Micro-moments for travelers
Origin Principals MJ Legault and Danielle Kristmanson spoke at the National Ski Area Association’s national conference in Nashville this month on the topic of Micro Moments. The focus of the presentation was based on research released by Google last year. Google studied the changing behavior of travelers and found that increasingly, people are turning to their smartphones for immediate answers to their travel questions. These new behaviours have had major implications on how we market to our clients' customers within the consumer decision journey. Increasingly, our marketing needs to be there to answer these questions, as opposed to the more traditional method of "communicating our key messages. The presentation focused on how resort marketers can and really must keep up with these new mobile behaviors and includes specific examples and clear ideas on how to apply this research in your own marketing.
What is a micro-moment?
Google's consumer behaviour research has revealed a new marketing opportunity that they are dubbing "a micro moment". They define it as “an intent-rich moment when someone acts on a need”. Really, what this means is these are small moments that are critical touch points with your brand and that when you add all these micro moments together, they ultimately decide how that consumer decision journey ends.
Because mobile is helping people find what they want more quickly, time spent per session on mobile travel sites is down 7% while mobile web conversion rates for travel sites have grown 88%.
Google has coined the term micro moment and mapped this out in the context of a new consumer decision journey in which there are 4 key moments;
- I-want-to-get-away (dreaming)
- I-want-this-trip-to-be-perfect (researching and validating)
- I-want-to-book-it (booking)
- I-want-to-make-the-most-of-it (experiencing)
What changed?
The consumer decision journey is no longer linear
Quick access to information means potential guests can jump in, and leave, at any phase of the decision journey, or go in any direction. The presentation outlined how you can ensure that content at every stage of the journey is equally accessible, and that it leads in multiple other directions.
The moments are shorter and more immediate
With vast amounts of rich and informative content readily available any time, potential guests can experience literally hundreds of digital micro moments while planning and booking a vacation. They may be quick, but every touchpoint is relevant and helps to deepen their relationship with your brand.
Brands must be present at each micro-moment
The presentation outlined how you can track your target customers’ journeys, identify the micro-moments, and develop content that addresses their needs at every touchpoint. This goes back to the very simple notion of the right content at the right time.
