Graham Tricker, vice-president of UK sales for data connectivity platform LiveRamp, says it is vital travel firms continue to diversify their revenue streams and shares how marketing can achieve this
Travel companies have experienced some turbulent times over the last few years, and many have continued to struggle to see a return to pre-pandemic levels of custom.
Coupled with the cost-of-living crisis and the ongoing disruptions caused by strike action, customer numbers are continuing to fluctuate, and travel companies are having to reassess their business models to remain buoyant through this trying period.
This need for strategic change has made it increasingly important for travel firms to diversify their revenue streams. Thankfully, there are plenty of opportunities for them to do this, particularly through their marketing efforts.
The first-party opportunity
The need for marketers to invest in strategies that are measurable, and produce the desired outcomes, has never been more important. The solution to this may lie in the inventory that travel brands have available to them.
Indeed, travel businesses are in a position of strength due to the amount of data they have at their disposal. These datasets, and the unique customer insight they have to offer, present a huge opportunity for data collaboration.
The first-party data owned by travel companies opens the door to them being able to provide invaluable insights into the habits of consumers. This data can be used in collaboration with other companies to provide travellers with increased personalisation and relevance.
Take, for example, a travel booking agency or aggregator, a beauty brand and a clothing brand. By bringing their datasets together, they can better understand the correlation between beauty purchases, for example buying ‘get ready for summer’ products such as body scrubs, self-tan and sunscreen, with those activities such as booking a sun holiday.
Similarly, activities such as booking adventure holidays and how that correlates to bug spray, high-factor sunscreen and certain types of clothing. All of these help to unlock rich behavioural insights, better segmentation of audiences, and gives brands the opportunity to be there when consumers are more likely in the consideration phase for certain types of products.
Safe travels
Of course, in the privacy-centric world, entering collaborations with other businesses can be fraught with risks if not done properly.
As such, to ensure businesses are collaborating with others in a manner that is respectful of user privacy, they need to ensure that they invest in technologies that help them to securely get the most out of their data collaborations.
A fundamental principle of the new privacy environment is that customers who agree to share their data, want to know how it is being used and for how long. At the same time, customers who have provided their data must retain control over their data at all times.
Any technologies adopted should be privacy-by-design, significantly reducing any risk to the business and its customers, while ensuring that collaboration is possible in any way the business sees fit. Thankfully, technologies, such as enhanced data clean rooms, have made this possible at scale.
Clean networks
Enhanced data clean room technology enables companies to collaborate with trusted partners in a safe environment that helps them to unlock a 360-view of their customers.
These can be utilised by travel marketers to better personalise the customer experience, improve outcomes, achieve better lifetime customer value, and acquire customers. As a result, travel brands open up new revenue streams.
A great example of enhanced data clean rooms in practice is in supporting commerce media networks. These can provide travel firms with a means to monetise their vast customer data, by helping those who may not have as much first-party data at their disposal to build audiences.
A collaborative future
As the travel industry continues to claw its way back to where it was before the pandemic, a shift toward data collaboration unlocks a range of much-needed opportunities for travel marketers to find new revenue streams for their businesses.
Clean rooms and the media networks they enable ensure that travel brands can collaborate with other businesses, while delivering consumers a highly-personalised experience and ensuring that their privacy is protected.
Collaboration is going to be the key to businesses continuing to thrive by satisfying the needs of consumers. Within the travel industry, this means an opportunity for all businesses from travel agents to airlines to work together to boost their revenues and provide customers with what they are looking for on their journeys, however near or far.