you don’t get a monster phone bill the next time you travel overseas.

Frequent business travelers might have to factor in new cost when abroad this year: Sky-high fees for international mobile phone calls and data use.

The phone company representatives say the higher fees reflect the overall cost of mobile roaming internationally. That means the impact on your bottom line when using your mobile device internationally can be significant.

Consider this tip to make sure you don’t get a monster phone bill the next time you travel abroad:

4. Consider using smartphone calling apps.
These can be big money-savers since they use low cost Wi-Fi connections instead of pricey international cell networks to provide service. Skype Mobile, for example, charges about 30 cents per minute for a call in Italy. I also like Palo Alto, Calif.-based Tango‘s app, because it offers a free video phone service. And if your business supports what’s called session initiation protocol (SIP) mobile service — that is the standard used by such tools as GoogleVoice — consider Czech Republic-based Acrobits‘s Softphone app ($7 to download). The app is designed to work with more company-oriented internet calling technologies and should provide a more professional experience than other services.

Four Ways to Save on Calling When Abroad (part 3 of 4)

Follow these tips to help ensure you don’t get a monster phone bill the next time you travel overseas.

Frequent business travelers might have to factor in new cost when abroad this year: Sky-high fees for international mobile phone calls and data use.

The phone company representatives say the higher fees reflect the overall cost of mobile roaming internationally. That means the impact on your bottom line when using your mobile device internationally can be significant.

Consider this tip to make sure you don’t get a monster phone bill the next time you travel abroad:

3. Take calls only from clients. 
As hard as it may be, stay off your cellphone as you wander the antiquities of, say, Rome or Athens. My rule of thumb is that my friends and family will understand if I don’t call. My clients will not. So, I take client calls only and do everything else — dialing out, calling my mom and checking my email — using a low-cost Wi-Fi connection.

It’s sweet when..

Saying Images | Images with Quotes (clipped to Polyvore.com)

Где российские туристы чаще всего снимают апартаменты?

Рынок зарубежной краткосрочной аренды главным образом подпитывают туристы из России. Среди них в большей степени востребованы Китай, Турция, Египет, Финляндия, Германия, Таиланд, Италия, Испания, Греция, Болгария, Кипр, Франции, Украина. В Турции и Китае также снимают жилье «челноки» – как, правило, посуточно. В данном случае речь идет о низкокачественном жилье, которое можно снять за $10-15 в сутки.

Среди туристов популярны квартиры на побережье или недалеко от горнолыжных и бальнеологических курортов. Эксперты Gordon Rock отмечают, что аренда жилья эконом-класса на популярных у россиян зарубежных курортах – в Египте, Турции, Болгарии, Таиланде, Черногории, южной Италии (Калабрия) и даже Германии и Испании – зачастую обходится дешевле, чем на российских курортах и в Подмосковье. Гораздо дороже аренда жилья на Кипре, в Северной Италии, на Лазурном берегу Франции и горнолыжных курортах Австрии, Франции и Канады, и этими предложениями пользуются немногие

Four Ways to Save on Calling When Abroad (part 2 of 4)

Follow these tips to help ensure you don’t get a monster phone bill the next time you travel overseas.

Frequent business travelers might have to factor in new cost when abroad this year: Sky-high fees for international mobile phone calls and data use.

The phone company representatives say the higher fees reflect the overall cost of mobile roaming internationally. That means the impact on your bottom line when using your mobile device internationally can be significant.

Consider this tip to make sure you don’t get a monster phone bill the next time you travel abroad:

2. Use Wi-Fi for calling, messaging, conferencing and accessing the Web to avoid international roaming charges.
Reference your phone’s manual or contact a representative at your phone carrier and ask him or her to walk you through the process of optimizing your phone for overseas use. This usually involves the following steps:

• Find what is usually called the “settings” area. This is the place where your smartphone controls many of its functions, including how it connects to the larger cellular network. Keep in mind that most smartphones use both a cell network and a local Wi-Fi hotspot to communicate, so there may be several screens you’ll need to look at.
• Turn off international roaming. This is the signal that is represented by a vertical bar logo in the upper right side of your phone’s screen. The more bars you see the more money you’ll likely have to pay.
• Turn on your Wi-Fi connection. You should notice concentric half circles on your screen, usually next to your network access bars. The more circles you see, the less money you’ll owe.

Remember, roaming begins as soon as you cross international borders. Also, many phones have features that limit updating email and social networks only over Wi-Fi networks.

Four Ways to Save on Calling When Abroad (part 1 of 4)

Follow these tips to help ensure you don’t get a monster phone bill the next time you travel overseas.

Frequent business travelers might have to factor in new cost when abroad this year: Sky-high fees for international mobile phone calls and data use.

The phone company representatives say the higher fees reflect the overall cost of mobile roaming internationally. That means the impact on your bottom line when using your mobile device internationally can be significant.

Consider this tip to make sure you don’t get a monster phone bill the next time you travel abroad:

1. Call your phone carrier before you travel. 
All major carriers offer online international sales-support staff and discounts for calling in and planning ahead. So call them and make sure you fully understand these issues:

• The cost to call back to the U.S. from your overseas destination. In-country calling back to the U.S. is usually more expensive than calling from the U.S. to another country.
• The cost to call another country — that’s not the U.S. — when abroad. These calls can be even more expensive to make.
• The difference between the cost of calling another mobile phone and calling a landline. Mobile phones are usually much pricier to call.
• The fees for sending and receiving text messages. Sometimes these cost 10 times the standard price when abroad.
• How your carrier bills video and audio content sent over text messages. Expect a major bump in rates, if the service is supported at all.
• How your carrier meters Web access. Data rates can vary dramatically by country.

Business travellers favour locks with pin codes to secure luggage

Business travellers prefer the efficiency of a pin-code lock to secure their luggage and its contents rather than a key lock or a zip tie, according to a new online poll.

The results showed the majority of respondents that participated in the poll, used locks with pin codes to secure their luggage when travelling. Only a small number of business travellers liked the idea of a full plastic wrap.

Results from the poll included:

- 139 or 35% of respondents preferred to use a pin code lock
- 106 or 27% of respondents use a key lock
- 85 or 21% of respondents use no form of lock at all
- 39 or 10% of respondents use a combination of luggage locks
- 18 or 5% of respondents use a zip tie, and
- 9 or 2% of respondents preferred a full plastic wrap.