HOTEL SEARCH CONVERSION: LOSING SEARCH BOOKINGS TO COMPETITORS

We are excited to announce the launch of Compete’s Travel Search Intelligence product. Throughout the month of September we will be featuring a series of Research Briefs that are focused on search and Compete’s new capabilities. For more information, please see the bottom of this page.

In the previous two (Article One, Article Two) installments of Compete’s search series, we examined characteristics of search traffic as it moves from the search engine to destination site. This week, we want to break down the search traffic after it defects off the destination sites, using the examples of Choicehotels.com and Marriott.com

In August 2008, 3% of search traffic to Choice Hotels booked a hotel room immediately following their search. Marriott’s immediate search conversion was slightly higher at 5%, and both data points are represented by the bars on the left below. The two bars on the right represent the rate at which these same Choice and Marriott search clickers booked hotel rooms at any hotel supplier site beyond just Choicehotels.com or Marriott.com, respectively. The takeaways: Hotel chain sites are converting just a quarter of their potential in search engine traffic, with the rest defecting and going to competitors.

Quantifying the behavior of branded and non-branded searchers demonstrates the importance of non-branded terms in the hotel consideration process. The findings show that while non-branded (generic) search clicks will have immediate conversion rates as low as half that of branded search clicks, these non-branded searchers will ultimately convert somewhere in the very near future at nearly the same levels as branded searchers.

Non-branded searchers at Choice and Marriott immediately converted at about half the rate of branded searchers. But as shown by the bars on the right in both charts, non-branded searchers will still eventually book hotel rooms somewhere online, and at nearly the rate of branded searchers. So while non-branded traffic may be responsible for fewer immediate search conversions than branded traffic, the conversion opportunity with non-branded traffic is significant. Engaging these non-branded searchers into the appropriate content (not necessarily a hard-sell in the booking path) until they are ready to transact at a later date, is critical to improving overall search effectiveness and boosting search ROI.

To learn more about how you can use Travel Search Intelligence, please contact Jack Drew from Compete’s travel team at jdrew@compete.com. We would gladly answer any questions or set up a product demonstration.

Also look for Compete at the Eye For Travel’s October conference in Las Vegas, where we will be making a research presentation on Meta Search on October 1st, and providing additional details on the Travel Search Intelligence product.