Travel companies will need to have an “experience first” mindset to capture bookings as the industry recovers.
A report from digital experience specialist Decibel says consumers were already placing a high value on digital experiences prior to the pandemic.
It points to the previous growth of online travel giants such as Booking.com and Expedia as evidence of this, saying that their digital focus may be what is needed by other brands to assist with their respective recovery strategies.
According to the report, digital "frustration" is higher in travel than other industries, with 8.7% of page views having some instance of user frustration.
The average of other industries is around 5.8%.
The report goes on to describe the sorts of issues that highlight a user’s frustration and those that have a high occurrence in travel.
These include birds nests, where a user shakes their mouse in frustration, unresponsive multi-clicks and repeated device rotation, where content does not fit the screen.
However, for engagement, travel websites score slightly higher than other industries with an average engagement score of 4.7/10.
Although travel websites show a slightly lower incidence than other industries of reading behavior, where users follow text with a mouse and select and copy behavior, which both indicate engagement, it scores well on responsive multiclicks.
In terms of the average digital experience score of the 11 industries analysed in the report, travel comes fourth from the bottom with a score of six, compared to the top performer (restaurants) with a score of 7.5.
Decibel points to research from Forrester that shows that on average of $1 invested in user experience reaps $100, to highlight how small tweaks can lead to significant gains.
The report, which is available here, provides advice to travel companies on removing friction and boosting engagement.