Mark Zuckerberg via Facebook launched a new

media platform where you didn’t need to have

a big ad budget or expensive PR firm to get

your name out there, while YouTube enabled

everyone to become the star of their own videos,

and Instagram provided a free platform to post

beautiful travel photography only previously

seen in glossy magazines.

With nearly 2.5 billion social media users online,

travel agency owners and individual advisors

have recognized the opportunities to cost-

effectively use these platforms to compete for

customers beyond their localities, while building

their brands, positioning themselves as experts

and enhancing relationships and business with

current patrons.

In this landmark survey, close to 1,000 readers

of Travel Market Report responded to an online

questionnaire via SurveyMonkey.

INTRODUCTION

When Steve Jobs created the smartphone, he built a platform for travel advisors that cut the

cord that for more than 30 years tethered them to those CRTs with blinking green screens.

At the same time search engines such as Google were bringing a world of information to

the fingertips of consumers in mere seconds – too much information to be useful. Search for

“travel” on Google and you will get 4.9 billion results. Even a more targeted search for “Los

Cabos luxury hotels” brings back 6.3 million results while “Best Caribbean cruises” brings

back 181 million options!

Travel Market Report

surveyed travel agents who read its

daily newsletter via email at the end of September 2018. A

total of 945 agents responded to the survey providing a +/-

confidence rate of three points. As a screening question,

agents were asked, “Do you or does your agency use social

media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, etc.) for

business?” The 15% of agents who answered negatively

were excluded from further questions, providing a total of

801 participating agents.

Of the agents who participated, 52% identified

themselves as travel agent/advisors only, 36% said their

roles included both owner/manager and advisor, while

12% said their responsibilities were limited to ownership

or management. From there, 63% of the respondents

said they were answering the questions from the

perspective of their business social media in their roles as

advisors while 37% said they were answering from their

perspective of agency practices in their roles as owners or

managers of the agency. We highlight results where the

owner/manager agency perspective was different from

that of advisors and how they use social media for their

individual business needs.

The respondent profile, namely TMR readers,

averages 12.8 years in the travel industry, $1.3 million

in annual personal leisure travel sales, with 92% saying

they sell with a focus on tours and vacation packages,

84% selling cruises, as well as a strong focus on FIT

vacations (63%), family travel (54%), group (53%), luxury

(51%), weddings and honeymoons (39%) and adventure

travel (30%).An incentive of two $250 gift cards was

offered for participation.

Who answered our survey?

CHART 1

|

7

TMR SOCIAL MEDIA SURVEY RESPONDENTS AVERAGE:

84

%

SELL CRUISES

TRAVEL INDUSTRY

12.8

YEARS

in the

focus on

TOURS &

VACATION PACKAGES

92

%

$

1

.

3

MILLION

in annual

PERSONAL LEISURE

TRAVEL SALES