Booking.com becomes second most talked about travel brand in the UK – according to Kantar analysis of online and offline conversations

- Emirates holds onto no.1 spot with Premier Inn in third place

- TripAdvisor, trivago and Travel Republic all see a decline in TotalSocial scores in 2019

A rise in the number of conversations about travel booking site Booking.com has seen it jump to second place in Kantar’s ranking of most talked about travel and tourism brands in the first half of 2019. The ranking combines TotalSocial®analysis of online and offline conversations, including public posts and shares on social media and blogs, with consumer surveys to understand how people pass on information and talk about specific brands in their daily lives.

Despite the challenges facing the travel sector, driven by Brexit and poor currency exchange rates, Booking.com is gaining more share of voice and outperforming others in the aggregator category, which saw trivago, TripAdvisor and Travel Republic all suffer declines in the number of conversations.

Matt Dodd, Managing Director of Analytics at Kantar, says: “In a sector that has become increasingly commoditised, we’ve seen Booking.com shift marketing focus in recent years, moving away from mainly search that drives sales, to investing in TV and online video ads as part of a long-term brand building strategy. As Kantar’s recent Mastering Momentum study shows, over reliance on marketing activities that deliver short-term sales growth will impact the ability of a business to lock in long-term market share growth. This new bolder brand positioning, which focuses on travel ‘as an experience’, has had a major impact on its overall score, with a strong uplift in online conversations and engagement in particular.”

Make sure you measure the full conversation
The TotalSocial ranking also shows big differences between a brand’s online and offline conversations, and highlights the importance for brands, particularly in a competitive sector like travel, to see the full picture and measure both online and offline activity in tandem.

Kantar’s Matt Dodd adds: “Brands focus on online measurement because of the value placed on social media today, but online is only one part of the story and, as we can see from our ranking, there are often huge differences between online and offline. If travel brands are making assumptions based on online conversations only, they are missing out on a huge demographic of audiences offline who have the power to influence bookings.”

Key highlights: TotalSocial Travel and Tourism Brands H1 2019

* Emirates (no.1) held the top spot, due to high brand sharing and influencers talking about their positive experiences of the airline.

* The UK’s biggest hotel brand, Premier Inn (no.3)with its “A good night's sleep guaranteed” customer promise continues to do well with a 7-point increase over last year, driven by online activity.

* Airbnb needs to do more to gain traction as an all-round booking site as it slips three positions from no.4 to no.7

* Expedia (no.10) is holding its own in the category with a 4-point increase online and a smaller 1-point increase offline.

* Despite recent problems, British Airways (no.4) shows sentiment gains, particularly online, and saw a 5-point increase in its overall TotalSocial score.

* Virgin Holidays (no.8) saw a drop of 10 points in its online score, but an 8-point increase in its offline score, driven mainly by its sentiment scores, i.e. how loved they are.

* Thomas Cook (no.17) saw a boost in offline conversations of 5 points, but saw an overall drop in the ranking because of a big decline in online conversations (down 6 points).

TotalSocial is the social intelligence platform of US-based data and analytics firm Engagement Labs. It combines analysis of public posts and shares on social media and blogs with consumer surveys to understand how people pass on information and talk about specific brands in their daily lives. Scores are calculated using four key metrics: volume of conversation; sentiment (positive or negative); brand sharing via social platforms, such as ‘likes’ or retweets; and talking about a brand’s offline marketing, such as TV or radio ads.

Ends

Notes for Editors:

The TotalSocial ranking of travel brands is available as a table. Please request a copy.

Kantar’s study, Mastering Momentum analysed the market share of 3,900 brands in the BrandZ™ database over a three-year period. Download the report at http://www.millwardbrown.com/BrandGuidance/mastering-momentu... or request a copy from kantar@eurekacomms.co.uk

About Kantar
Kantar is the world’s leading data, insights and consulting company. We understand more about how people think, feel, shop, share, vote and view than anyone else. Combining our expertise in human understanding with advanced technologies, Kantar’s 30,000 people help the world’s leading organisations succeed and grow. Further information can be found at www.kantar.com/analyticspractice, Twitter:Facebook: LinkedIn

What Is TotalSocial?
Working in partnership with industry-leading social intelligence analytics firm Engagement Labs, TotalSocial is Kantar’s premier data and analytics platform providing brands with insights that inform their business strategy, improve marketing ROI and grow revenue. Fuelled by actionable online and offline data, TotalSocial® is the only platform that encompasses and listens to the entire social ecosystem. TotalSocial® offers unique, proprietary data about brands, its industry and competitors.

With cutting-edge diagnostics, patent-pending predictive analytics and machine learning, TotalSocial® identifies business opportunities and provides recommendations and a roadmap to grow revenue and achieve business and marketing goals.

To learn more visit www.engagementlabs.com / www.kantar.com/analytics/totalsocial.

Media contact:
Amanda Hassall, Consultant
Amanda@eurekacomms.co.uk
T: 01628 822741
M: 07855 359889
T: @mandyhassall