Nowadays, whoever has a business and manages to survive, for me, is a hero. But if the company is in the tourism sector, it is already a hero. we are talking about a superhero one of those in the movies that you don't know how, but it always survives.
The The tourism sector is suffering the worst crisis in its history. and is clearly in a real emergency situation.
At DDigitals we work with many companies related to travel and we are often asked about how they can improve their situationThe EU's strategy and what to do in the face of such an unusual situation.
Frankly, I would love to have the answer and to help; but it is difficult to resurrect a market that is, to put it bluntly, destroyed.
However, for those companies that have the financial muscle and can hold out, there are certain strategies that can be beneficial in the long termbut the stakes are high and the return will by no means be immediate.
As we always say, don't expect any magic wand to explode your turnover or improve your margins, but you can. we'll tell you where we think you should be when all this is over and why.
This battle of travel will be won by whoever can hold out the longest in the long term and whoever has a brand and digital positioning above their competition.
Facts about Covid turismo
According to the latest issue of the UNWTO World Tourism Barometerthe international tourist arrivals stood at 72% less in the January-October period in 2020. compared to the same period of the previous year.
Three important points are concerned:
- The trust of travellers.
- Their own restrictions of the pandemic carried out by countries.
- The instability world general.
This drop in the first 10 months of the year represents a drop of about 900 million less tourist arrivals and a loss of $935 billion of dollars across the sector.
Against this backdrop, the pace of vaccination and the economic situation of families; The sector's recovery is not likely to happen overnight.
However, with the facts clear, and in the spirit of managing expectations, I pose the following question: How can my tourism company best adapt to this situation? How can my travel agency gain market share by the time all this is over?
It's not all bad news.
How the travel industry is trying to rebuild itself through consumer confidence
In addition to the obvious financial problems, the two main problems facing the tourism industry are the fear and uncertainty of the traveller.
And we are not talking about problems of cancellation or flexibility of a plane ticket or a hotel.
Fortunately, the industry was able to react and any travel website provides customers with fast and reliable alternatives when it comes to changing their ticket.
This fear and uncertainty is focused on the sudden closure of borders in another country.
As a result, the sector has shifted its focus to the travel security (something that is already outdated if we look back a year) to the interruption of travel and the problems it may cause for the customer.
Shorter journeysThe use of the "in-country destinations" or exclusive experiences can be a good activation lever.
In our country, for example, there are communities such as the Canary Islands that have been able to react and change their model tourist industry so that the blow would not be so hard (which it has been).
trends.embed.renderExploreWidget("TIMESERIES", {"comparisonItem":[{"keyword": "viajar a canarias", "geo": "ES", "time": "today 12-m"}], "category":67, "property":""}, {"exploreQuery": "cat=67&geo=ES&q=viajaracanarias&date=today 12-m", "guestPath": "https://trends.google.es:443/trends/embed/"});The consumer has also accepted the rules of the game. and knows that if he wants to travel he has to be flexible, therefore, this focus on flexibility is and will also be one of the keys.
The work to be carried out is a work of building consumer confidence.
Good news: we're mad about travel
However, we are not in a position to be throwing any rockets around, we are better off than we were a year ago (I know this is no consolation); and in a few months, we will be clearly better off now.
This is what our clients tell us, the data we handle in the agency and what users' own searches tell us according to Google.
Human beings like many things, but travelling, travelling is something that drives us crazy.
According to a report that Google has developed with Boston Consulting Group31% of the survey respondents will make a trip as soon as they feel sufficiently secure and constraints allow.
I believe it, because that's the first thing I'm going to do (ask the guy next to me and you'll find he'll do the same).
You can see it here:
trends.embed.renderExploreWidget("TIMESERIES", {"comparisonItem":[{"keyword": "where you can travel from spain", "geo": "ES", "time": "today 12-m"}], "category":0, "property":""}, {"exploreQuery": "geo=en&q=wheresecantravelfromspaspaa&date=today 12-m", "guestPath": "https://trends.google.co.uk:443/trends/embed/"});Not only that, but there are many related searches which indicate that the consumers want to travel as soon as possible.
The example is from Spain, but you'll find it in every country in the world with a clear upward trend.
trends.embed.renderExploreWidget("RELATED_QUERIES", {"comparisonItem":[{"keyword": "where you can travel", "geo":"", "time": "today 12-m"}], "category":0, "property":""}, {"exploreQuery": "q=whereyoucantravel&date=today 12-m", "guestPath": "https://trends.google.es:443/trends/embed/"});Thus, while travel agencies and hotels decided to contract in the midst of the crisis, they decided to cut back on ERTES and reduce costs, The time has come to start investing in order to be able to compete.
Actions taken now will determine tomorrow, and in a post-COVID era the digital traveller interactions (which were already in place) are here to stay and will never be forgotten.
Recovery scenarios
Whatever happens, as happens in all sectors and companies, decisions have to be taken.
In this report created by BCG and Google called Actions for Destination Marketers to Navigate in a COVID-19 World are raised 5 different scenarios taking into account 3 factorsThe severity of the virus, the actions of governments and consumer behaviour.
They are betting on a U-shaped or L-shaped recovery, or rather L-shaped, I would say.
The good news? There is time to develop actionsThe industry itself will (as it always does) return winners and losers in a year's time.
In general terms, the travel industry has opted for behave in a laggardly manner forgetting the long term and the different recovery scenarios.
If this first move was useful in the first instance of the crisis, will be of no use in the future, as the leaders continue to invest heavily in their sector at the strategic level.
Clearly, the tourism sector needs to stop thinking in the short term and focus on the long term, be proactive, and optimise costs instead of eliminating them.
What is the Five-R approach?
The study Travel marketing during COVID-19 developed by Skift Research defines 4 phases related to marketing for the tourism sector.
We are currently in phase 3, where we need to start building campaigns and pivot within the market varying products and services and anticipating all possible scenarios.
It is also interesting to re-examine what the report says Actions for Destination Marketers to Navigate in a COVID-19 World call Five-R approach.
If there is a before and after COVID-19, no company (and the tourism sector is no exception) should fail to evaluate itself and to reflect deeply on its before, during and after.
This Five-R approach speaks of five key points The sector needs to rethink before moving on to the tactical side.
- Reassess offers and their value proposition.
- Be informed; to inform travellers and reassure them about their health concerns.
- EThe governmental situation in each country should be monitored.
- Inspire consumers.
- Remove barriers to convert consumers to travellers and revive local trade.
Easy to write it, complicated to do it; but very necessary.
Particularly, points 1 and 3 have been and will be critical in moving forward. Not all brands that have a discourse will survive, but it will be impossible to withstand this crisis if it does not exist.
We have to inspire, tell who we are and who we are. why our customers should stay with us.
Moreover, the historical data of the companies are of no use, since the traveller's pattern has been broken and, therefore, they will not be useful for predicting his behaviour due to the volatility of the situation, but real time will be.
Quick wins and some resources for the travel industry
Now I want to tell you about actions that you could implement as of today so that phase 4 doesn't catch you by surprise.
It is always interesting to think in the long term, but we also need to be able to take immediate action.
Here are a few that can change the life of your company's digital health in the short term while you build for the long term with revival in mind.
1. Find a speech
A year ago I was already talking about this in one of the talks I was invited to at IEBS.
I remember that it invited us to stop and reflect on three points:
- In addition to earning some money, what is my business for?
- Do we have a voice? Something to tell? Do we inspire our clients?
- In reality, my sales channels were sufficient?
The COVID-19 crisis has shown that when everything explodes, there are fewer ears to listen and fewer eyes to watch, and we will only pay attention to brands that add value and differentiate themselves.
Find your difference and translate it into speech.
Then choose the right channels to tell the story and make a strong commitment to your company, because no one else will.
You can download the full presentation here
2. Audit the website of your travel agency, hotel or whatever
You can't just poke holes in a wall with a wooden stick, can you?
So you can't build a digital business with a non-functioning website and that it does not meet the appropriate technical requirements to fulfil objectives.
It does not matter in which tourism sector you operate, your centre of operations is your siteIt must work perfectly, there is no room for half-measures.
3. Governs the data and analyses
If you really want to make a difference in tourism, in addition to having an impeccable website, you have to have a tagging decent.
Take advantage of this break to audit and define what you want to measure and how.
If you don't, you will only make bad decisions.
This does not mean that intuition has to disappear altogether, but if I had to make a division, I would go for a 5% for intuition and a 95% for data.
4. Take advantage of falling advertising costs
Keep in mind that advertising prices work like any other price, supply and demand.
If there are fewer players investing, prices go down, if there are more, they go up.
It is a good time to recover and reviving campaigns that worked or even revise them.
5. Don't fan SEO for travel
Google is one of the main channels for attracting users and, therefore, of travel agency budgets.
The same applies to hotels and the sector in general (I won't go into OTAs).
You are interested in: What is SEO content?
If your business allows it at the search level, you should stay ahead of your competition and position yourself where others are not.
Building today will give you possibilities tomorrow and all the ground you gain is little.
6. Define a digital marketing strategy focused on the tourism sector.
There is still time to overtake the other competitors on the right.
If you think digital, you think data and targets and, of course, KPIs.
The only way to do this is to define your business objectives and translate them into your website, and then establish measurement indicators.
Use your experience, common sense, and a qualified team for this purpose.
7. Better understand the global tourism market in COVID times.
Although it is a volatile and complex time in which we can neither control the environment nor be aware of all the data, there is a lot of accessible information that can and should support us.
For example, Google has developed Destination Insight a portal where you can obtain travel trends.
It is particularly useful for visualising the global travel demand and what are the implications by travel type and destination.
8. Make a descent into local mobility
The local mobility reports will help you to understand how a population is behaving in the different areas in which they interact.
Understanding this, we will bring value to the user or customer and we will be able to draw up a different brand discourse that is based on the porting of value.
Similarly, we will be able to pivot on our commercial decisions o propose new services and products.
All these local mobility reports can be found at the Local Mobility Reports page created by Google.
By the way, here you have available the presentation of the IEBS talk in case you want to keep it.
9. Understands hotel trends (which are tourism trends).
Google has come out with a fantastic tool called Hotel Insight by Google.
With it you can review city-by-city hotel trends and get a good understanding of the which markets you should and can target.
Here is an example from the city of Barcelona.
Not bad, is it?
