Travelers are drawn to videos when choosing hotels according to hospitality experts, TravelClick; 'People trust videos more than photos when picking accommodation,' TravelClick's director of sales Andreas Von Ruemker, said at the ITB Convention in Berlin.
While pictures can be pretty, Ruemker says that videos are more engaging. When a hotel has a video playing at the top of its home screen, customers are more likely to stay on the site.
And when it comes to rooms, high-quality videos are even more important.
Ruemker said video was superior to photo when connecting with guests. He added, “When they watch a video of a room, they can really start to picture themselves in it and that is going to drive sales.”
He added that by 2018, 90 per cent of searches will be video and that early-adopter hotels will be rewarded for marketing and investments in video content.
“The sooner you integrate videos into the site, the sooner you start building your position on search engines,” Ruemker said. “The hotels we work with in Berlin and Paris come up first on Google video searches when you type in ‘Hotel Berlin’ or ‘Hotel Paris.’”
Furthermore, companies like TravelClick are striking deals with Facebook so that potential customers can select hotel dates on the social network.
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