Digital Marketing Transforming the way Travel Industry Functions

The experience of traditional vacation is fast being replaced with digital transformation. Increase in the usage of mobile internet has transformed the traditional traveller to an "always-connected-traveler." Sources opine that 66% of the vacationers and 59% business travelers use Internet to research Travel Online. As per the recent survey conducted by Trip Advisor, 92% of the UK travellers search for the reviews before booking a holiday. The mobile internet has not only empowered the consumers but has a great impact on the way they purchase, experience and talk about their holiday. The consumers spread the word about their experience by writing reviews, by posting comments on social networking platforms- before, during and after their vacation. The travel companies should tap into this trend as people are tuning into the Internet to find everything starting from their destination, stay to restaurants, and coffee shops to hotel reviews. The hotels, small and medium-sized ones, travel companies can no longer afford not to have mobile optimized websites.

Three phases before a traveller decides to purchase a holiday

In today’s competitive world a travel cycle is driven by Internet technology that is a vicious one.

• Dreaming phase- The first phase is the dreaming phase when travelers search in the web for information about their destination they wish to travel to,
• Decision making phase- second phase is the choice of stay and visit,
• Sharing phase- This is the last phase and is known as the experience sharing phase. Analysts opine this is an important phase because a traveller’s experiences will inspire his friend or acquaintance to start dreaming and this continues.

Here we have put together a few important travel and tourism marketing digital insights that leisure and tourism companies should implement if they want to take their businesses to new heights.

• Stay connected using social media channels- The travel companies should integrate social media channels such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest and Instagram to connect and also interact with customers on regular basis. The reason is travelers today are tech savvy and would like to 'check-in' at their location on Facebook, hash-tag their exposure and experience on Twitter or even submit their memorable pictures on Pinterest. Social media platforms allow the travel companies to customize their offerings and benefits to their individual travellers. The travel and tourism companies need to come up with innovative ideas and marketing tactics to change the phase of technology based on their digital marketing analysis into face-to-face client experience.
• Email Marketing allows you give discounts and lets your customers know about your offerings- Email Marketing is still in use and is still consider one of the powerful tools in digital marketing campaigns. It’s one of the ways to stay connected to your past clients and acquire new potential customers. A well written email newsletter can bring in good return on investment and it’s a way to manage the existing customers of the travel business. Email marketing is not only cost effective and measurable it also helps to increase the brand awareness. You can reach out to the customers faster and more quickly. Email marketing allows the businesses to create personalized emails to suit the tastes and preferences of their clients.
• Travel business should use high resolution photos showing the various travel destinations- Content strategy is not just about writing impressive literature on the various tourist attractions. These days the travellers would want tohave a glimpse of their destinations. Therefore the content strategy should also include high resolution images, videos along with texts. Visual content coupled with readable texts that have all the information that a customer is looking out for can help the travel company to close the deal and also the website would rank higher.

Tourism companies have to come up with innovative ideas using technology to make the travel experiences of their customers more memorable. Until now, most of the companies were focusing on the booking phase, while they have not tackled the emotional phase known as the experience. This is a challenge that travel and tourism companies have to take up to connect with the potential customers and let them know that they have the information they are searching for if they want to propel the business ahead.

Mobile technology is playing a vital role in the day to day life of a consumer. He researches, plans and carry out his travel plans using mobile. Therefore, the tourism companies should consider developing their apps to cater to the needs of their potential customer.

Http://www.yumadigital.com/ YumaDigital - A digital marketing company offers professional internet marketing services.