Tips and tricks on surviving the next generation of travelling!
2023 is the year of sustainable and revenge travelling and it’s at its peak compared to recent years, but operators have not fully recovered from the slowdown. As one of the most competitive industries that are fighting for customer loyalty via means such as lower prices, increased quality of service, and always aiming to excel in traveller experience beyond means, it drives the highest job growth, and the ongoing labour shortage is forcing them to pivot to the digital realm. Coupled that with global and market unpredictability, their experiments and learning curves are only getting steeper.
We sat down with Jonathan Newbury from Preferred Hotels & Resorts, Laura Houldsworth from Booking.com, and Juliana Kua from Singapore Tourism Board for an exclusive Q&A that covers almost everything travel, from hotels and OTAs and tourism boards! We uncover the sizzling questions from their Digital Travel APAC 2023 panel “Returning with Resilience – How can you respond to challenges brought by uncertain markets and workforce shortages”, such as tips on employing the next generation of travel employees, trends in mobile booking as compared to pre-pandemic, and dealing with overtourism in destinations.
Given the labour shortages, how do we make the travel industry attractive for the next generation of workers?
Jonathan
We have to make the jobs more attractive for people. We have to pay better and offer better benefits to workers. Additionally, training and career progression paths are important. There is no magic bullet, talent will go to the employer who offers the best package overall.
Laura
I think the next generation of workers will be looking for different things that a company can offer them. For example, purpose in their job matters much more to them (compared to older generations of workers). Many of them want to work for companies that are giving back to the community and the planet.
There is great opportunity to attract workers to the travel industry, as we know that travel can be a force for good - it expands perspectives and horizons of travellers while creating livelihoods for many local communities."
On China - does geopolitical tension really effect travel decisions? And is safety in the context of covid rather than threat?
Geopolitical tensions are increasing between China and foreign countries due to the lack of transparency surrounding their local laws such as exit bans and wrongful detentions. Couple that with the China government having strong regulatory power compared to most governments due to the strong numbers of Chinese tourists, it’s causing 2 out of 5 Chinese adults to choose avoiding travelling internationally due to the tensions between China and foreign countries.
Jonathan
The tensions absolutely effect travel decisions! Several bills and Executive Orders have been passed by the Biden administration over investments into China. This will have a major impact on business travel between the two countries.
In addition, if tensions worsen between the two superpowers, leisure travel will also be affected as governments restrict visas.
Laura
From our APAC Travel Confidence Index study done earlier this year, we saw that Chinese travellers are one of the most confident travellers in APAC. When the travel ban was lifted earlier this year, two-thirds proceeded with their domestic travel plans while the remaining one-third changed their trip to an overseas one The slower than expected return could point to a few factors: slower processing time to get visas or replace expired passports, lack of outbound flights due to manpower etc.
Due to all these various factors, we see that 9 in 10 travellers would prefer to travel domestically this year; including those who changed their plans to travel internationally when travel restrictions were lifted. Domestic tourism really flourished during the pandemic, and many people have discovered that they can find the same fulfilment of travel within their own country.
Are you noticing any trends of consumers booking more through Mobile post pandemic?
Laura
Yes, we recently reported (in our Q3 2023 Booking Holdings Earnings call) that over 50% of our room nights were booked through our apps in Q3 2023, which is about 6% higher than in Q3 2022.
Our Booking.com mobile app consistently ranks among top travel apps worldwide based on user reviews, and was the most downloaded travel app globally in 2021 (according to leading third party firm app annie), and we also see the strongest direct repeat customer behaviour on mobile when compared to other platforms like desktop or mobile web.
Juliana
Consumers have indeed been using their mobile phones to book their travel arrangements, even before the pandemic. That this is increasing today is not surprising, given the high dependency on smartphones worldwide. This trend is leveraged by marketers, travel operators and other tourism stakeholders, as smartphones can be the conduit for consumer engagement and building brand affinity, even before travellers decide where to fly to for their next trip.
At the same time, destination marketers also need to invest in understanding different consumer preferences across different markets, as there are consumer segments that may still prefer other ways of booking. The Singapore Tourism Board has partnered businesses such as Trip.com and Klook, who have an in-depth understanding of traveller behaviour and preferences. For example, Klook’s Travel Pulse Survey shows that 97% of Millennials and Gen Z travellers in Southeast Asia rely on social media to find travel inspiration and recommendations for their holidays.
Our marketing and tactical partnership with Klook for Southeast Asia includes digital content powered by Klook’s network of Klook Kreators to drive engagement and conversion.
What's are the best ways for host countries to deal with overtourism?
Jonathan
The only reasonable way to do this is at a governmental level. Local authorities will need to restrict permits for new Hotels and put rules around holiday rental (Airbnb for example). In addition, they can restrict the number of flights into the local airports.
Overall, though, these destinations need to define what their strategy is for tourism over the next 10 years. Do they want to be mass tourist destinations or add restrictions to limit passenger numbers.
Laura
For OTA businesses like us, we can play our part to educate our travellers on the impacts of over-tourism, as well as help our partners raise awareness of their sustainability efforts by showcasing those actions taken on our platform.
Consumers themselves are very much aware of those impacts themselves - 76% of global travellers have expressed a desire to travel more sustainably. By making information easily accessible on our platforms, we can help travellers discover more sustainable destinations and make more conscious choices themselves.
Jonathan Newbury, Executive Vice President - Asia Pacific, Preferred Hotels & Resorts
Laura Houldsworth, Managing Director Asia Pacific, Booking.com
Juliana Kua, Assistant CEO - International Group, Singapore Tourism Board