6 Omni-Channel Tactics to Perfect Travel Experiences This Summer

Customers Are in OOO Mode

The minute the new year festivities end, customers have sun, sand, and much needed R&R on the brain. Even if summer is many weeks away, marketers need to begin strategizing now if they want to deliver the perfect vacation experience for customers at every touchpoint, from booking the trip to unpacking their suitcases.

Want the travel marketer’s cheat sheet? See how these leading travel brands deploy first-class omni-channel campaigns to drive engagement and revenue.

Powerful Pre-Trip Planning

Customers’ experience with a travel brand begins long before their vacation even starts. Pre-trip communications offer marketers a valuable opportunity to get off on the right foot with customers and ensure that their vacation is smooth as can be.

The number one factor customers look out for with any purchase, trips included, is cost. This makes dynamic, real-time pricing an absolute necessity when motivating customers to book a trip.

JetBlue took the real-time approach one step further by not only showing updated pricing, but personalizing their recommendations for additional relevance. Based on the customer’s origin airport, intended destination, and travel dates, JetBlue powered an omni-channel campaign that pulled live pricing information directly from their website.

From email to rich push, this automated campaign showed customers not one, but two personalized options. On the right, customers saw real-time pricing for a one-way fare, and on the left the best deal for a flight and hotel bundle. Customers loved the convenience of this campaign, and JetBlue saw an 11% increase in direct opens on their app as a result.

Customers love getting the most bang for their buck, but many aren’t afraid to add a little extra luxury to their stay. For those seeking the most premium experience possible, IHG powered an upsell campaign that enticed customers to treat themselves a little.

Using automated APIs, IHG enhanced their confirmation emails by displaying available upsell offers that matched what the customer had already booked. Each offer linked to a unique landing page that included more details and live pricing in a dynamic banner.

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Mid-Trip Enhancement Opportunities

Once customers are enjoying their vacation, the focus of marketing messaging shifts: now is the time to enhance customers’ stay with relevant, on-the-go information and cross-sell opportunities. It’s critical not to inundate customers with countless communications while they’re vacationing, but when strategically delivered, these communications can nurture their relationship throughout the current trip and beyond.

Hawaiian Airlines powered a dynamic map to display all of the possible islands customers could visit during their stay. This campaign created a valuable cross-sell opportunity for the airline, while simultaneously encouraging inter-island exploration for customers to create a far more memorable trip. Not only did the campaign drive engagement and revenue for Hawaiian Airlines, it was also automated to help the marketing team save valuable production time.

Virgin Voyages makes the most out of the customer's trip by reinforcing loyalty throughout their stay with a data-driven email. Including first name personalization, booking number, name and date of their cruise, and tier status, sailors can sit back and relax knowing that all of the information they need is in one place. This campaign continues even when the trip ends—once they’ve returned home, customers receive loyalty communication including an exclusive offer for the next time they want to set sail.

Post-Trip Loyalty Drivers

When the sweet memory of a fun trip is still fresh, marketers have the perfect opportunity  to reach out to customers with communications that encourage them to return. For most, big international vacations are a special and less frequent occurrence, so the messaging sent in between trips is critical. This is the time to build into loyal customer-brand relationships.

Best Western Germany fosters loyalty in a fun, gamified way with their New Year-themed scratch off. Deployed via email and mobile, the brand thanked their corporate clients for their stay and looped in names and locations to generate personalized messages for each customer. The campaign also highlighted Best Western Germany’s charitable contributions throughout the year, helping customers to feel good about where they spent their hard-earned cash.

Another successful marketing tactic to ease customers’ post-trip blues? Helping them get their next trip on the books so there's always something to look forward to. Even if customers have to wait before booking their next big trip, Global Hotel Alliance (GHA) has them covered with localized recommendations to support a fabulous staycation.

If customers joined GHA’s member program while on a trip, the brand followed up with a loyalty communication that highlighted regionally relevant recommendations. Based on the member’s home address on file, GHA displayed brand and properties within staycation distance for a quick getaway. This automated campaign was the perfect follow-up to encourage customers to keep engaging with the brand in between their higher-cost trips.

Take Off With These Marketing Tactics

With these omni-channel tactics in your back pocket, you’ll be able to support customers’ most memorable vacation yet. To discover more valuable travel-centric marketing strategies, explore the related resources below.

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