Making the switch from Offline to Online

About Us

Established in 2000, MakeMyTrip Limited is India's leading online travel company. We own and
operate well recognized online brands, including MakeMyTrip, Goibibo and RedBus. Through our
primary websites and mobile platforms, travellers can research, plan, and book a wide range of travel
services and products in India as well as overseas. Our services and products include air ticketing,
hotel and alternative accommodations bookings, holiday planning and packaging, rail ticketing, bus
ticketing, car hire and ancillary travel requirements such as facilitating access to third-party travel
insurance and visa processing. We provide our customers with access to all major domestic full-
service and low-cost airlines operating in India and all major airlines operating to and from India,
over 1,00,000 domestic accommodation properties in India and more than 500,000 properties
outside of India, Indian Railways, and all major Indian bus operator.

Background

As the Indian travel market continues to expand, MakeMyTrip wants to provide seamless services to
all its customers. The Indian online travel market is diverse, layered and highly contextual. Online
flight transactions, today, comprise more than 50% of the total flight transactions. However, the
same does not hold true for online hotel bookings. The online hotel bookings account for less than
20% of the total hotel bookings. Even today, there are many people that are still not comfortable
making their travel bookings online, both for flights and hotels.

Following are some of the challenges for offline customers that restrict them from making online
travel bookings:

• Offline customers have trust issues while booking on an online portal.

• These customers prefer to book with offline travel agents as all their needs are taken care of
• These customers are apprehensive about providing their personal and credit/debit card details
with external companies.
Challenge

Objective: To drive customer shift from offline to online travel booking

MakeMyTrip wants to drive the customer’s preference from offline to online booking for their travel
needs. Online transactions consist of a very small volume across the entire travel booking value
chain – air flight booking, hotel booking, holiday packages, etc. as the travel & tourism ecosystem is
highly unorganized, fragmented, and complex.

The company recognizes that customer preferences differ for an offline traveller and consumer
research would be a key aspect to understand and drive this customer shift.

Your final recommendations should clearly highlight the following:

• What are the primary reasons (other than the factors mentioned above) that act as a blocker for
the customers to transact online?

• How to get these customers online? What features/services should be offered by MakeMyTrip to
make their purchase journey seamless?

• What are the value propositions that can be included to help the offline customers make the
switch to online?

• What is the product-level changes required to complement the business propositions? How
would you prioritize these changes? State your reasons for prioritization explicitly.

Thought-starters

Think of the needs and preferences of an offline booking traveller and how can MakeMyTrip with
the help of its strong product, funnel and value propositions would help make them book their travel
plan online. Below are few attributes which you can consider.
• Customer travel preferences – Flights, Rails, Hotels – How do they finalize their travel plans?
• Customer journey of the offline traveller – Various touchpoints encountered in the lifecycle of an
offline traveller.
• Apprehensions of these customers to book their travel via online travel companies.

The primary focus should be on residents of Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities in India, excluding the top 15
metros and urban areas, with the goal of encouraging them to book their accommodations through
MakeMyTrip.

Please note that these suggestions are not based on any specific research or data and should be
considered only as thought starters. Please feel free to rethink on the user problem and reimagine
the funnel experience accordingly.
Research Resources

Few research references to get you started are given below.

1. https://www.statista.com/outlook/mmo/travel-tourism/india
2. https://investor.ihcltata.com/files/IHCL_Integrated_Annual_Report_2022-23.pdf
3. DGCA data sources: https://www.dgca.gov.in/digigov-portal/?page=4252/4205/sericename
4. Getting Started with Luxury Segments -
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/services/hotels-/-restaurants/global-hotel-
chains-checking-in-to-india-with-new-brands-following-pandemic-
years/articleshow/99478103.cms
5. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/voices/travel-trends-and-predictions-expected-in-
2023/

Sanity Check – Dos and Don’ts

• Do not propose an existing solution. Do not propose an infeasible solution. Any solution that is
proposed should be backed up with a proper feasibility check.
• For a business idea proposition, you should specifically describe how the product will incorporate
the idea. You need to prioritize the product changes based on clear assumptions.
• Clearly define the go-to-market strategy to implement the change that you propose.