A recent report by Frommers Unlimited in conjunction with Travel mole suggests that, despite the recession, organisations plan to increase spend on online marketing for 2010. Over half of the 225 Travel organisations surveyed suggested that they wanted to increase online spend by 11-50%. The most important areas of the online marketing mix for these companies were Social Media, SEO and Unique Content (With 81% of those surveyed making this of paramount importance in their marketing plans). In addition to this is it clear that a massive force within the online tourism domain is that of user generated content. The following statistic highlights this sentiment :
From EyeForTravel and HOTELMARKETING.COM (June 2009)
‘Visitors to travel websites want social media and user-generated content, with 38% of users preferring recommendations and advice from other users when booking a holiday online.’
From VisitBritain eNews – (November 2009)
Visit Britain’s website, which has won the very prestigious world travel award 2009 is a fine example of a site that harnesses all SEO, Social Media and Content:
The statistics on this site speak for themselves :
- 57 sites in 41 countries
- 21 Languages
- 17 Million Visitors per year
- The site is launching a newly updated version in 2010 that hopes to attract 20 Million visitors annually.
From Travel Mole – Online Marketing and Web Content Report (November 2009)
The stats bellow represent the countless other online travel companies that are turning to contemporary online media sources and illustrate how and where they intend to change their budgets:
From Google Report on Travel Decision (July 2009)
- 64 % Depend on search engines for planning personal trips
- 56 % Depend on search engines for planning business trips
- 67 % Depend on search engines to find hotels for personal trips
- 81% Depend on search engines to find hotels for business trips
- 59 % Depend on search engines to find flights for personal trips
- 74 % Depend on search engines to find flights for business rips
From Online Hotel Reviews are gaining popularity (June 2009)
User generated reviews
- 1/5 North Americans read guest reviews online before booking travel
- 1/10 North Americans write reviews after staying at a Hotel
- 8.6%- the percentage of North Americans who wrote travel reviews in 2009
Guests who write reviews are 20% more likely to recommend a Hotel and 40% more likely to engage in repeat business than non review writing consumers.
From Travellers are making travel decision based on Twitter Conversations (November 2009)
Twitter and the Travel Industry : Sample of 90 Twitter users who tweet about Travel
- 52% Tweeted between 4 and Ten times per day
- 25% Tweeted 10 updates or more per day
- 60% used Twitter to connect with local suppliers, hotels and transport companies.
- 28% Made a reservation following an initial contact on Twitter
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