Travel Brands on CTV: Oh, the Places You’ll Show

4 Min Read

After a few rough years of a pandemic and lockdowns, travel brands are amid the hottest summer in years – and the future’s looking brighter than ever. But a lot has changed since the travel industry slowed in 2019; new technology has emerged, consumer behavior has changed, and strategies have shifted to accommodate.

To find out how today’s leading travel brands are navigating this strange and exciting post-COVID world, MNTN and Worldwide Business Review polled senior travel marketers at leading brands. From pain points to avoid, strategies to update, and tools to leverage, we left no stone unturned—and now we’re sharing the insights we learned.

Join Tim Edmundson, Director of Content & Research at MNTN, as he reveals key insights from the study that shows how travel brands are maximizing this summer of opportunity. Edmundson will use data-driven insights to give your travel brand everything it needs to capitalize on this golden year. Registration is free—RSVP now to save your spot. In the meantime, here’s a preview of what Edmundson will be discussing.

CTV is a Part of Leading Travel Brands’ Plans

In our polling, we found that travel marketers are drawn to Connected TV for its ability to marry TV’s storytelling capabilities with digital marketing’s targeting and performance. But just how popular is CTV with leading travel brands, and how important is it to their future strategies? 100 marketing leaders across the United States and Canada weighed in:

• 60%: Say CTV ads play a significant role in their marketing strategy for 2022-2023
• 70%: Currently run CTV ads
• 80%: Can effectively tie success and specific goals (revenue, website visits, etc.) back to their CTV ads
• 82%: Believe their CTV ads are “very” or “somewhat” effective for engaging travel customers and generating business

It’s clear from our polling that CTV has become an essential part of travel marketers’ toolkit. Thanks to its ability to transform the TV platform into a measurable performance marketing machine, CTV is also sitting alongside existing digital strategies. And that complementary position is important, as 56% of travel brands expect to increase their digital ad budgets in the next year.

Finding Your Next Brand Loyalist

As digital ad budgets grow – and Connected TV continues its upward trajectory in popularity – the channel is expected to become more crucial to travel brands. But why are so many travel brands banking on CTV? The answer is simple—it’s where their future brand advocates are. 86% of consumers interested in travel are currently CTV users, and 77% of that demographic watch ad-supported channels. CTV’s audience-first approach makes it incredibly easy for travel brands to reach this audience. Rather than buying media connecting to specific programming, you can ensure your ad buys are made based on what your audience watches.

Further, audiences can be segmented by tastes, demographics like age and gender, or even by location. The result is a powerful ad platform for travel brands to find their audience—and use CTV’s audio-visual format to showcase beautiful vistas and scenic sights waiting for them outside their living room. And with 65% of travelers planning to “go big” this year to make up for lost time, travel brands are using CTV to inspire, excite, and help these consumers form new buying habits (and build brand loyalty along the way).

Picking Up New Strategies in 2022

While some travel brands are new to CTV this year, a lot has changed for the seasoned pros as well. One of these updates is affinity-based targeting, a new and popular tool in leading CTV ad platforms. With affinity-based targeting, your brand can find potential customers who haven’t engaged with you yet but are interested in what you offer—or engage with your competitors. This tool has been helping travel brands unlock new opportunities as new customers flood the market, looking to make new and memorable travel experiences. Affinity-based targeting gives marketers avenues to build brand loyalty and enforce travel habits that may last a lifetime—but note that not every CTV platform has this popular feature yet.

Another popular strategy that travel brands are updating their CTV campaigns with is geotargeting. Geotargeting allows marketers to deliver specific ads to exact locations based on factors like zip, state, or city. For travel marketers, the benefit is customized ads that hit harder than generic placements. For instance, a travel brand can deploy different creative for different parts of the country—targeting mountain getaways to coastal residents or showcasing city nightlife to rural residents. This strategy helps to build excitement and maximize the effectiveness of ads for CTV audiences.

There’s More to See

There are plenty of more strategies, insights, and insider tactics to share from our polling. RSVP to save your seat for Have Ad, Will Travel: Why CTV is The Window to the World for Jetsetters to get more actionable insights to make this a year to remember—for both your brand and your customers. We look forward to seeing you there.