Avis Exceeds Net Booking Targets With Contegro

Avis New Zealand now gets first ranking on Google searches and has achieved its highest ever level of internet bookings, thanks to Exceed Online and the Contegro content management system…

Avis Rent A Car System operates one of the world's leading car rental brands. Based in New Jersey, the company provides services to business and leisure customers at more than 2,000 locations in North and Central America, Australia and New Zealand.

Like many companies in the travel industry, Avis New Zealand, was keen to tap the growing market in internet bookings.

“Increasingly people are using the internet to plan their trips therefore it is important for Avis to communicate our services and promotional activity when potential customers are in the travel planning process” says Avis New Zealand brand manager Claire Anderson.

But Avis New Zealand’s website, which was incorporated into the global Avis website was restricting the online growth of Avis New Zealand.

“Part of the problem was that we had to send content changes to the US, resulting in delays therefore effecting our efficiency in being proactive within the local market,” says Anderson.

The second problem was that the New Zealand pages were not being recognised by search engines such as Google. “We weren’t featuring on search engines at all,” says Anderson. This meant Avis NZ had to invest in paid advertising on Google to drive customers to the NZ site. To overcome this problem Avis NZ decided to setup a locally hosted and managed website. Anderson decided to approach Auckland based web consultancy Exceed Online for a solution.

“I had worked with Exceed previously therefore knew they specialised in developing websites that searched naturally within search engines, as well as creating a design that effectively portrayed the brand. This is in contrast to other companies that concentrate on building a creative website, and may not consider the search engine optimisation” she explains.

Exceed proposed a two-part solution, consisting of a re-design of the website with search engine optimisation and implementation of the Contegro content management system. The Contegro system would enable Avis NZ to independently control its website content, and alter or update the material locally whenever required.
After gaining approval from the US head office the project began in earnest last September commencing with a specification meeting to verify and confirm that the solution would meet Avis NZ’s needs. This meeting included a review of Avis’s business model and objectives as well as covering the company’s branding requirements and online marketing strategy.

The new website went live in mid-December and has already resulted in Avis NZ’ s highest level of internet bookings ever. Anderson says she has “no issues whatsoever” with the Contegro software which now allows Avis NZ to set up and manage its own web pages.

“We can now change content in minutes and the flexibility Contegro has provided has allowed us to be more proactive in the online market, as well as allowing us to enter into more online partnerships.” Exceed’s search engine optimisation skills have also worked wonders for Avis NZ’s Google rankings.

“We now have first ranking on Google for our main brand names like ‘Avis’, or ‘Avis New Zealand’ and we are climbing up to the first page for generic searches like ‘rental cars.’ We’re not number one yet but we aim to be - the trend is positive.”