One of the ways to ensure your travel or hospitality business’s success is to know your customers. However, because the travel industry is constantly evolving, it can be somewhat difficult to understand what can motivate your base to take advantage of your services and products. Luckily, the findings below, from five separate studies conducted by online travel news source EyeforTravel, will help you glean a better understanding of individuals’ purchasing behavior.

EyeforTravel examined the habits of 8,400 travelers from the United States, United Kingdom, France and the Netherlands over an 18-month period. 

Here are some of the major findings regarding when people book trips:

  • Booking travel at the last minute has become increasingly popular.
  • However, residents of the Netherlands have proved to procrastinate the least. Seventy-three percent of Dutch residents make their travel plans at least one month in advance.

When it comes to how the participants booked their trips, EyeforTravel discovered that:

  • Fifty-eight percent of people in the U.S. reserve travel using online travel agents like Expedia, Orbtiz and Travelocity.
  • Sixty-eight percent of Dutch individuals tend to make plans by paying the travel supplier directly.

Something else you should consider if you work in the travel industry is that only 27 percent of participants thought that travel websites were user-friendly. Thirty-three percent thought that these sites could be improved.

If you work in the travel or hospitality industry and want to capitalize on the statistics above, then consider contacting internet advertising agencies. You may want to ask about how these firms can redesign your business’ website and even help with ad production so that consumers stay loyal to you instead of purchasing services from other companies.