Each week, we give you a run down of the latest hostel industry insights and offer our take(we can also provide a variety of GIFs for your entertainment, too!
1. EXPEDIA RELEASE GEN-Z TRAVELLER STATS
“As the first fully digital generation, Gen-Z travelers can be influenced by social media and advertising, especially appealing images and deals, so marketers should implement a content-rich, mobile-friendly and multi-platform approach to successfully reach this valuable audience.” – Source.
According to Expedia Group™ Media Solutions, Gen-Z are prioritising travel similarly to their millennials predecessors but are “much more receptive to inspiration and information and more reliant on their smartphones at nearly every stage of the purchase journey than any other generations.”.
The research found that most Gen-Z travellers haven’t yet chosen a destination when they decide they want to take a trip and nearly 70% of this age group use their smartphone when looking for travel inspiration.
Expedia also found that 84% find social media influential, particularly when it comes to special offers and travel pictures and videos from friends or experts. Hostels need to be encouraging and reposting user-generated content to build trust with modern travellers and showcase their guest experience.
As we mentioned last week, effective paid advertising is the secret weapon hostels need to boost bookings and this research backs up our point. Over 60% of Gen-Z travellers stated that advertising can influence their decision making, with appealing deals and images particularly impactful. Paid social ads with tailored targeting (and retargeting) are working with younger generations so it’s time for hostels to start investing properly in this marketing method to boost bookings, reach more guests and increase revenue.
2. CAN BRANDS KEEP UP WITH INSTAGRAM DEMAND?
A third of Stories viewed are from businesses, says Bannon, highlighting brands such as Airbnb, and Hostelworld who have taken advantage of the format. – Source.
Travel content continues to soar in popularity on Instagram, attracting one of the most engaged audience on the platform – but can brands keep up?
Neasa Bannon, head of travel for EMEA for Instagram, stated that travel lovers watch ‘THREE times more accounts than any other audience, seven out of ten follow a brand and they are twice as likely to watch video content as any other audience.’With over a million travel-related hashtags searched for every week and around 75% of travel fans likely to take action on videos they see (sharing with a friend, visiting a website for example), users are actively seeking inspiring content. Why then, are some brands struggling to keep up?
Bannon commented: ‘The growth of the platforms means more and more brands are competing…I would advise using IGTV and Stories…it’s very much a test-and-learn platform so you need to relook at audience and content. What worked six months ago might no longer work.”
Instagram is one of the most effective platforms for hostels to reach and engage with their target audience so it’s vital hostels stay ahead of the game with this platform. Diversify hashtag usage, repost high quality user-gen content, use Stories to showcase the guest experience and stay active – it’s millennials and Gen-Z favourite social platform and it’s not set to change any time soon.
3. HILTON HOT ON HOSTELS’ HEELS FOR MILLENNIAL ATTENTION
In an interview at last week’s Phocuswire Conference, Hilton’s Chief Marketing Officer Kellyn Kelly spilled the beans on what they’re getting up to in order to target millennial and Gen-Z travellers.
After acknowledging that they were not meeting the needs of young travellers – and realising the incredible potential there is when it comes to this age group – Hilton asked themselves ‘what are the most compelling things we can include in our marketing to attract millennials?’.
Kellyn said: “One of the key things about this demographic is that they spend money on experiences, they want to travel, they want to explore.’
Until recently, Hilton were not tapping into this target market but with the recent announcement of their new hostel inspired concept, ‘Motto’, it’s clear that they are looking to cash in on young travellers’ passion to travel.
Their recent ‘Expect better, expect Hilton’ campaign has been a roaring success among millennials as the international hotel corporation saw a 22% increase in consideration for the brand in just six weeks from this age group. On social media channels, double the number of millennials were talking about Hilton than before the campaign began, illustrating the effectiveness of their targeted and tailored paid advertising.
Aside from millennials and Gen-Z, Kellyn also spoke about their focus on getting the booking experience right for their guests. After changing their phrasing from direct bookings to ‘direct relationships’, Hilton are working on building trust with travellers by ‘talking simply and directly’ – and trying to dispel the belief among 61% of US travellers that OTAs are less expensive than booking directly.
‘We want to be your friend and your support, we are not trying to catch you out’, Kellyn concluded.
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