The importance of price transparency can’t be overstated and the travel trade will benefit from being clearer in their communication
By addressing consumer trust gaps in price transparency, COVID-19 health and safety measures, data privacy and information credibility, according to new independent research commissioned by worldwide leader in travel retail, Travelport.
The Four Trust Gaps
Price Transparency
The study of 11,000 travelers across 10 countries was conducted by Edelman Data & Intelligence (DxI), the research and analytics arm of Edelman, which has studied trust for over 20 years through the Edelman Trust Barometer. It revealed the two most important factors in building consumer trust in travel agencies and travel suppliers, such as airlines, are having ‘no hidden costs’ (55%) and ‘fully flexible or refundable products’ (45%). Unfortunately, most travelers currently deem industry performance in both of these areas to be poor (60% and 57% respectively)[1]. Travelers in New Zealand and Australia were shown to be the most disappointed on this point, with a significant 40 and 39 percentage point gap between importance and performance.
COVID-19 Health & Safety
The majority (56%) of travelers that participated in the study said the travel industry has done well in implementing COVID-19 health and safety measures. Going forward, however, around half said they would like more reassurance on how robustly some measures are being enforced, in particular, improved air filtration, social distancing and managed boarding and queuing[2].
Data Privacy
Data privacy was another key issue highlighted by the research. Only four out of ten travelers (40%) reported that they currently trust travel companies to use their personal information in the right way. This was especially apparent among Baby Boomers (33%) and Gen Z (36%) respondents.
When it comes to using information to personalize experiences, travelers said they are most comfortable with companies using data that they have actively shared with them through one-to-one conversations (46%), past booking behavior (46%) and loyalty activity (44%). They are less comfortable, however, when information is sourced indirectly, for example, through social media activity (35%), public records like credit scores (37%) and past shopping, search and booking behavior with other companies (40%).
Information Credibility
According to the research, the most trusted sources of travel-related information that travelers use when researching a trip are those perceived to have aligned interests: friends and family (67%) and review websites (50%). In contrast, the least trusted are those with a clear vested interest in selling, such as social media influencers (30%) and celebrities (25%). Once again, Gen Z was revealed to be the least trusting in almost every category[3].
A similar story played out when examining trust in different types of travel-related information[4]. Customer ratings (54%) and written customer reviews (51%) are among the most trusted.
Third-party certification (39%), photos of products such as hotel rooms provided by travel companies (42%) and third-party ratings such as hotel star systems (43%) were revealed to be the least trusted.
Enabling Retail
In addition to identifying gaps in trust, the research also uncovered evidence that trust directly influences purchasing behavior. Due to COVID-19, almost half (46%) of travelers today, for example, were shown to prioritize trust over all other factors when choosing a travel supplier. Many travelers also stated, when trust is in place, they will consider purchasing multiple travel-related items (48%), upgrading their package (43%) and buying non-travel-related items such as credit cards (34%).
Trust combined with cutting-edge technology and effective sales, it becomes a powerful proposition.
