A new research report from Travelport has shown Aussie travellers are all over new technology like a rash.
Sorry for the gross analogy but it’s Monday and we couldn’t think of anything better.
Anyway, the Travelport 2018 Global Digital Traveller Survey revealed that 33 per cent of Australian travellers are using voice search – such as Apple’s Siri, Amazon’s Alexa and Google Assistant – to research travel and for a new technology it is already increasing its impact on users, with 17 per cent of respondents stating that voice search had the greatest influence when travelling.
Travelport’s managing director for Australia and New Zealand, Scott Barber, said its really only in the past year that the Aussie market has had these voice search products and they seem to be embracing them.
“What is most interesting from this research is that it points to a shift in travel behaviour; the embrace of voice, chatbots and even biometrics shows that travellers are happy to use digital tools alongside human touch points if it improves the overall experience and reduces annoyances like time spent waiting in line,” Barber said.
“As this technology matures over the next few years we’ll see a much difference travel experience.”
The research also found that travellers use around 8.3 apps while researching and booking parts of their trips, with 34 per cent using a digital wallet or payment app while travelling.
The most important features identified by leisure travellers in their travel apps are the ability to search & book flights (58 per cent) and real-time flight alerts throughout their journey (57 per cent) and a third of travellers find it painful and frustrating when they can’t access all of their booking information on their devices.
Despite Australia’s use of smartphones being one of the highest in the world, with smartphone penetration in Australia expected to surpass 90 per cent by the end of 2018, when it comes to booking travel 77 per cent are still using a desktop computer, compared to 16 per cent who are using mobile to book.
“Australia is an interesting market when you look at the global trends around mobile usage – despite such high penetration of smartphones in the market, we’re still seeing the majority of bookings being made on computers which are bucking the global trend in almost every other market we surveyed,” said Barber.
“But then we found that mobile is key for other elements of the journey, in fact 61 per cent of Australian travellers prefer seeing all their trip itinerary in one place on their phone and over half of all travellers said that they would be lost without their smartphone when they travel.”
