Travel firms are losing bookings by being too pushy
Travel websites are losing bookings by pushing customers to the booking stage without letting them browse.
Google’s head of travel, Nigel Huddleston, cited easyJet’s ‘Inspire Me’ web feature as a good example of when customers can narrow down the holiday options without having to book.
Thomas Cook has also just launched a product which enables agents to create a ‘wishlist’ for clients for them to take home and discuss with friends and family, see separate story.
Huddleston said: "Very few sites do a good job of letting you browse without pushing them to the booking stage."
Six out of 10 people buy their holiday online and 85% either research, book or do both on the internet, but he added that the internet can still struggle with complex queries.
Huddleston said: "There’s still great value in human interaction and offline booking."
The Google travel chief said most people are looking for reassurance online that they are going to the right place and are paying the right price.
He also said:
– 70% of people look at maps and between 60% and 90% look at review sites before booking a holiday.
– 86% of smart phone users share holiday photos with friends and three quarters of people using social media look at it every day when they’re on holiday.
– three out of four people use a search engine when looking for a holiday with the others going direct to a specific travel website.
– on average, 44% of people search for holidays each month, with the lowest number (39%) in September and the highest (48%) in February.
Huddleston said that holidaymakers are focusing on fewer websites when searching for a holiday, looking at 11 different screens during the process.
Video is also an increasingly popular tool with huge surges in people looking at YouTube and other professional and amateur footage.
More customers are searching on tablets, mainly while they are watching TV, and also on smart phones. But he stressed that smart phones are still unpopular for booking holidays.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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