Summer 2011 Whitepaper

We are pleased to announce the release of our latest whitepaper, entitled Summer 2011. The paper looks at the potential development of a challenging and value-driven lates market for holiday suppliers. Throughout the paper, we've highlighted insights on the latest query trends and have provided data which will hopefully help travel advertisers plan for the summer ahead. We welcome any feedback as well as questions on the paper and hope that it proves insightful.

Please find the paper here.

Posted by Matt Kala, Industry Analyst

Surfing this Summer Whitepaper June 2009

June 2009: The aim of this research paper written by Industry Analyst, Jonny Cranmer, is to provide data on travel search trends to help in planning for 2009. Our methodology was simple. We looked back over last Summer and analysed travel query trends. We split the period into three sections: Pre-school Summer holidays, Summer holidays & Back to school.

Our findings are referenced against factors we believe had some effect on people's travel related behaviour. We looked at how major sporting events, public holidays, macroeconomic conditions and weather influenced people's online travel research.

The results are interesting, highlighting opportunities where advertiser exposure to online traffic could be increased. For example the adverse weather in August and September 2008 lead to high travel query volumes throughout September, possibly because people were motivated to find some late sun. As our ad depth study shows, advertisers failed to fully capitalize on these searches. You can download the white paper here: Surfing this Summer.

Searching For Sun White paper June 2008

June 2008:

Searching for Sun

Search strategies for the summer lates

Approaching the summer lates market, we are experiencing a very different travel market online than in previous years. With reductions in industry capacity, soaring oil costs and travel business bankruptcies, there will be opportunities to claim online share through paid search for those advertisers willing to shift budgets to the digital space. We look back to 2007 to identify potential query patterns and examine the year to date to gauge the likely impact of the industry's new challenges. For full details, download the whitepaper here:Searching For Sun.

Learning from 2007

• July represents the peak traffic month of the year, 6.4% higher than January in 2007

• Weekly queries peak in early summer, at the start of July yet remain above January levels throughout July and August

• Opportunity within packages with 9% sector query outperformance and capacity cuts creating available auction inventory

• Opportunity in late summer as CPCs fall

Recommendations

• Ensure budgets are in place for peak annual traffic

• Ensure bidding is most aggressive at the start of the period

• Allocate budget for late summer bookings opportunity when efficiency is greater

• Assign budget for late August Bank Holiday weekendEnsure budgets are in place for peak annual traffic

Understanding the new challenges of 2008

• Queries in 2008 are increasingly aligned with holiday periods; post- Easter surge in searches coincided with school holidays, peaking in the 7 days up to 12th April at 39% y-o-y growth

• Missed opportunity post-Easter as queries grew yet investment remained flat

• Search efficiency greater in the shoulder periods in 2008

Recommendations

• Anticipate query growth of over 30% over the summer when setting budgets

• Claim excess search inventory arising from industry capacity reductions

• Optimise positioning by varying CPCs in cost-effective shoulder periods

• Anticipate aggressive CPC bidding at peak times with less industry capacity and consequently higher lates prices

Growth

• City break destinations such as Paris and Barcelona have retained their popularity YTD

• Long-haul destinations consistently resilient amidst economic concerns

• North America and Middle East destinations (both up 20%) have witnessed the strongest growth

Recommendations

• Expand keyword lists for local attractions and city areas and test creative messaging forcompetitive city destinations

• Ensure budgets, keyword lists and ad creatives are suitable and tailored to the high growth regions