Many pixels have been spilled over the rise of SoLoMo - social/location/mobile - so it's about time for a shift in jargon. This is the year of the mocal traveler, according to
MDG Advertising.
From the
paper:
While both mobile and social media have individually influenced travel decisions over the past decade, this will be the year the two trends converge to become a single, highly powerful motivator. Used appropriately, this anytime, anywhere access to social media via smartphones and tablets can have far-reaching consequences for your travel business.
While there's nothing specifically different about "mocal" as a convergent trend, the elimination of "social" in this particular term suggests that mobile and local have won out as the most important trends in travel. This is fairly obvious, especially as social media has been subsumed to mobile as the dominant platform.
On mobile, the impact on travel marketing has been enormous, with an ongoing level of bookings being completed on mobile. This particular report pegs that number at 20%, although this number fluctuates depending on who's counting; this booking data is not shared widely by private companies.
As far as an overall trend, the importance of mobile content on social media is another reason why social has been subsumed into mobile.
Mobile has become a tool to not simply consume social media but mostly to create it - photos, updates, links and more can be shared easily via the device. And the near-ubiquity of the device means that there's increased consumption of all kinds of content - including local.
Even though mobile has become the most important and dominant platform, using social media as a tool via mobile is still one of the most successful ways to market. Tips to deliver a successful local/mobile marketing campaign include:
- Targeting travelers within 50-mile radius in order to increase likelihood of booking.
- Consider the types of content being shared, and use exclusivity to increase interest in the shared content.
- Deploy hashtags to encourage sharing while on-property or in-destination.
- Keep visitors informed of the rewards/loyalty opportunities via the social channels.
The whitepaper goes on to look at case studies from Marriott, British Airways, and Four Seasons, with each case study demonstrating that its more than just "the year of mocal" but a full-on shift to the mobile-everywhere reality.
NB: Money-making phones image courtesy Shutterstock.