• Clickatell recently released its Chat Commerce Trends Report: Travel Edition, looking at what customers desire from travel companies.
• The survey featured responses from 1 000 people in the US.
• It highlights the importance of mobile messaging among Gen Z, Millennial and Gen X customers.

The pandemic still remains a concern globally, but as lockdown restrictions continue to ease, more people are looking to travel. With this in mind, Clickatell recently released its Chat Commerce Trends Report: Travel Edition, with a specific focus on what customers desire most from travel companies.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, effective communication via mobile channels ranked highly among those surveyed, which is said to be 1 000 respondents in the US, according to Clickatell.

To that end, the survey found that 87 percent of consumers prefer to use mobile messaging to communicate with travel companies. While we do not have a breakdown in terms of the different age demographics of the respondents, it looks like this high percentage is driven by Gen Z, Millennial and Gen X consumers.

On top of this, outside of basic communication, messaging services should also be viewed as a key driver for personalised or tailored experiences, the survey found.

“Clickatell’s new research found widespread demand for personal and convenient customer experiences through messaging conversations, such as 92% of participants would like to use mobile messaging to interact with hotels, 89% would like to use mobile messaging to interact with airlines, and 85% would like to use mobile messaging to interact with rental car companies,” the company highlighted in a press release sent to Hypertext.

“Gen Z, Millennials and Gen X also all place mobile messaging as their top method of communication with travel brands, showcasing that younger generations are the most inclined to interact with brands via mobile,” it adds.

For those wanting to point to this survey being US-specific, a recent report from FNB also shows the value that Gen Z, Millennial and Gen X consumers place on mobile experiences.

Here the financial institution looked at its own data, noting that, “Millennials make up 64% of virtual card users and 57% of all digital payments. Gen X follows with 32% and 28% for virtual cards and all digital payments, respectively. Gen Z, those born between 1997 and 2012, are the third highest users of digital payments with 12%, but they lag Baby Boomers (born between 1946 and 1964) in the adoption of virtual cards.”

One of the other key findings, and one that Clickatell in particular highlighted, was the embracing of payments options via mobile.

“Travel companies are missing out on a unique application of the mobile messaging experience: payments. In fact, 73% of consumers indicated that they have never made a purchase via an SMS payment link,” the company points out.

“With 77% of consumers saying they’re willing to use a mobile payment link with travel brands, there is a major opportunity for airlines, hotels and rental car companies to enhance the travel experience and allow consumers to browse, purchase and track their travel plans all on their mobile phones. 81% of consumers would likely make a purchase via a payment link with any type of travel company, with hotel reservations topping the list (58%),” it continues.

With the smartphone being the primary screen for a high percentage of Gen X, Millennial and Gen Z consumers, travel companies wanting to make an impact, need to build more services to cater to such platforms.

You can download the Chat Commerce Trends Report: Travel Edition, as a PDF, here.

[Image – Provided]