Digital Travel Trends 2016 - Don't Get Left Behind!

In partnership with Travolution www.travolution.com

Digital Travel Trends 2016 – Don’t Get Left Behind!

Agenda

1. The Changing Customer Journey2. Important Google Updates3. Reputation & The Power of Reviews4. Overcoming the Social Firewall5. Retargeting & Dynamic Content Delivery6. Questions

Customers Make Their Own Path

24Average journey

length in days before purchase

1:43Average research

time in hours before purchase

17.6Average site visits before purchase

Online Travel Buying Has Become

A Full Time Job

Resulting In A Complicated And Noisy

Path To Purchase

For brands 80% of success is simply showing up:

•In the right place •At the right time •With the right content •In the right format

Omni-Channel: Every brand interaction is seamless and consistent no matter what channel or device

Leading To Customer

Centric Marketing

Moments Of Truth

How This Works

Stimulus ZMOT

2MOT

Retargeting

Social activations

Display offer

The Secrets To Search

The Brains Behind Search

Google Is Changing…

Mobile Matters Content is King

Links are a Silent Killer

Google has made 4 big changes this year

What you need to know about RankBrain:•Simplifies longer search queries to deliver proven results•RankBrain is learning what’s ‘good’ and what’s ‘bad’ in each industry niche•Focus on your Travel niche, look to the leaders•Make great content and focus on context, relationships and entities•DO THE BASICS WELL and don’t try and game the system

RankBrain: Artificial Intelligence & Search

• 60% of searches for destination information come from mobile devices

• 52% of travellers would switch sites if it took too long to load on their mobile

Mobile Matters

Since 2015 over half of searches came from mobile devices so you have to provide a good user experience or risk losing significant traffic

Accelerate Mobile Pages (AMP):

To improve mobile UX Google strongly hinted that AMP adoption will become important:

• AMP is a new open source HTML protocol that enables web pages to seamlessly load faster on mobile devices

• Define specific elements of AMP HTML and make a second cached AMP version of each page

For now QUICKER simply is BETTER

AMP The Future Of Mobile!

Content Is King

Google values unique, well written and relevant content above all else. The ‘Panda Algorithm penalises poor website copy.

Panda has been slowly rolling out since July 2015. Now, for the first time, it will be continuous.

1. Evaluate your website copy2. Build out key people and product pages, in line with marketing

objectives3. Improve content quality, word count, keyword focus and relevance

where needed4. RESOLVE ANY DUPLICATE CONTENT ISSUES

Travel Tip: 32% choose to book with a particular travel company due to detailed information on the website

How To Appease The Panda?

Google judges a site’s popularity based on the number and quality of links to it using the ‘Penguin’ algorithm to penalise those with ‘suspicious’ link profiles.

•Penguin will be active again rolling out later this year•As a result any sites with unknown or historical negative links could be penalised, losing substantial amounts of traffic

Links Are A Silent Killer

Google has indicated a new ‘real time’ Penguin update is coming soon so:

1.Check Google’s Search Console for any penalty notices2.Check a sample of links pointing to your site to see if you are at risk3.Remove or “disavow” any negative or suspicious links4.Generate authoritative and editorially granted links to boost trust and authority in your niche

Travel Tip:•In March Google punished sites which exchanged reviews for freebies•In future check any blogger relationships:

• Insist they add a “rel=nofollow” link which doesn’t pass on SEO authority (PageRank)

• Get bloggers to disclose any relationship or sponsored content• Before any blogger outreach programme check they haven’t been hit

by any penalties

How To Please The Penguin?

Reviews: The Uncontrollable Killer

So…

1.Make sure you are prepared for any crises 2.Monitor your online reputation carefully (search and 3rd party sites)3.Respond to any negative reviews in a timely and proactive manner

Travel Tip: Use review collection and monitoring services like Get Five Stars

People Trust People

And Then Trust Brands

say review sites have the most

influence on their booking decision

59%

of users view online reviews as strongly as personal reviews

75%

Infiltrating the Path to Purchase

Meaning you need to get users to share stories for you.

So encourage sharing and user generated content through:•Competitions, incentives and rewards that motivate•That hit a common theme/desire among audiences•Is playful and easy to participate/gamify•Easy to collect and curated content around a focal point (hashtag)

Overcoming The Organic Firewall

factored online & peer opinions into

their buying decisions

follow travel brands to learn about promotions &

announcements

But organic post reach on

Facebook has dropped to just 2%

Millennials say User Generated Content (USG) is 20% more influential than any other type of media

60% 48% 2% 20%

By collecting user data and remarketing you can:Segment users through web interactionsDeliver tailored ads and offers that resonateBring users back to your websiteCreate a custom experience to returning visitorsBe seen at the right times throughout the path to purchaseLearn and refine for later campaigns

Remarketing & Dynamic Content Delivery

PROSPECT YOUR SITEPROSPECT IS TRACKED

PROSPECT LEAVES

YOUR AD ON OTHER SITES

PROSPECT RETURNS TO YOUR SITE

1. Get to know your customer better2. Create content that meets customers’

practical and inspirational needs 3. Be mobile, be relevant, be Google friendly4. Monitor your reputation5. Mobilise your followers on social6. Leverage data and remarketing

In Summary

Win the Zero Moment of Truth

Kevin Mullaney Flagship Consulting

020 7680 7119

kevin.mullaney@flagshipconsulting.co.uk@kevinmullaney @FlagshipCons