More than 25% of travel shoppers research and book hotels on their mobile devices - are you reaching these shoppers? View these slides from our webinar, Mobilizing Hotel Storytelling to Reach Travel Shoppers, to learn why mobile optimization is vital for hotel websites.
8. 5* things you need to know about hotel
shopping journey on mobile devices
*actual presentation may include more than 5 things.
Director of Industry Relations, Expedia Inc.
Adam J. Anderson
16. Mobile is here, not coming
It’s not just about the smartphone any longer;
consider multi-device usage in your marketing
The Shopping Journey, is just that
Key Takeaways
26. Don’t operate solely on a 9-5 mentality
Partner
It’s totally do-able by all types of properties
Key Takeaways
27. The Ultimate Visual Storytelling Solution for
Hotels
VBrochure
VScape Media
Publishing
VNetwork Analytics Customer
Success
BestSTART
++ + ++
Online
Players
Mobile
Web
Gallery
Facebook
28. ► About Leonardo
► Invitations to upcoming webinars
● June’s topic is Best Practice Storytelling on 3rd Party Travel
Channels
► Recording of this webinar
● Share it with your colleagues
It’s a Wrap
Interestingly enough, the majority of mobile users - 61% of mobile and 70% of tablet users - research or book travel when at home.
When it comes to travel research, the hospitality segment is the top activity performed by 83% of mobile (and 74% of tablet) users, followed by flights and car rentals.
When it comes to making hotel reservations, two-thirds use mobile devices to do so
--[all stats from http://www.tnooz.com/article/Mobile-travel-marketing-deep-dive-Multiple-devices-campaign-strategy-spend/]--
Mobile is a hot topic in our industry and it will continue to make a significant impact to the way consumers plan and purchase travel for years to come. According to Business Insider, in 2014 more people (globally) accessed the internet via a smart phone than a personal computer. It’s only logical to assume as more people access the internet via their phones, more people will be shopping and purchasing travel from the device. By the end of 2015, PhoCusWright predicts that mobile share of online travel bookings will be almost 30%.
It’s also important to note as consumers from emerging countries obtain internet access for the first time they are leapfrogging the PC in favor of smartphones and tablets or in the case of Asia, Phablets (which is a combination of a smart phone and a tablet.)
And it’s not just about bookings, it’s about discovery, research and exposure for your hotel. Customers are all over multiple devices and multiple places online when they are getting inspired, researching, shopping, booking and more. You want to be present in all of these places and stages so you aren’t eliminated from the consideration set. In other words, if they can’t find you online when they are looking for a hotel – no matter what stage or device, you might miss a customer.
Ok, let’s now take a look at what these bookings look like:
Mobile bookings are generally shorter and booked closer to stay date than traditional bookings. You knew that. Let’s break it down further:
Mobile phone bookings are generally shorter LOS and booking window than tablet. Tablet resembles more the traditional PC booking: We see about the same LOS for tablet bookings compared with general non-mobile SA hotel bookings and a longer booking window (26) in non-mobile bookings.
(Merchant standalone bookings on EWW & HWW, US point of supply, booked data, last 12 months ended 30 Apr 2014)
However, the mobile category, i.e. mobile phone and tablet together the BW is growing. That’s because more and more customers are getting used to booking on their phones and tablets and it’s not just a last minute channel for those who are stranded.
When combined (tablet & web) the booking windows is shortening. Together:
Not in this slide: Lower star rated hotels have higher mobile phone purchase. For 1-star properties, 12.2% are booked on a mobile phone (not including tablet) and that progressively lessens through 5 star properties at 7%, so if you have a limited service hotel, this channel is even more important for you.
(Merchant standalone bookings on EWW & HWW, US point of supply, booked data, last 12 months ended 30 Apr 2014)
So what do you do with that info? Make it work for you in your distribution strategy. Specifically, use it as a tool in your toolbox to play to the booking curve that fits your strategy.
Mobile bookings are shorter and that can help you fill a need. Your strategy may also call for medium and long booking window channels – so don’t be a victim, use these channels strategically. With Expedia, you can choose fenced, mobile-only promotions to attract more bookings to this channel if that’s what you require.
Another recommendation is to communicate your goals to your market manager so they can ensure your hotel is best positioned to attract customers when you need the business. Additionally through a face to face meeting or phone conversation, they can tell you exactly what the booking window patterns are for your market and or hotel specifically. These reports will also tell you if tactics you put in place to attract customers in certain booking windows are actually working.
So how do you make your hotel available on mobile and get those bookings? Partner well.
Expedia has more than 125M downloads of its apps, and features more than 140 mobile Web sites in nearly 70 countries and 35 languages
Your partnership with Expedia gives you exposure across our brand apps and mobile web. Automatically.