How Earned Content is Transforming The Travel Industry

HOW EARNED CONTENT IS TRANSFORMING THE TRAVEL INDUSTRY

The power of visual user-generated content (UGC), or earned content, as an indispensable marketing tool is growing by the day—and the travel industry, which now generates a whopping 10% of the world’s GDP, has arguably more to gain from the visual UGC revolution than
perhaps any other industry. The prospective benefits that UGC offers to hotels, cruise lines, and other travel players in this nearly $8 trillion industry—which is forecast to grow another 50% to almost $12 trillion by 20251—are innumerable.

Evolving social trends are favoring a major travel-selfie revolution. Already, 72% of consumers post photos on a social network while on vacation, and 76% post them after they return2—this within a context where Instagram’s 400 million active users post 80 million photos per day3, and 350 million photos are uploaded daily to Facebook.

By harnessing user-generated photos—the most authentic, compelling, and affordable brand
assets available today—on their own websites, hotels and other travel brands can dynamically
showcase the overwhelmingly positive experiential and emotional elements that define the travel experience, and keep visitors there to book—a growing imperative in   hypercompetitive operating landscape. In doing so, they’ll both dramatically reduce the staggering costs of producing lackluster stock content—the woefully outdated industry norm—and engage new customers while building their bottom line.