Company News • 20.05.2015
Major travel providers fail to keep up with the times
UK’s top 8 youth travel providers are failing to provide sufficient mobile and social support
London based user experience company USIO released their 2015 Millennial Youth Travel User Experience Evaluation report. This study explores 8 of the top youth travel providers and their online desktop and mobile offerings.
The millennial travel demographic represent a growing proportion of today’s holiday goers. They are an audience that have grown up with technology, and this forms a key element of their decision making process. As a result, they expect easy to use, logical and smooth user experiences.
The report unveils that mobile solutions are critical in all stages of the booking lifecycle, but despite this, very few travel providers provide a robust solution. The report also surprisingly uncovers that many travel providers do not use video content, a key influencer for travellers, as well as social engagement and active areas for users to continue their research once their trip is booked.
On the report's findings Usio’s Managing Director, Robert Elding said, “The report highlights that many of the big players are not providing the required support for their users. We were surprised at the lack of focus on mobile and video, which should be a key influencer for this target group."
Improvements to the test group propositions should include providing travellers with inspiration for adventure, a clear search function as a starting point, ways to share results with social channels, special offers, post booking travel advice, and a bespoke service based on user preferences. In a world where an online purchase is very much about the customer experience and where social marketing, video content and community-based information is becoming more important; it is clear that youth travel sites could drastically improve in these areas.
As technological developments continue to move so quickly, the winner will be the travel agent that is proactive rather than reactive to digital trends. These providers will build more meaningful relationships with travellers and reap the rewards in terms of turnover and customer engagement.
For the full millennial travel report please go to usio.com.
Source: USIO
channels: online trading, mobile shopping, smartphone, social media, social commerce, online booking
