AI electrifies Lightning online booking for CTM travel management

Online booking experience for Lightning users gains simplicity and speed. Building trust with travelers will raise program adoption, supporting travel managers in their goals of delivering savings and duty of care.

The launch of Lightning’s AI gives CTM the ability to intelligently recommend personalized options, even as different content types and options from suppliers exponentially expand the amount of choice today’s travelers see at the point of booking.

“If there are fifty options that fit within a company’s travel policy, that triggers the ‘paradox of choice,’ where too many options make it harder for a traveler to choose and feel confident in their decision quickly. We’re doing the hard work for them, cutting booking times by a minute already,” says Bailey.

Available immediately

New CTM customers can take advantage of Lightning’s AI capabilities immediately by sharing data booked with their previous travel management company and some initial customer value segmentation by the CTM team based on policy and booking data.

CTM’s Chief Product Officer, North America, Lehi Mills, has led the project and is excited to see it unveiled. “We’ve been quietly building a dedicated team of AI, ML, and Data Science specialists for the last three years,” he says. “This announcement is the first public acknowledgment of that dedicated team and how their work is shaping the future of CTM innovation across multiple products. Lightning’s AI works like your own personal travel consultant who knows what you’ve booked, what you’ll like, and your policy.”

CTM is launching Lightning AI in North America, its largest global market, with its other global regions following in the next 12 months.

Lightning’s artificial intelligence has been built using proprietary data models and leverages cloud-based cognitive search capabilities. CTM began indexing booked travel choices in 2019 and today uses a variety of AI and machine learning data points to produce company and traveler-specific rankings to surface the perfect options for each traveler and client.

Read about CTM’s proprietary CRM service