The fastest growth in travel industry advertising spend will come from social and video commercials, says recent Expedia Media Solutions/Phocuswright research.
The growth is aligning well with the growth in gross bookings, with the research predicting an increase of $29 million spent on travel display ads between 2013 and 2015.
As far as where this money is being spent, social and video ad budgets have tripled in the years between 2011 and 2014, and account for 18% of the total digital dollars spent. Other stats include:
- Foursquare was ranked as the least effective form of advertising by 53% of surveyed travel advertisers.
- Facebook, on other other hand, was ranked as at least moderately effective for 68% of travel advertisers.
- 84% of those advertisers are either currently deploying or testing Facebook page photos and or link photos.
One surprise when it comes to planning future digital spends, only 28% of advertisers planned on experiementing with Pinterest - the same percentage as Google+!
This is surprising because Google+ doesn't enjoy nearly the same level of attention and engagement as Pinterest. Add in the fact that Pinterest's visual interface is perfect for travel, and the relative wealth of that platform's audience, and it seems that travel marketers should reconsider decisions not to test Pinterest for travel.
Infographic follows, including the full-size version here.