Meet your next fastest growing segment in travel & tourism industry : the Millennials

After reading this article “6 Year Olds Are Better At Digital Than Adults” I started thinking about new digital generation and how technology is dominating our lives in every aspect. Digital arena is developing very quickly and every year there are new developments, therefore new generations are more digital savvy. The way we communicate is changed forever.

Who are the Millennials (also known as the Millennial Generation or Generation Y)? Generations born between 1980-2000, meaning that now they are aged between 14 and 34. They are tech savvy individuals now growing up and spending more which makes them fastest growing segment for travel and tourism industry. By the end of this post you should get a picture who the Millennials are how can their motivations and behaviors influence travel & tourism industry.

Technology savvy and the NOW! generation

The Millennials use technology much more than the older generations and they have much higher expectations. They want instant information and they are looking for new ways of entertainment all the time. That is why they are called “NOW! generation”. A lot of travel companies assume it is enough just to have a website to attract customers from this segment. They do not realize that a website can be counter-productive if it is not fast enough, doesn’t have relevant information or has outdated design.

The Millennials have high expectations from your website:

• fast loading time (everything under 4 sec is too long and will not keep their attention)
• clear and easy navigation (make sure that the first goal of your website should be usability)
• relevant and meaningful content that answers most (if not all) of their questions
• possibility of online bookings

They suffer from FOMO syndrome

FOMO syndrome (fear of missing out) is created for Millennial Generation and their social media presence, meaning they are really concerned that your friends or person sitting next to you is having more fun.

Millennials love to travel for leisure with friends and have a lot of fun. Millennials are highly influenced by word of mouth when it comes to deciding about next travel destination. Social media made this recommendations come in real time descriptions and experiences. Here is how tourism and tour operators can use this fact in their advantage:

• be present on major social media
• post real time photos of happy customers from different locations to make them interested to experience your product and services
• make sure that you have online booking software that can enable them to make booking right away
• enable mobile bookings for quick reservations

They want to be immersed in the local culture with an authentic local experience

Millennials love to travel and they travel quite lot, much more than generations before. They are also more educated than previous generation of Baby Boomers and they love to experiment. They want to learn something more while they travel and they have high appetite for trying new and exciting things. They prefer having personalized experiences inline with their character and interests. What tour operators can do to attract their attention:

• while making standardized tours, add some spice to the conventional tour set. Like for example: after visiting Louvre, go to taste local wine or try great local ice cream
• include in your offer non standardized activities from where they can choose. For example: bungee jumping, water skiing or zorb. Something new, exciting and something they never tried before.

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#travel, #tourism, #digital, #socialmedia, #millennials, #FOMO, #technology

Resources:

 What you need to know about the Millennial Mindset                                                          Know your next big customer: the Millennials                                                                    6 Year Olds Are Better At Digital Than Adults                                                                    New Study Sheds Light on Millennial Generation