How Travel Marketers Are Measuring Content Marketing Success

Last week we launched the latest report in our Skift Research Reports service, The State of Content Marketing in Travel 2017.

Below is an excerpt from our Skift Research Report. Get the full report here to stay ahead of this trend.

Nearly as important as finding the right content to publish and the right people to create it is measuring its success. How should travel marketers evaluate the success of their content efforts? As many travel executives admit, there’s a variety of methods and models to help answer this question.

One of the more common methods of measuring and quantifying the role of content in travel marketing is to think about its position within the marketing funnel. Using this metaphor, the idea is that travelers undergo a distinct process when deciding to make a travel purchase, passing from an “inspiration” phase early in their trip-planning journey through the research phase of a specific destination or product, and then on to the actual purchase of a trip.

A great visualization of how content fits into this marketing funnel can be seen below, created by Caitlin Domke of content marketing agency NewsCred.

More marketers are thinking about where their content efforts fit within the traditional marketing funnel as they attempt to define such efforts’ return on investment. (source)

The longstanding industry perception of content marketing in the travel industry is that it’s a discipline mostly designed to reach consumers at the top of the funnel, meaning that it’s intended to build brand awareness and inspire consumers to investigate further, not to make a sale. “It really is mostly about brand awareness,” said Visit Seattle’s Daniels.

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