Keeping Tabs on Travel and Facebook

Keeping Tabs on Travel and Facebook

Compete Exploration December 15, 2011

2

Today’s presenters

Ryan Williams

Director, Client Services, Travel

Lincoln Merrihew

Managing Director, Transportation

Alyssa Maine

Marketing Coordinator, Marketing at Compete

3

Who we are and what we do

• Founded in 2000, joined WPP/Kantar in 2008

• Passionate about understanding consumers to inspire great

marketing

• Fastest-growing operating company within Kantar in terms

of revenue and new customer growth

• World-class advertiser, agency and media clients

• Strategic partnerships to enable marketing optimization and

provide holistic view of consumers

• Largest panel in the industry with 2.3 million US consumers

4

Webinar logistics

• Today’s webinar will be recorded. You will be

emailed a link.

• Please enter your questions in the

Questions box. We will answer as many

as possible at the end.

• If you have technical difficulties, try logging

back in or use a different browser

• The Twitter hashtag for today’s webinar is

#competeauto

5

Agenda

• Where Facebook and Travel Stand Today

• Exploring The Value of a Facebook User

6

State of the Travel Industry

Recovery in the hotel industry is slow but steady despite the weak economy, with ADRs up over 4% YoY in North America.

The flight industry is not faring as well, with YoY declines in reported online bookings and significant increases in ATPs to offset higher costs.

The car rental industry is seeing a surplus of cars as fleet management becomes increasingly difficult. Rental rates are down 21% YoY as a result.

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Vacation Intended (Left) Consumer Confidence (Right)

Vacation Intent is Up Despite Weak CC Trends

• October’s consumer confidence index of 40.9 is the lowest it has been in 2 ½ years but

November projections (not shown) push it back to 56

• While vacation intent is up, the means of travel (not shown) are shifting with intent to fly

actually down 8% Oct vs. Aug and intent to drive up 8%

Consumer Confidence and Vacation Intent (Feb’08-Oct’11)

7 Source: The Conference Board, Nov’11 Results

Read as: As of

Oct’11, 49% of

consumers

intend to take a

vacation in the

next 6 months,

but the

consumer

confidence

index was at a

2.5 year low –

41. Note, 90 is

considered a

“healthy” index.

8

29.2%

3.1%

12.4%

18.2%

30.9%

3.6%

14.3%17.6%

33.5%

4.1%

15.8% 16.5%

All Travel Car Rental Hotel Air

2009 2010 2011

More of the IBP is Shopping for Travel

• The share of the internet browsing population that shops for travel has increased, both in

aggregate and across major travel lines of business

• With the IBP also growing month to month (not shown), this means there are more

consumers shopping for travel in 2011 than in the past 2 years

Average Travel Visitor Share of IBP (2009, 2010, 2011 YTD)

8

9

3.8%

0.6%

1.3%

2.3%

3.9%

0.7%

1.4%

2.1%

4.5%

0.9%

1.6%2.1%

All Travel Car Rental Hotel Air

2009 2010 2011

And More of Those Shoppers are Booking

• Book rates for the IBP have also improved vs. prior years, with nearly 5 of every 100

internet users booking some form of travel in 2011

Average Travel Booker Share of IBP (2009, 2010, 2011 YTD)

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10

Bar is Set Low for Facebook Travel Services

• Travel is consistently a hot topic of discussion and Facebook is often at the epicenter of

those discussions. However, consumer expectations of Facebook travel services are low.

• Across multiple categories, fewer than 10% of survey respondents indicated Facebook

travel services would be better than existing online services

Expectations for Facebook Travel Services (Survey: Jul’11, n=601, top 2 and bottom 2 box)

Read as:

6.2% of

respondents

indicate

Facebook travel

services would

be better than

existing services

with regard to

Loyalty &

Rewards

programs

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35%

Ease of Research

Variety of Brands

Variety of Destinations

Ease of Booking

Price & Fees

Trust w/PII

Loyalty & Rewards

Ease of Changing Reservation

FB Better

FB Worse

11

-50%

-40%

-30%

-20%

-10%

0%

10%

May-11 Jun-11 Jul-11 Aug-11 Sep-11 Oct-11

UVs (MoM %)

Page Views (MoM %)

Avg Stay (MoM %)

Visits/Person (MoM %)

Facebook Engagement Metrics Down Since Sep’11

• Facebook made significant and controversial UI changes in September and shifts in user

behavior on Facebook.com were immediate

• While unique visitors are up slightly since the changes, core engagement metrics like page

views and average stay have seen considerable decline

Facebook Key Performance Indicators (May – October 2011)

Read as:

Target has

generated 7.4M

fans of its brand

on Facebook as

of 12/11/11

12

Social Media ROI Not Well Understood

Many companies today are not measuring ROI for the money they spend on social media marketing, likely because they don’t have the tools to do so

Brands are indicating they are not prepared for social media but most still plan to increase its use

According to Compete, Facebook under-indexes for hotel shoppers when compared to the IBP

• On average, only 8% of Facebook’s monthly unique visitors shop for hotels in the same month (16% for mapquest, 13% average for non-travel sites)

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4.4%

2.4%

2.0%

1.4%1.3%

1.1%

0.7%0.6%

0.5% 0.4%0.3% 0.2% 0.1%

Travel Sites Not Commonly Upstream of Facebook

• Despite the potential for sharing travel related information on Facebook, travel sites as a

category lag behind most every other web category as a source of traffic to Facebook

Share of Inbound Referrals to Facebook.com, by Category (Upstream) (Oct’11)

Read as:

0.3% of sites

immediately

upstream of

Facebook.com

are categorized

as Travel sites

14

10.9%

3.7%3.3%

1.8%1.4%

1.1% 1.0% 0.8% 0.6% 0.4% 0.2% 0.2% 0.0%

Travel’s Downstream Popularity Also Suspect

• The same holds true for post-Facebook activity, with just 0.2% of sites immediately

downstream of Facebook.com being Travel sites

Share of Outbound Referrals from Facebook.com, by Category (Downstream) (Oct’11)

Read as:

0.2% of sites

immediately

downstream of

Facebook.com

are categorized

as Travel sites

15

Agenda

• Where Facebook and Travel Stand Today

• Exploring The Value of a Facebook User

16

Impact of Brand Page Interaction on Site Engagement

16

70k Incremental Bookings in

60 Days

Visits per Unique Visitor

+90%

Page Views per Unique Visitor

+128% Average Time Spent per Visit

+156%

Compete | Expedia Media Solutions – Exploring the Value of a Facebook User, November 2011

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The “Like” Barometer

• A year ago, Mashable.com published an infographic that showed 139 brands had over

1mm likes on Facebook, with Barbie and Lego quickly approaching 1mm

• Today:

• Barbie has 2.8mm likes with Lego at 1.3mm

• The needle can move in a hurry

• Expedia had 130k “likes” at the start of

their FriendTrips campaign and over a

million when it ended 2 months later

• Brand success is tied to more than just “likes” – engaging with your fans and, more

importantly, getting your fans to engage with you is as important as getting them to “like”

you in the first place


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1,143,254

273,469

7,420,162

5,503,904

Expedia Delta Target Best Buy

# of Likes (as of 12/11/2011)

Are “Likes” a Good Measure of Social Media Success?

• Retail brands are the obvious leaders in volume of “likes”

• This doesn’t necessarily mean Target and Best Buy have been any more successful with

Facebook than Expedia or other travel brands

Facebook Fans (Number of “likes” for each brand, as of 12/11/11)

Read as:

Target has

generated 7.4M

fans of its brand

on Facebook as

of 12/11/11


19

4.1%

4.0%

7.4%

18.3%

13.9%

11.2%

11.5%

11.5%

7.8%

10.4%

More than 30

21-30

11-20

6-10

5

4

3

2

1

0

A Facebook Fan’s Shelf Space is Limited

• Over 60% of respondents indicated they “like” fewer than 6 brands

• Showing up late to the game could mean access to fewer fans

How many retailers and/or consumer product companies do you “like” on

Facebook? (Survey: n=1,627)

Read as:

13.9% of survey

respondents

indicated they

“like” 5

retail/CPG

brands on

Facebook

Source: Compete Spring 2011 Online Shopper Intelligence Survey

20

Fan vs. Non-Fan

• Brands commonly present a different welcome page to non-fans in hopes of capturing the

all-powerful “like”

• Same URL: www.facebook.com/target


http://www.facebook.com/target

21

Ongoing Conversation is Key

• Smart brands don’t simply launch a promotion and leave it running forever

• URL: www.facebook.com/expedia (screenshots from different dates)


http://www.facebook.com/expedia

22

Why Visit the Site When You Can Buy on Facebook?

• More and more, brands are offering visitors the ability to initiate shopping and even

complete the booking within their branded Facebook pages

• The idea is ancient – be present when the consumer is ready to purchase


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Major Campaign: Expedia FriendTrips

• April 2011

• Expedia launched the FriendTrips

game, the largest promotion ever

hosted on Facebook

• Expedia used this campaign to

generate over 1mm “likes”

• Roughly 85% of the aggregate

monthly UVs to Expedia’s branded

pages on Facebook (Jan-Aug’11)

visited in April and May – the months

of the active promotion


24

Major Campaign: Target Summer Fun Finder

• June 2011

• Target’s Summer Fun Finder

Facebook application launched

• Extremely viral and engaging

• 53% of the aggregate monthly UVs

to Target’s branded pages on

Facebook (Jan-Aug’11) visited in

June and July – the months of the

active promotion


25

Major Campaign: Best Buy Deal of the Day

• August 2011

• Best Buy launched their “Deal of the

Day” campaign, and promoted

Facebook as one of the access points

for these great deals

• 42% of the aggregate monthly

UVs to Best Buy’s branded pages on

Facebook (Jan-Aug’11) visited in

August – the month of the

active promotion

• The “Deal of the Day” is no

longer promoted on Best Buy’s

Facebook page


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Consumers’ Facebook Brand Page Visits Up in 2011

• Consumers this year are 12% more likely than in 2010 to visit a brand’s official Facebook

pages

How often do you visit official Facebook pages of retail and/or consumer

product companies? (Survey: At least once per month; 2010 n=3,061; 2011 n=3,269)

Read as:

27% of survey

respondents

plan to visit a

brand’s official

Facebook pages

at least once per

month, up 12%

from last year

24%

27%

Spring 2010 Spring 2011

+12%


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Facebook Penetration is Strong for All Brands

• 80-90% of brands’ unique visitors also visit Facebook in the same month

• The share of brand.com visitors visiting the respective brand’s official Facebook pages is

much smaller, but we’re still talking about significant volume

Facebook Penetration (% of brand.com UVs that also visited Facebook.com in the same month, Jan-Aug’11)

Read as:

2011 YTD,

86.1% of

Bestbuy.com

UVs also visited

Facebook.com

in the same

month, but only

0.2% visited

Best Buy’s

official

Facebook pages

0.4% 0.1% 0.2% 0.2%

85.4%81.4%

87.6% 86.1%

14.6%18.6%

12.4% 13.9%

Expedia Delta Target Bestbuy

% Not Visiting Facebook

% Visiting Facebook

% Visiting Brand.com's Official Facebook Pages


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30%

50%

43%

28%


2011 YTD

Big Opportunity to Better Engage With Your Fans

• While a small % of your site visitors actually see your official Facebook pages in the same

month, a much larger % of visitors to your Facebook pages hit your site

• There’s still opportunity to better connect with your Facebook page visitors

Facebook Brand Page UVs and Brand.com - Overlap (% of unique visitors to Brand.com’s official Facebook pages that also visit Brand.com, Jan-Aug’11)

Read as:

Only 43% of the

visitors to

Target’s official

Facebook pages

visited

Target.com in

the same month


29

Impactful Facebook Campaigns Drive Visitors

• This month by month view into unique visitors to each brand’s official Facebook pages

shows when different campaigns were launched

• It is clearly possible to generate strong engagement with the right campaign

Unique Visitors to Facebook Brand Pages (Number of unique visitors to Brand.com’s branded pages on Facebook, by month)

Read as:

In Apr ’11,

Expedia’s

official

Facebook pages

received over

1M UVs

0

200,000

400,000

600,000

800,000

1,000,000

1,200,000

Jan-11 Feb-11 Mar-11 Apr-11 May-11 Jun-11 Jul-11 Aug-11

Expedia FriendTrips

BestBuy DOTD Target Summer

Fun Finder


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13.6%

13.7%

26.4%

29.0%

56.2%

Connect with other people who like the retailer

Let others know why I like a specific retailer

Appears in my news feed b/c a friend "likes" it

Learn more about a specific retailer

Keep up to date on sales and promotions

Facebook Brand Pages Visitors Are Price Sensitive

• Nearly 6 in 10 survey respondents indicated they visit a brand’s official pages in Facebook

to gain access to sales and promotions

Why do you visit official Facebook pages of retail and/or consumer product

companies? (Survey: n=1,627)

Read as:

56.2% of

survey

respondents

indicate they

visit a brand’s

official

Facebook pages

to keep up to

date on sales

and promotions


31

38.4%40.1%

21.8%

48.0%48.1%

56.6%

25.4%

56.1%


FB

BFB

Brand Page Visitors Are More Loyal

• People who visit brand.com and that brand’s official Facebook pages exhibit a stronger

sense of loyalty, allocating more of their category visits to that brand’s site

• Upwards of 41% more in the case of Delta.com

Brand.com vs. Category Visitation by Segment (Share of category visits allocated to brand.com, by segment, Jan-Aug’11)

Read as:

Of people who

visited

Delta.com and

Delta’s official

Facebook pages

in 2011, their

Delta visits

accounted for

57% of their

total air supplier

visits over the

same period


25% 41% 16% 17%

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Facebook Brand Pages Visitors Are More Engaged

• Generally, people who visit a brand’s official Facebook pages visit the respective brand.com

site more often

Visits per Monthly Unique Visitor (Brand.com visits per UV by brand, by segment, Jan-Aug’11)

Read as:

People who

visited both

Delta.com and

Delta’s official

Facebook pages

had 5.3 visits

per UV on

Delta.com,

139% more than

general

Facebook

visitors who also

visited

Delta.com 1.7

2.1

1.5 1.7

1.8

2.2

1.7 1.8

3.5

5.3

2.9 2.9


NFB

FB

BFB

7%

90%

5%

139%

19%

69%

6%

63%


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24.7 27.5

9.1 12.8

23.0 26.0

13.2 15.4

52.4

79.1

30.3 31.6


NFB

FB

BFB


• It’s not just the variance in frequency of visits – we also see lift in actual brand.com page

views by those who have also visited the brand’s official Facebook pages

Page Views per Monthly Unique Visitor (Brand.com page views per UV by brand, by segment, Jan-Aug’11)

Read as:

People who

visited both

Delta.com and

Delta’s official

Facebook pages

had 79 page

views per UV

on Delta.com,

187% more than

general

Facebook

visitors who also

visited

Delta.com

-7%

128%

-5%

204%

45%

130%

20%

105%


34

16.0

27.5

9.4 10.3

15.1

25.2

11.4 9.1

38.7

64.8

25.4

14.7


NFB

FB

BFB


• Time spent per visit to brand.com shows a similar increase for those who have also visited

a brand’s official Facebook pages in the same month

Time Spent per Visit (Minutes spent on brand.com per visit by monthly UV, by brand, by segment, Jan-Aug’11)

Read as:

People who

visited both

Delta.com and

Delta’s official

Facebook pages

spent 65

minutes per visit

on Delta.com,

136% more than

general

Facebook

visitors who also

visited

Delta.com

-5%

156%

-8%

157%

21%

123%

-11%

61%


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Facebook Brand Pages Do Influence Purchase

• 3 of every 4 surveyed respondents indicated a brand’s official Facebook pages had at least

some influence on their purchase decision

How influential have Facebook pages been on your decision to purchase

products from those retailers? (Survey: n=1,627)

-5%

156%

5-8

157%

21%

123%

-11%

61%

22.5%21.7%

32.9%

16.7%

6.2%

Influence Extremely influentialNot at all influential


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Brand Page Interaction Leads to Increased Conversion

• Consumers who engage with both a brand’s website as well as that brand’s official

Facebook pages show a much stronger propensity to book

Lift in Brand.com Conversion – FB Segment vs. BFB Segment (Lift in average monthly conversion rates between different segments)

-5%

156%

5-8

157%

21%

123%

-11%

61%

107%

57%

69%

37%

Expedia

Delta

Target

Bestbuy

Read as:

People who

cross-visited

Target.com and

Target’s official

Facebook pages

were 69% more

likely to convert

on Target.com

than general

Facebook

visitors who also

visited

Target.com


37

Impactful Facebook Campaigns Drive Visitors

• This month by month view into unique visitors to each brand’s official Facebook pages

shows when different campaigns were launched

Unique Visitors to Facebook Brand Pages (Number of unique visitors to Brand.com’s official Facebook pages, by month)

Read as:

In Apr ’11,

Expedia’s

official

Facebook pages

received over

1M UVs

0

200,000

400,000

600,000

800,000

1,000,000

1,200,000


Expedia FriendTrips

BestBuy DOTD Target Summer

Fun Finder


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0.0%

0.5%

1.0%

1.5%

2.0%

2.5%

3.0%

3.5%


Expedia Domain

Expedia Flight

Expedia Hotel

Delta

Target

Bestbuy

Can Facebook Campaigns Drive Conversion?

• It is clear the Expedia FriendTrips game not only sparked visitation to Facebook but also

accounted for a much more significant portion of Expedia’s total bookings

• The success touched multiple lines of business as well – specifically Hotel

Purchase Patterns of Visitors to Brands’ Official Facebook Pages (Bookings on brand.com by UVs to that brand’s official FB pages, as % of total brand.com bookings

Read as:

In Apr ’11, 2.2%

of Expedia’s

total monthly

bookings were

made by people

who also visited

Expedia’s

official

Facebook pages

Expedia FriendTrips

BestBuy DOTD

Target Summer

Fun Finder


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The Upside for Some Brands is Significant

• Expedia’s opportunity amounts to incremental booking growth of 2%

• 1% for Target and Best Buy

Opportunity (Incremental online purchases with 100% overlap between Facebook brand pages and brand.com, Jan-Aug’11)

Read as:

If 100% of the

visitors to

Expedia’s

official

Facebook pages

also visited

Expedia.com,

this could have

generated over

93k incremental

bookings Jan-

Aug’11

-5%

156%

-8%

157%

21%

123%

-11%

61%

93,151

5,218

23,796

18,383



40

Ten Tips to Building a Brand Worth Liking on Facebook

• People want to believe there’s value in “liking” your brand. Offer exclusive content, discounts, etc, but keep it relevant to your brand. 1. Give Your Fans What They Want

• Another way of staying relevant to your customers is to ensure promotions on your website are relayed on your Facebook pages as well.

2. Crowdsource Your Website Content

• Encourage potential fans to “like” your brand by hinting at additional content or promotions to which they’ll have access after “liking” you.

3. Encourage People to “Like” Your Brand

• Keeping your brand presence simple is increasingly important as time-spent metrics on Facebook decline. Too many sub-pages or links could distract your fans. 4. Don’t Dilute Your Own Content

• Considering a consumer’s shelf-space is limited, you should view this as a privilege. Be suggestive in your sales pitches, but not pushy. 5. Be Persuasive, Not Pushy

• Make it easy for users to access your website from your Facebook pages. The likelihood of converting a fan to an actual customer will increase substantially. 6. Link to Your Website

• By enabling communication between your fans, you empower them to speak on behalf of your brand, leveraging the power of positive word of mouth. 7. Create Conversations

• Be careful not to be too serious in your communication or risk taking on a lecturing tone with your fans. Communication should be light and fun but brand-appropriate.

8. Keep Your Tone Social But Brand-Appropriate

• Keep your brand presence on Facebook fresh and encourage social sharing by giving your fans something to do, talk about or send to friends. 9. Engage With Your Fans

• Now that you have thousands if not millions of fans of your brand, think of unique and inspiring contests that encourage sharing beyond your existing fan base.

10. Feature Contests, Sweepstakes, Games, etc.

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Thank You.

•Ryan Williams •Director, Client Services

•[email protected]

•206.226.9082

•Lincoln Merrihew •Managing Director, Transportation

•[email protected]

•617.933.5629

Questions?

Keeping Tabs on Travel and Facebook

Technology

Transcript of Keeping Tabs on Travel and Facebook