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Hitwise Intelligence - Heather Hopkins - UK
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New Year's Eve in Paris, London or New York
December 21, 2005
Travelmole published some interesting stats from ABTA today on the favoured destinations of UK consumers over Christmas and into the New Year. ABTA published the most popular holiday destinations and I thought it would be interesting to see if there were any major differences between what UK consumers are searching for, using Hitwise data, and what UK consumers are booking, based on ABTA's release.
The top destinations for New Year's celebrations on Hitwise match up quite well to ABTA's list. I ran a Search Term Suggestion report for 'new year' to find all of the terms that UK consumers entered into search engines in four weeks ending 17th December 2005 that included the keywords 'new year'. Based on the share of UK searches, UK residents want to ring in the New Year in Edinburgh, Paris, New York, London, Dublin, Prague and Newcastle. Hitwise data shows more domestic destinations, likely because most don't involve a flight booking and may not have been captured by ABTA.
ABTA also reported on the top sunny destinations and found that Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Turkey and Dubai are joining the Canary Islands, Florida, the Caribbean and Southern Spain as top choices.
I ran a Search Term Suggestion Report on Hitwise for searches that include the keyword 'flights to' in order to find the most searched for destinations for flights. I noticed some real differences in the results from the ABTA stats published on Travelmole. Hitwise data shows that many of the top destinations for flights are for long-haul destinations such as Australia, New Zealand, New York, Canada, and Bangkok. I suspect the reason for this is that consumers look around for deals much more when it comes to higher priced, long-haul tickets so that we'll see more searches than bookings. If you have thoughts on this, please post a comment.
I ran another Search Term Suggestion report for 'holidays in' to find the most searched holiday destinations. These results were much more in-line with ABTA's findings on the favoured sunny destinations. Top results on Hitwise in the past four weeks included Tenerife, Egypt, Spain, Cyprus, Dubai, Goa, Cuba, Italy, Thailand, and Canada. Many of these line up with the top bookings according to ABTA but again the long-haul destinations are different, supporting the idea that long-haul destinations lead to more searches.
Insights into the differences between the destinations that holiday-makers are booking versus those on which they are searching can help online marketers to fine-tune online marketing campaigns. Comparing ABTA booking data with Hitwise Search data may reveal differences in the ways that consumers research and book holidays. While popular short-haul destinations require less research long-haul destinations that often come with a higher price tag, require more research. I welcome any comments on this hypothesis.
Search Term Suggestion Report for 'flights to'. Four Weeks Ending 17th December 2005
Search Term Suggestion Report for 'holidays in'. Four Weeks Ending 17th December 2005
Posted by Heather Hopkins at 04:00 AM
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Comments
I was one of those searchers who spent much time looking for a great New Year's trip in the run up to Christmas. After finding the perfect one - three nights at the Essex House in New York - I was less than pleased to be told that the holiday company had sold out of those deals. So why were they still promoting them on their website?! Grrr etc. (We ended up going to Rome and having a blast, so I won't complain too much.)
Posted by Jackie Danicki | January 11, 2006 09:12 AM
good job!
Posted by ava | December 21, 2005 11:41 AM