Digital trends for... Tourism

Based on our digital trend watch and experience with clients in the tourism industry, here are eight key trends we're observing:

1. Consumers are doing more research about destinations and product online, and increasingly booking online too
2. The traditional distribution model is flattening out as consumers go direct to tourism authorities and even product operators rather than travel agents
3. Online intermediaries and aggregators such as Expedia and Hotels.com are taking a growing share of consumer attention
4. Consumers highly value and expect comments from peers, using sites like Trip Advisor before choosing a destination
5. Online competition for the same and similar destinations and product is fierce - effective digital marketing, differentiation, cross-selling, on-trip and after-trip communication and nurturing consumer loyalty (and ultimately advocacy) are paramount
6. Tourism websites are investing in innovative tools and user interfaces for consumers to find, filter and build custom itineraries of product - examples include Hotel.com's Vizualiser and Ving Travel Finder
   
7. Effective tourism operators have a presence where their audience are online, whether that be YouTube, Myspace, Facebook or Trip Advisor
   
8. Tourism websites are increasingly incorporating social media onto their websites - be that traveller journals, photos or video.