Where to Budget Your Advertising Dollars in 2021

digital advertising trends

 

As 2020 is creeping toward a close, the travel and tourism industry will have had the most challenging year any vertical has seen.  And as you’re probably aware,Q4 means budget season is underway. Many sales and marketing executives are carefully trying to decide where they can allocate their marketing budget to see the best return on investment.

Emerging Ad Spend Trend

According to an article written by eMarketer, the travel industry digital ad spend will amount to just $3.24 billion at the end of 2020, an astonishing decrease of 41% year over year. Most of which has been spent towards search ad spending. Search engine marketing spend (think: Google, Bing, etc.) will account for almost 60% of the travel market’s digital budget, compared to other industries where search engine marketing makes up around 40% of their budget.

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Why is Digital Advertising Important?

If you were trying to hit a target on a shooting range, wouldn’t it make sense to aim with a rifle rather than a shotgun? Similarly, digital search advertising precisely targets potential customers in search of your service and greatly increases your likelihood of success, rather than shooting in multiple different directions and hoping to hit your target.

According to Google, there are 3.5 billion searches made by users per day and the volume of Google searches increases by approximately 10% each year. 92% of these users will pick businesses found on the first search engine results page (SERP). Digital ads, when used effectively, will seamlessly integrate into your target customer’s internet browsing experience. The ads can then be personalized to maximize relevance toward your target audience, making it more effective than other mediums.

So, What Do I Do Now?

The increasing importance of digital search ads coupled with the current leisure “staycation” travel trend makes for a perfect blend of social and search advertising to warrant maximum success. Social advertising will give you the most reach with the lowest dollar and search advertising will allow you to most easily target your ideal customer. So, what do you do now? Ensure that going into 2021, digital advertising holds a large portion of your marketing spend. We’re hopeful for the revival of travel in 2021 and want to provide our friends with the tools to make it happen.

McConnell Marketing would be more than happy to help curate an effective and efficient digital marketing strategy – feel free to email Jake VanDerkar (our Director of Business Development) with any questions you may have.