Travel marketers need to think about how they approach consumers differently in 2022. Video content creation platform 90 Seconds explains how to create video campaigns that ensure brands remain ahead of competitors.
After two years of lockdowns, constantly changing global travel restrictions, various rounds of vaccinations, and families not having seen one another for (quite literally) years, it’s safe to say, today’s travel marketer is out of practice. Now, with the world finally opening up, throngs of would-be explorers are rearing to dust off their suitcases and venture to far-flung places. But with competition at an all-time high, brands need to think a little more creatively to secure the business of today’s consumer than they did in years gone by.
According to Wyzowl,
92% of marketers believe that video is crucial to their marketing strategy. Being able to deliver highly relevant and authentic moving image-based content to consumers is of paramount importance in 2022 — even more so in the travel industry, with
63% of leisure and business travelers using marketing videos to inform their travel decisions.
Travel purchases are largely emotional decisions and nothing can convey (and evoke) emotion quite like video, taking a would-be consumer right to the destination themselves. The right video marketing campaign can help brands tell stories which resonate, build trust, create a sense of longing, and ultimately, steal market share. We’ve compiled a few best practice tips based on our own research and expertise here at 90 Seconds to help you create video campaigns that ensure you remain ahead of competitors.
Rise of virtual reality
With so many of us staying largely cooped up indoors since March 2020, it is no surprise that we’ve seen an evolution of 360-degree videos and panorama that provide a virtual reality experience. While VR is nothing new — newspapers like The Financial Times have been using 360-degree videos to profile cities as far back as 2016 — hotels are increasingly using VR tours to showcase their hotel rooms, while travel agents are doing the same depicting tourist attractions.
Last year in the UK, 90 Seconds saw
walkthrough videos — used to provide viewers with every detail and give as close to an ‘IRL’ experience as possible — quadruple in demand.
And it makes sense. Travel purchases are largely made based on emotions, and the purpose of these types of videos is to stoke the desire for sensory experiences — which they do very well.
What’s more, virtual reality is incredibly engaging. Featuring this form of video content on your website directly increases the time visitors spend on it, allowing you maximum opportunity to engage traffic and influence buying decisions. They’re also incredibly shareable, resulting in increased audience reach.
This is the future of travel marketing. Take this cinematic, beautiful movie titled
Wild Tasmania, which uses 4K footage to evoke the wanderlust in us all.
Social is king
You don’t have to be a marketer to understand the pull of holiday envy. Brands must leverage this by creating shareable video content, using social channels to drive their efforts. Be sure to embrace new platforms and consider how they may complement the tried and trusted. Take TikTok, for example. With an
average session length of 10.85 minutes — more than twice the level received by Pinterest, which ranks second at 5.06 minutes — and a reputation for “discoverability” marketers have a unique opportunity to reach a colossal, captive audience through travel-related content on TikTok. The world may be opening up gradually, but our mobile phones are always open, and with over two billion downloads and one billion monthly users, TikTok users are hungry for new content — harness this!
In comparison, TripAdvisor, which continues to rank as number one in the Travel and Tourism category in the US, has
490 million active monthly users — which is less than TikTok’s daily visitors. And while it is by no means obsolete, TripAdvisor’s practical function as a review and booking platform can be used more effectively to serve mid- to low-funnel objectives, while image-based platforms like TikTok should be embraced as the next destinations for travel-related video marketing content. Just don’t forget to tag your location, as geo-location is an influencing factor in TikTok’s algorithm, ensuring your content will end up in the relevant searches.
This social media ad created by 90 Seconds for
Songkran festival is visceral, simple, and effective, drawing the viewer in as if they were there themselves and delivering that authenticity that does so well on social media.
Harness the power of the influencer
Today’s consumer conducts research before making a purchasing decision — and the higher the emotional investment, the greater the level of review. We rank our Foodpanda options by rating, we check out Rotten Tomatoes when trying to decide what movie to watch — and when booking a holiday…? Multiply that research commitment exponentially. To get maximum cut-through, consider engaging micro-influencers in your content creation to help forge a connection with your consumer and create a sense of trust through social proof.
Trust from unbiased sources is naturally cultivated. It’s authentic, genuine, and we all instinctively relate to it; however, that’s especially true for millennials, who trust user generated content (UGC) two times more than content from brands. What’s more, customers who end up on an e-commerce site through a UGC video are
184% times more likely to purchase — and when they do, they’ll spend approximately 45% more.
Combined, user-generated and professional video content
increases brand engagement by an average of 28%. So if you’re looking to win market share, ensure your content marketing strategy incorporates your own videos as well as those from influencers to leverage the benefits of both and drive results. Consider the use of
customer stories or
case studies — like this example,
Sculpture on the Gulf, which features multiple customer testimonials and is a great illustration of how a marketer can generate a feeling of trust using voiceover alone, whilst showcasing the beauty of the sculpture and region through moving images.
Covid-19 didn’t just turn our world upside down; it reduced the size of that world to the four walls we call home. As borders open, holiday bookings will soon follow — and there’s no greater tool to encourage consumers to choose your brand than an effective video marketing campaign.
90 Seconds
90 Seconds is a global video creation platform enabling the world’s biggest brands to create high-quality and authentic videos anywhere in the world. With a growing creator database spanning 160 countries and diverse skillsets, the platform offers brands direct access to over 13,800 videographers, directors, photographers, drone operators, and more. Through its unique technology — including end-to-end collaboration tools — 90 Seconds offers an intuitive, efficient way to manage offline video productions with automated online workflows.