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News Corp identifies forecasts 5 trends in consumers’ approach to travel

Trend forecasts in consumer’s attitudes towards travel and tourism by News Corp’s Travel Network has revealed that after feeling stagnant throughout 2020, consumers are eagerly seeking new escapes and experiences.

In April the number of page views on overseas destinations across News Corp’s network were up 46% on the prior three weeks. Interest in New Zealand as an international destination has jumped from being ranked 30th last year to 10th, likely inspired by the trans-Tasman travel bubble.

The consumer trends were identified through the News Travel Network and 8.5 million Australians that interact with News’ brands.

“The News Travel Network is very clear on the types of readers that we’re focusing our efforts on commercially, editorially and from a product and technology standpoint,” said News Corp Australia’s head of travel, Dwayne Birtles.

“Our research has identified five core travel consumer segments ranging from the Savvy segment, younger customers who are looking for value in their travel experiences and have a high propensity to book online, all the way up to the highest value travel customer via our Prestige segment, who look for the very best in quality and experience from their travel.

“Marketers are also able to target very specific audience segments through our digital marketing platform News Connect, which has one of the strongest and richest commercial datasets in the market, to reach millions of travel intenders across 152 travel segments, providing the scale and sophistication they need to drive effective outcomes.”

Adding to the first trend of consumers feeling limited by 2020 is the sentiment that consumers are feeling ‘trapped’ by uncertainty in bookings and the sense that they should withhold making plans in fear of last minute cancellations.

According to Kerrie McCallum, editor-in-chief of Escape, consumers are seeking ‘hassle free booking experiences because they want the simplicity, the clarity and the flexibility’ to make them feel safe in committing to bookings.

This links in with an insight from another trend about the new face of customer loyalty in the tourism space that factors such as customer service, reliability and communications are driving consumers decision making, rather than price. Consumers are also opting for organised tours for the security of the their investment and to maximise their time away.

In addition, the sense of feeling trapped has led to consumers looking at ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ travel, using the annual leave they banked up in lockdown to plan longer trips to ‘bucket-list destinations’. The News Travel Network is also forecasting an increase in multigenerational family travel.

Further trends revealed that consumers are turning to road trips in cars or campervans, and others are hoping to spend more time in domestic destinations given the flexibility of workplaces and hours uncovered by COVID-19 lockdowns.

News Corp Australia’s managing director, food and travel, Fiona Nilsson, said: “The past year has dramatically changed the way we travel and how we think about travel. With a disruption as big as this, we also see big shifts in consumer interests and behaviours.

“The purpose of our new Trends Forecast is to call out those shifting trends with a focus on the ones that are going to make a difference in the near future and help inform the travel industry on its path to recovery.”

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