The modern traveler’s journey: Powered by data and technology

In 2018—in the US alone—consumers spent $2.1 trillion on travel. As the buying power of Millennials and Gen Z expands and they increasingly crave new adventures over material possessions, that number is poised for growth.

Knowing that today’s consumers are researching, booking and interfacing with brands in different ways, predominantly on mobile, companies are leveraging the power of social media to influence interest and website traffic. But much more is needed to impact decision-making, create personalized experiences and convert the shopper to a confirmed traveler.

Understand the trends driving the industry today.

From “bleisure” trips where business travelers extend their stays to tour local sites to affordable “sharing economy” stays at Airbnbs and “insta-holidays” where vacationers leverage last-minute deals, today’s trends are reshaping the industry. Other trends are amenity focused and have already been successfully implemented in top brands, such as sustainable options for ecologically correct travel and wellness solutions incorporating healthy options for the traveler. But today’s most prevalent (and opportunity-rich) trends are driven by personalized information:

Personalized Travel Experiences
Fueled by open, scalable, API-enabled platforms; artificial intelligence; and easy access to data at the edge of the enterprise, personalization helps cement brand loyalty.

Virtual Communities
Consumers read user reviews and leverage web communities like TripAdvisor to influence their travel decisions, discover new things to do and see, and tailor trips to their preferences.

Improved Loyalty Programs
Airlines and hotels are upping their perks on retention programs in response to heavy competition from Online Travel Agencies (OTAs) like Kayak, Expedia and Priceline.

Mobile Apps Galore
Travelers use various apps with distinct purposes, such as Hopper for price predictability and TravelZoo for vacation package deals. Wouldn’t it be nice to integrate some of these apps into your site?

Take a pragmatic approach to delivering more meaningful experiences.

The message behind the trends is that it’s time to optimize your approach to customer touchpoints from beginning to end. And the more personalized, relevant and timely your customer information is, the more your understanding of your audience grows.

The keys are data and technology. Travelers want a simple, integrated, and personalized way to experience travel through a robust platform fueled by AI and other consumer preference data. And you want to optimize your travelers’ journeys, increase brand loyalty and transform researchers into revenue. Here’s how Celerity can help.

Optimize Your Customer Journey

Celerity leverages proven and proprietary methods to help you determine the right strategy for your brand. We can help you:

    • Define key personas and map the customer journey from interest, intent, and booking
      to active travel and post travel
    • Assess current digital assets and remove
      friction impeding the customer journey
    • Simplify customer touch-points
      across the journey

Improve Performance and Enable Innovation

Through strategic consulting and seasoned development expertise, Celerity will help:

    • Evaluate your architecture and move from monolithic applications to micro services
    • Migrate to the cloud to leverage continuous integration and delivery for ultimate market
      and consumer responsiveness
    • Implement lean product development utilizing Agile methods, scaled Agile framework (SAFe), rapid prototyping and continuous “testing and learning” to drive innovation and speed to market

Enable Value-Added 3rd Party Integration

Celerity’s mastery of emerging technologies makes it possible to:

    • Build flexible and scalable
      API-enabled platforms
    • Accelerate innovation and automation
      across the customer journey through
      3rd party integration
    • Increase revenue channels by integrating preferred ancillary products and services

Personalize Your Customer Touchpoints

Our data expertise is bringing the personalization trend alive, enabling you to:

    • Leverage artificial intelligence to power preferences and personalization across the customer journey
    • Move from monolithic data stores to data at the edge for seamless access
    • Analyze first, second, and third party data to gain insights and offer a holistic, personalized customer experience