In the Hotel Travel Trends report we take a close look at which destinations are gaining popularity, how far in advance travelers book by destination and how many searches they make. Hotel marketers can use this insight to guide their future marketing decisions and deliver improved business performance.
Key findings include:
- More than one in three travelers to New Orleans, Las Vegas, Orlando and Washington DC booked hotels more than 30 days in advance.
- Those traveling with families, as well as travelers who are 20-29 years old, have a higher number of searches prior to booking hotels.
- More exotic destinations have a higher share of hotel searches compared to bookings.
The top destinations for hotel bookings were consistent between the first half of 2015 and first half of 2016. However, several destinations grew in popularity, year over year, including the City of Brotherly Love, New Orleans, Boston and Miami. As of 2016, Anaheim and Pittsburgh both make the list of top 30 markets for hotel bookings.
The report finds the number of travelers tends to correlate with the number of searches prior to booking, for example one person would on average search 7 times prior to booking a hotel, whilst bookings for three people conducted on average 10 searches. From this insight CMOs can deduce that families have a higher number of searches prior to making hotel bookings than lone travelers.
Unsurprisingly, more exotic destinations focused on holidays have a higher number of searches than more business-focused destinations. Hotels in the Caribbean represent over 1.3% of all hotel searches, but only 0.5% of bookings, showing an index of 267 searches/bookings. In contrast, the share of bookings to Frankfurt is actually higher than the share of searches.
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