Expedia Media Solutions Group Launches PassportAds

New behavioral marketing service gives advertisers ability to target the Web’s largest audience of in-market travel consumers

BELLEVUE, Wash., Feb. 26 /PRNewswire / — Expedia(R) Media Solutions, the advertising sales division of Expedia, Inc., has introduced a new behavioral marketing product called PassportAds(TM), which gives advertisers an effective way to reach in-market travel consumers throughout the trip purchasing lifecycle. Expedia.com(R) reaches 50 percent of all online travel shoppers, allowing PassportAds to deliver unparalleled reach to this highly qualified audience across the Internet using anonymous visitor data(1).

The first program of its kind in travel advertising, PassportAds anonymously identifies in-market travelers through “explicit” search behaviors, such as a search for hotels in Hawaii. PassportAds then uses this anonymous search data to build segments of highly qualified travel shoppers, and targets them with controlled frequency throughout their decision-making lifecycle. Unlike typical contextual buys, advertisers can appear in front of these audience segments anywhere online.

“PassportAds offers unrivaled reach to consumers actively in-market for travel. Now advertisers can create highly tailored messages that target travelers during the entire vacation planning and booking process and throughout the entire online experience – from reading the news to checking their weather forecast or shopping for clothes,” said Doug Miller, vice president of Global Media Solutions, Expedia. “We’re focused on offering clients the ability to deliver behaviorally and contextually relevant advertising to the largest and most valuable audience of in-market travel consumers in the world.”

PassportAds builds on the success of Expedia’s bid for placement product, TravelAds. TravelAds uses shopper search behavior to deliver highly targeted advertising at the point-of-sale. Introduced in 2008, TravelAds offers hotel partners the ability to differentiate their property by bidding for premium placement within hotel search results on Expedia.com and Hotels.com. Both TravelAds and PassportAds allow advertisers to capitalize on the rich data generated by users when they search for travel.

Expedia Media Solutions helps advertisers reach a significant share of the online travel market, providing advertisers access to the 23.3 million monthly unique users that visit Expedia, Inc. Web sites and offering solutions that harness the power of these consumers’ search and shopping behaviors(1).

PassportAds and TravelAds are two key products in Expedia’s Media Solutions portfolio. They represent the company’s efforts to help travel and non-travel brand advertisers tap the unmatched value of Expedia’s global online travel marketplace. In addition to PassportAds and TravelAds, Expedia Media Solutions offers myriad opportunities to reach shoppers with a demonstrated interest in travel, including banner ads, sponsorship opportunities, promotional activities, placement in Theme Stores and more, helping companies get the most value out of their marketing dollar.

More information on Expedia Media Solutions is available on www.advertising.expedia.com.

About Expedia Media Solutions

Formed in 2007, Expedia Media Solutions is dedicated to building online and offline media partnerships for travel and non-travel brand advertisers and to enable them to leverage the unique media value of Expedia’s network of leading travel brands and global points of sale. For more information, visit www.advertising.expedia.com.

About Expedia, Inc.

Expedia, Inc. is the world’s leading online travel company, empowering business and leisure travelers with the tools and information they need to easily research, plan, book and experience travel. Expedia, Inc. also provides in-destination concierge service and activity desks for travelers. The Expedia, Inc. portfolio of brands includes: Expedia.com, hotels.com, Hotwire, Egencia (formerly Expedia Corporate Travel), TripAdvisor, Expedia Local Expert, Classic Vacations and eLong. Expedia, Inc.’s companies operate more than 60 global points of sale in more than 40 countries, with sites in North America, South America, Latin America, Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia-Pacific. Expedia, Inc. is a component of the S&P 500 index. For more information, visit http://www.expediainc.com/.

(1) Customized comScore data, April 2007 – March 2008, US

Expedia, Expedia.com, PassportAds and the Airplane logo are registered trademarks of Expedia, Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries. Hotels.com is a registered trademarks of Hotels.com, LP, a subsidiary of Hotels.com in the U.S. and/or other countries. Hotwire.com is a registered trademark of Hotwire, Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries. (C) 2009 Expedia, Inc. All rights reserved. . CST # 2029030-40

SOURCE Expedia Media Solutions