Do’s and Don’ts for Successful Travel Tech Advertising

Travel business is booming. According to Deloitte research, the growth of the travel sector has been going up over the last ten years. However, a thriving sector like this still presents a problem for business travel management companies.

Problem?

We live in a world where travel is easier than ever. From online travel agencies to metasearch machines and the travel agencies down the street, there are several ways that businesses can choose to book a trip for their business travelers.

How can business TMCs stand out in a busy market with so many travel carts?

Marketers need to reach consumers effectively in this ever-evolving digital landscape. To be successful in this era of convergence, business travel providers need to think more strategically about how to sell the full business travel experience. And only the travel brand that uses the best multi-channel advertising strategies will win the race.

To put it simply, multi-channel marketing is all about giving your customers choices. Marketers are developing today and they need to implement multi-channel marketing solutions for customers. As the number of channels continues to grow, the need to embrace multi-channel marketing will become a critical strategy for business travel management companies. That, the opportunity lies in overcoming these challenges by introducing these companies with new solutions for business travel. And embracing this could be a paradigm shift for the business travel sector.

When working on your business travel management marketing campaigns, it is important to note that they are very different from those of B2C. Sales programs are relatively long, there are more points of contact, decision making in each phase is becoming more complex than ever, and the volume of purchases is much higher. Therefore, you need to make sure that you use every aspect of these hyper-tempo digital channels with your target customers in mind.

Below are some of the ways to get the most out of these multi-channel strategies and increase sales for your business travel platform:

Make mobile first approach your top priority

In 2018, Google indicated that more than half of business travelers use their smartphones to book their trips. And according to a report by Amadeus Study, 61% of business travelers use smartphones for flight controls and open the apps after reaching their destination. Business travel management mobile apps are not only useful, they are also growing rapidly in demand.

If business travelers can not use your marketplace to book their flights, you will be wasting a lot of time on your sales. Therefore, keep the following points in mind in your mobile marketing efforts:

Focus on mobile compatibility and ease of use

Improve your page loading speed

Make sure your website responds to smartphones

Focus on delivering top-class user experience

Your target customer should be the focal point of your marketing strategy. Make sure you have an exceptional landing page that highlights your offerings and the unique value proposition for your audience to see.

Also, make sure you write compelling ad copies for your PPC campaigns and back up your clients with data. A poorly designed landing page that does not highlight the benefits and unique value propositions for its clients will lose audience to their competition. Hence, when focusing on your ideal business traveler, always remember to show your discounts and benefits on the hero section of the landing page. This strategy will not only improve your CTR but also improve your credibility and you can position yourself as a trusted source of information.

Use the power of Voice Technology

It was reported by Travelport Digital in 2017 that more than 23% of travelers used voice search to search for or book a trip. In this sense, the former business travel agencies realize the potential of speech search, how better equipped they will be when offering a more meaningful conversation with today's modern traveler. This new ecosystem will not only transform how travelers communicate with brands, airlines and travel companies, but also have a greater impact on the 'next billion' mobile users who are now online for the first time.

Use video campaigns to bring the travel experience to your customers

Reading about a travel experience is one thing, but watching a video brings a much more engaging experience. A video-based campaign will enable your audience to live the experience beforehand and will result in a more engaging, powerful and authentic presentation. Not just for the travel sector but marketers in all sectors use video campaigns to spread market awareness.

YouTube, Facebook and Instagram are great platforms to run your multi-channel video campaigns with an ever-growing consumer base. As of 2017, about 51% of U.S. marketers have advertised on YouTube. According to Wyzowl, 72% of people would rather use video to learn about a product than a service Tweet This! and this certainly holds even more true for the travel industry.

Build relationships for returning customers

Once they pick you up, make sure they pick you up again! It is essential to cultivate a strong relationship with your customers in every business; it has a significant impact on your business travelers because they return to your business more often. Building brand loyalty can be the game changer for your business. Learn more about how to enable personalization of your business travel company with this in-depth blog.

Come up with a unique social media marketing strategy for your brand

The social network will give business travel vendors the greatest variety of opportunities for engagement, access to the largest audience, and integration with a ton of free marketing tools. As a travel marketer, you need to use your social media channels to keep your audience up to date with the latest travel news and information. Use platforms like Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube and Instagram to show consumers what they are missing, if not through your books.

For example, travel is one of the 'Top 10' interests on Pinterest with travel-related pins reaching a peak of 4 million repins per day. Tweet It! The images as visuals on Pinterest and Instagram serve more as banner ads. Using these platforms gives you the features of both, a visual search engine and a social media platform, and offers many ways to share content and unavoidable photos of the accommodation venues and facilities.

'Office Away from the Office' Underfining

Business travel customers not only look for Wi-Fi and on-site amenities in their transportation options, but they also seek first-class business experience as a travel tech customer. So, it is always better to highlight these in your ads when advertising for travel tech companies. Additionally, highlighting features like office lounges at the travel destinations and crucial business travel amenities can add value to your business travel ads and help deliver with the 'office away from the office' experience.

Do not overestimate the value of your website

In the digital world we live in today, the role of an organization's website has become increasingly important. A lot of the time a customer first interacts with your organization by visiting your website. For business travel management companies, it is important that their brand identity comes through their website and reflects who they are and what their products and solutions are. Having a strong logo, graphics, fonts, website design, and interstitial ads on the lying pages of travel tech services are super important, and they all need to work together.

Do not forget to use your own media channels

Apart from social media channels that use proprietary media channels like the company website and service pages, blogs, whitepapers, and pubsites provide an excellent advertising platform for travel tech companies. Since these are advertising platforms from companies, they have 360-degree control over establishing their travel business brand through advertising.

Pubsites work primarily as the best channel for advertising for travel tech companies, as they host one-stop destination for news, trends and events related to specific domains in the sector. For example, run pub sites like travel.report, wheels.report, aviation.report, etc. For the business domain, make sure specific and relevant travel insights are provided as visitors land on these pages.

Do not skip improving your own information flow

For a multi-channel marketing approach, it is important to get the information flood under control. Use tools like Netvibes or iGoogle to customize your own information resources. To be successful in a digital world, travel marketers need to continually change the messages to arrive at just the right time for individual travelers, but be flexible with those messages, channels and timing.

By effectively implementing multi-channel strategies, social web and well-optimized mobile technologies, market awareness can spread. TMCs can keep business travelers well-informed and aware, and experience newly personalized business trips.

Business travel is primarily driven by well-optimized business travel management solutions along with constant innovations in business travel solutions. Imagine a situation where a business management company is fully equipped with all the latest technologies from the travel industry and has the most effective management for its travel solutions.

Here, multi-channel marketing comes to your rescue and sets a niche in the tech travel world. Multichannel advertising always works, because when it comes to marketing, it is always better not to leave a stone unturned.

Passionate Digital Marketer