Experiential travel: The concept, the market, and insights on starting the segment
As per a recent survey, millennials are about one-third of the world’s population, and when they travel, a whopping 86 percent travel for experience. As many as 60 percent of them consider the authentic culture of the destination as the essential constituent of their trip. It indicates evolving expectations of the travelers from the destination of travel. They want to go beyond guided tours and have experience-driven trips; that’s why there is an exponential rise in experiential travel. Experiential travel primarily combines cultural exploration of the destination and activity-based experiences. It could be actively engaging with a destination’s community, getting to know their culture, food habits, their philosophy of life, and livelihood. Or it could be less intimate, where travelers engage in activities that are true to that destination. Generally, the “authenticity in travel” is getting more critical. People no longer want to visit a place and spend all their time gazing over the structure of the property they are staying in; with every new destination they travel to, they look for a unique experience. However, if you look for the term experiential travel, you will hardly find it in the travel market. Because the majority of the players in the travel industry package it as “adventure travel” or “experience travel.” Some luxury travel brands like Scott Dunn from the UK use and market the term experiential travel. Scott Dunn describes it as “Travel is by its very nature ‘experiential,’ but many of us now seek experiences that connect us to cultures and people in a more meaningful and enriching way. If you find yourself hankering for a more fulfilling travel experience that reinforces the things that make life worth living and is aligned to your personal values, you’re not alone”. Hence, only a few players in the travel market are positioning and marketing “experiential travel,” while the market size is huge. Per Fatbit’s estimates, the segment will reach US$266.7 Trillion in value by 2027. The segment is expected to grow at a CAGR of 7.7 percent. So, it poses a tremendous opportunity for the players in the travel market to come up with more “experience travel” offers, position and advertise them to cash-in this opening. Before you venture into the experiential travel segment, there are a few grounds you will have to cover. Here, we are detailing four crucial factors you should consider before starting an experience travel business. Delivery To manage efficient delivery, you have to organize your sources. You can assume you will operate in a market where the end consumers are highly aware of their choices. So, the delivery should be targeted and precise. You can achieve this by having a good mix of suppliers, partnering with resellers, and being available on all good marketplaces. Also, to boost personal sales deploy POS and channel manager. Positioning and Marketing The positioning of the offering will determine how you will fare in this segment in the long run. Identify your market, and you already have the story of “experience travel.” Yet, you must find a differentiator in terms of what you add to the story, work on your search engine optimization, leverage social media, and paid ads to position your offering. You will be good to go. Presence We mentioned SEO, Social, and Paid Media. All this will come into play and become a force when you are available on all possible online mediums. When we say all mediums, we mean don’t discount a channel, don’t assume you don’t need an IOS app. Test and scale your presence everywhere, from the web to mobile apps. Viability Experiential travel is directly related to localities and communities. Indeed, they will get incentives when you do business with particular communities and localities. But you have to keep sustainability at the top of the pyramid, keep your operations green, and maximize social benefits for people who are not directly involved in your business. Once you check these boxes, you can certainly build a viable and sustainable business on experiential travel. Recommended: Is Bliesure The Future Of Business Travel? In this piece, we detailed “how” many travelers are pivoting towards experience travel from conventional travel, the potential of the segment, and how you can introduce experiential travel on your platform with caution and efficiency, also for sustainability. The possibility of “experience travel” is there in numbers, and it could very well be the future of travel. 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Is Bliesure the Future of Business Travel?
Business travelers are returning faster than the industry predicted. Global Rescue reports about 60% of business travelers had at least one multi-day domestic business trip by July 2021. And nearly one-third of those travelers also flew internationally. Still, the complete rebound of business travel is a little too far, and it will take time. At the same time, this emerging trend of Bliesure is pulling loads of employees back on the roads and in the open air again. The mental makeup of the Millenials, the new generation, is a strong reason why Bliesure Travel is taking off. They are not taking vacations – time off from work, which is why they are burning out faster than their older peers. Also, businesses are now gradually understanding – virtual meetings could be an alternative to face-to-face meetings, but they cannot replace them. Personal interaction is still the most effective way to build and maintain professional relationships, nurture trust, and drive your company’s growth. That said, let’s first understand what is Bliesure and what makes it different from conventional business trips. What is Bliesure? Bliesure is an amalgamation of business and leisure, allowing employees to add vacation days to their business trips. It’s basically a business trip with an additional leisure component added. There are two ways to chalk out a Bliesure trip: add leisure days at the start or end of a business trip; it’s good mostly when traveling alone or in a group. Another way for Bliesure is to take friends and family on the trip, where you take time off every day to do leisure activities, and the company fully sponsors it. The Bliesure as a concept is not new; it has been around for some time now. The significant difference is now when the travel industry is recovering from the slump of the pandemic; marketeers are fuelling this term. But it does not anyway limit the potential of Bliesure as a concept. Organizations can use bliesure to attract a good talent pool, offer it as an additional employee benefit, and it can play a significant role in employee retention. How Can Bliesure Transform Business Travel? Apart from the benefit that businesses and organizations can drive from bliesure, bliesure travel opens heaps of growth opportunities for the travel industry. Let’s look at three leading ways the travel industry can take advantage of the Bliesure buzz: 1. The Bliesure Messaging Messaging is essential; you can’t sell what you can’t publicize. So, travel businesses need to create packages for Bliesure and start reaching out to the planners, which are still in the early booking process. Alternatively, travel businesses can directly reach out to business travelers. Start the messaging process by educating travelers about the concept of bliesure. Send educational content, run ads or launch a full-fledged marketing campaign to target business travelers who might be interested in the idea of bliesure. 2. Cost-Effective On-Trip Offerings For business travel, it’s mostly planners, in-house or third agents that make all the booking arrangements. And the agents prefer to book room blocks for sales meetings and conferences to get competitive rates. The business travel planners and agents always try to get maximum travel benefit on corporate rates, and they are very price-conscious. So, you cannot sell them, which goes even slightly above corporate rates. But you can always sell cost-effective on-trip offerings that make your venue more appealing. And convince them how you can make the leisure part more enjoyable for their travelers. 3. Value Addition on Experience Once you are able to convince planners and agents, they will do free marketing for you. While you need to understand the limitations of Bliesure travelers, they can only extend their trip for a few days, not weeks. So, you have very little time to make their Bliesure experience worthwhile. Recommended: Five Emerging Technology Trends in Travel Industry Every four out of five business travelers spend about five hours figuring out – what they can do once they are over with business obligations. That’s where the opportunity lies; you can incorporate athletic activities, water sports, special meals, hiking, and biking into your package. And sync these activities with travelers’ business obligations. Supposedly, they can enjoy these activities if they have a day off during the trip. Else, they already have extra days for the leisure part of their bliesure trip. Make sure you inform the planners of every activity. As mentioned earlier, they will do free marketing for you. Because they also have to justify their choices. The Bliesure might not be a new phenomenon. Still, it has great potential to boost the travel activity in its new avatar when so many Travel and Marketing companies are pushing it in the public eye. And it can potentially become a new norm for business travel.
How Can IATA Travel Pass Help Countries Reopen Borders?
The world has not yet wholly rebounded from the social and economic impact of the pandemic. And it’s high time for countries to reopen borders with no restrictions and smoothly facilitate international travel. The International Air Transport Association IATA started an initiative called the IATA travel pass, which allows countries to confidently reopen borders without any mandatory quarantine. It’s a digital health pass, and it will be available to all nations for free. A recent press release from IATA says the development of IATA’s digital travel pass is in its final stage. As countries use testing to limit Covid-19 importation, verifying all the testing and vaccination information becomes critical. And IATA travel pass solves the same problem statement by creating an infrastructure for easy flow of information among governments, airlines, labs, and travelers. Before we get into the intricacies of how the Travel Pass will work, let’s first understand the initiative and what it aims to achieve. What is IATA Travel Pass Initiative? The primary objective of the IATA travel pass initiative is to provide a digital infrastructure to countries that allow them to re-open borders without any quarantine. The travel pass will have accurate information on passengers’ health status. And the travel pass will work on a two-way mechanism that helps both passengers and governments. For passengers, IATA Travel Pass is a mobile app where they can find all the information regarding what tests results they need to produce, where they can get the test, and methods to verify vaccination status before their travel. Also, with the IATA travel pass mobile app, passengers can directly share Covid health information with governments in a secure and discreet manner. Recommended: Five Emerging Technology Trends in Travel Industry How does IATA Travel Pass Work? As we mentioned earlier, the whole initiative of free IATA Pass revolves around providing a one-stop solution to all stakeholders that facilitate travel in the post-pandemic world. Now let’s quickly understand how the travel pass initiative helps these stakeholders at different levels. Governments Governments of the countries using the Travel Pass will get unified and authenticated data of tests, vaccination status, and the identity of travelers to confidently open borders and thoroughly scrap post-travel quarantines. Aviation Industry Airlines will get an efficient information distribution mechanism, which they can use to inform their passengers and potential travelers on test requirements. Also, verify if a passenger meets the mandatory requirement for travel. Covid-19 Test Labs IATA authorized test labs and centers will have a single source mechanism to send test reports and vaccination certificates directly to the passengers. Also, they will be to process passengers’ data confidentiality. Travelers With the help of the Travel Pass App, passengers will be able to create digital passports. And they can also verify their vaccination and test result in real-time and check if their “Digital Passports” meet the covid travel norms of their destination. Recommended: Is Bliesure the Future of Post Pandemic Business Travel? As countries with the likes of Singapore, Qatar, Malaysia, Switzerland, and 60 other nations are already using the IATA Travel Pass on a trial basis, it’s going to be a monumental tool to bring back international travel to the level pre-pandemic times.
Five Ways World Travel and Tourism Industry Digitalizing Journeys
It’s a fact that the pandemic completely stalled the world travel and tourism industry at one point. However, if you look back now, when the impact of the virus is subsiding, people are getting used to living with it, the temporary setback offered more than it took to the travel industry, especially airlines across the world. The experience made the travel industry realize the importance of digitalization and modern tech to facilitate journeys. Today, airlines worldwide are promoting contactless journeys because it’s imperative for the industry to bring back the lost confidence in the passenger. “Every CEO that I speak to agrees about accelerating digital strategies,” – MD, Travel and Transport, IBM. While passengers today expect a more seamless travel experience from the airlines. In a survey, IATA recorded 10,408 passengers’ responses from 145 countries. And the insights were astonishing in terms of what passengers expect from the fliers. As many as 65% of respondents were willing to share personal data for expedited security checks. About 70% of passengers favored self-service baggage check-ins. Also, the survey showed the passengers wanted real-time information throughout their journey, 82% wanted real-time flight status on their phone, and about half of the respondents favored getting the real-time status of their baggage. Therefore, the World Travel and Tourism industry is willing to digitize journeys, and the expectations from the travelers are also in public. Then, let’s have a deeper look at what the industry is doing to bring technology into travel. Five Ways World Travel and Tourism Industry Enabling Seamless Travel Through Digitalization The world travel and tourism industry is gradually reeling from the bumps of the pandemic. And navigating through the realities of the day is not easy – the “new normal” is new for the travel industry as well. There’s no precedent for taking reference from and dealing with it. That said, modern technologies are helping the travel industry a big way to get the ball rolling again. So, now, we look at five major ways world travel and the tourism industry, particularly airlines, deploy modern tech to ensure efficient and safe journeys. #1 Increased Passenger Experience with Virtual and Augmented Reality The likes of Air New Zealand and Pratt & Whitney are pumping massive money into AR/VR systems to provide a better in-flight experience to passengers. Air New Zealand partnered with Microsoft Hololens to identify passenger mood and similar details. The information helps cabin crew offer more personalized offerings to traveling passengers. On the other hand, some carriers are also offering in-flight virtual tours before arrival. And using VR for cabin crew training. Recommended: Five Emerging Technology Trends in Travel Industry #2 Efficient Security Checks with Artificial Intelligence Against the backdrop of more stringent rules and covid protocols, airports are using AI to speed up security check operations and offer passengers a better traveling experience. Not just the carriers, governments worldwide are also investing heavily in AI security systems. In the previous financial year, the UK government pumped 1.8 million Euros to build new AI security systems, which bolster security and reduce passengers’ wait time. #3 Internet of Things for Improved Airport Experience The airlines are now gradually understanding the customer experience is the primary variable that gives them a competitive advantage. And at a time when the travel industry is on the path of recovery from the chaos of the pandemic, it becomes more critical. Airlines are now increasingly employing beacon technology for better to and fro communication from carrier to flier. The beacon technology assists passengers throughout their time at the airport, from providing nearby promotional offers, the status of security check, updated time of departure to minor things like informing the passenger of the correct gate number. #4 Passenger Assistance with Robotics Airports are using robots to fill the gap between human assistance and digital solutions. One such example is Indianapolis International Airport, which in partnership with Double Robotics, offers a “web-cam on wheels” for special ability passengers. The camera directly connects to the human assistant through a video link to resolve passenger challenges. Fliers are also using robots as “dynamic environment analyzers.” Indira Gandhi International Airport, New Delhi, uses a robotic technology called RADA by Tata labs to disseminate information like departure gates, weather at the destination, and flight status by simple boarding pass scan. Recommended: Is Bliesure the Future of Post Pandemic Business Travel? #5 Personalised Customer Offerings with Wearables and IoT Along with the demand for a seamless travel experience, customer expectations are also evolving. With an increasing number of customers who use wearables and are connected by IoT, fliers can use data to offer more centralized and personalized offerings to passengers. Some airports are already using IoT to push luggage information to passenger’s smartphones. As mentioned earlier, most passengers today are willing to trade personal data for getting seamless travel experience. Modern technologies are playing a significant role in bringing back passengers’ confidence, severely hit by the pandemic, and following protocols. And with the digitalization of journeys, the world travel and tourism industry looks poised for a strong recovery.
