Online search plays an increasingly significant role in the travel and tourism sector.

Recently OTX conducted a survey on behalf of Google called “The Travellers Road to Decision.” They wanted to get their heads around:

• How travel planning will change in the current economy
• Whether the Internet plays a significant role in travel planning
• How the research process changes by traveler type
• What role online video played in influencing travel decision-making processes

They surveyed over 6500 travellers (5000 business/leisure travellers and 1500 affluent personal travellers).

Overall they found that:

• Business travellers are more involved and passionate about travelling than personal travellers.
• The Internet is used throughout the travel purchase stream. It was found to be the most powerful prompter in getting people to actually book a trip.
• Search engines are used by 60% of travellers.
• Online searchers shop around more than non-searchers.
• More than half of business & personal travellers interact with online travel videos in all stages of their travel planning.
• Travel reviews and online video’s from more objective sources are more trusted than those from travel industry experts.

They found that business and personal travellers behaved differently.

• In this post we’ll discuss their findings on business travel behavior.
• In my next post we will talk about how leisure and affluent travellers are faring and how emerging media like video is impacting the travel decision cycle.

Travelling Less. For Less.

It was found that 28% of business travellers would be travelling less in 2009 than last year. Over 50% of those cited that a decrease in travel budgets was the reason for this.

Business Travellers: Travelling more or less ? (OTX Research for Google 2009: “The Travellers Road to Decision.”)

Business travellers are more likely to book a package than personal travellers; and 34% of them typically book packages which offer a discount.

TIP: Don’t underestimate the benefits of offering discount packages to business travellers – especially online, where they are more likely to shop around given that they are currently subject to budget cuts. Do conversion testing to determine what packages and discounts work for what category of business travel.

Mobile Access Rapidly Becoming Important

Business travellers are more likely to access information from their mobile device. 25% said they would access information from their mobile device – which is up from a similar survey in 2008 – where only 13% of business travellers said they would access travel data from a mobile device.

TIP: Your travel sites targeting business travellers should start gearing for mobile access. Ideally – you shouldn’t just offer a diluted .mobi version of your site. Analyse how and why these travellers are accessing your site via their mobiles and cater for that functionality when it is needed.

Loyalty And Rewards And Leisure

Most business travellers (83%) are members of travel rewards programmes. They held specific memberships as follows: 

• 68% flight reward programmes
• 64% accommodation programmes
• 40% car hire programmes

Almost half of business travellers always (or frequently) make time for leisure activities when travelling for business.

TIP: Tap into the natural behaviours of business travellers and explore how you can cater for that online – through the information and services you offer when they engage with your brand online. Make it easier for them to link their business travel with interesting leisure and/or adventure activities.

Spreading The Travel Love

Interestingly, compared to leisure travellers, business travellers are more likely to

• Explore new places;
• Read about travel and travel related topics;
• Watch Travel networks and travel programming;
• Be adventure travellers;
• Give advice on travel topics; and
• Be asked by others for advice about travel planning.

TIP: Consider how you can engage the passion of business travellers to either promote your brand further or engage more deeply in social media spaces more naturally.

Make it easy for them to share their positive experiences online with others and possibly even reward them for doing so with something (tangible or intangible) which is valuable to them.

In summary:

If you are targeting business travellers for Search Marketing purposes, be aware that they: 

• Are more passionate and informed about travel in general.
• Will more likely seek out money-saving packages and will shop around online. Make sure your Search Marketing efforts take that into account.
• Are increasingly likely to access data from their mobile devices.
• Will most likely tack on time for leisure activities when traveling for business.
• As expected – have a high tendency to be part of a membership programme.
• Are highly likely to share their travel advice and experiences with others. Rewarding them to do so positively in some way may be a way to augment your online search activities.

In the next post we will look at leisure and affluent travellers and then how online video is affecting travel.

Data Source: The statistics in this post were obtained from “The Travellers Road to Decision”. OTXResearch survey conducted on behalf of Google in April/May 2009.

This is the 1st article in a 4-part series by Quirk’s Head of Search – Suzan Gray. She discusses factors to consider when doing Search Marketing for the Travel industry and how the current economy and emerging media realities like video are affecting the travel industry online in 2009.

Part 1: Business travellers
How they gather online information and make travel decisions.

Part 2: Leisure and Affluent travellers
How they gather online information and make travel decisions.

Part 3: The Brand Value of Search for the Travel industry

Part 4: Online Video and Travel Search