Destination Marketing Guide: Tips to Inspire, Connect, and Convert
At a glance
- Travel demand continues to rise globally, creating expanded opportunities for destination marketers to reach and influence potential visitors.
- Successful campaigns require reaching the right travellers at the right moment; timing and audience targeting are critical to conversion.
- Expedia Group offers research on traveller intent and behaviour to support data-driven decision-making in destination marketing campaigns.
- Full-funnel solutions combining ads, analysis and optimisation help DMOs tell their destination story across multiple planning stages.
What the report covers
This guide from Expedia Group addresses destination marketing strategy for DMOs of all sizes. It covers how to influence traveller behaviour, drive destination demand, and measure advertising impact. The report draws on Expedia's research into traveller intent and purchasing behaviour across key planning moments. It positions the company's full-funnel advertising solutions as tools to help destinations reach audiences early in the decision process and convert them into visitors.
Key findings
Traveller interests, influences and behaviours are continuously changing as travel demand rises globally. DMOs face the challenge of reaching the right audience at the right time, regardless of destination size. The report emphasises that successful campaigns depend on understanding what attracts travellers and when they are most receptive to messaging.
The guide highlights the importance of data and research in destination marketing. According to the material, key data and insights help marketers understand what travellers want, enabling more informed campaign decisions that deliver measurable impact. Expedia Group positions its traveller intent and behaviour research as unmatched in the industry.
Full-funnel solutions are presented as central to strategic storytelling. The report advocates using industry-leading solutions across the entire customer journey—from awareness through conversion—supported by end-to-end expert support in ad creation, analysis and ongoing optimisation.
The material references successful campaigns launched by DMOs partnering with Expedia Group Advertising, including VisitScotland's use of native advertising to attract US and European travellers, though specific results are not detailed in the available summary.
Why it matters
DMOs & destinations
This guide equips destination marketers with strategies to compete in a rising-demand environment by understanding traveller behaviour and timing campaigns effectively. Access to research on traveller intent allows DMOs to make informed decisions and measure advertising impact, essential for justifying marketing spend and optimising limited budgets.
Hotels & hospitality
Hotels benefit when DMO campaigns drive destination awareness and attract visitors. Understanding how travellers select destinations and what messaging resonates helps properties align with broader destination positioning. Data-driven destination marketing increases overall visitation, benefiting individual properties through higher occupancy.
Travel tech & distribution
Distribution platforms gain when destinations market effectively and drive demand. Full-funnel advertising solutions increase visibility and visitor volume, strengthening the pipeline of bookings. Access to traveller intent data enables platforms to refine targeting, improve campaign performance and demonstrate clear ROI to destination partners.
Methodology and limits
This brief is based on the publicly available summary of the destination marketing guide only. The source material does not specify the research methodology, sample size, fieldwork period or data collection method underlying Expedia Group's claims about traveller intent and behaviour. No primary research findings, survey results or statistical analysis are detailed in the available text. The guide functions primarily as a strategic resource and sales document rather than a research report with disclosed methodology.
Official source
The report is © Expedia Group. This brief is an original editorial summary by TourismIntel — it quotes only figures published in the source and never reproduces the document.
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Expedia Group's Unpack '24 report forecasts major travel trends for 2024 using 70 petabytes of platform data and a 20,000-respondent global survey. Set-jetting—travel inspired by television and film—dominates, with over half of travellers having booked screen-influenced trips.
Expedia Group's 2023 Traveler Value Index reveals that travel has re-established itself as a consumer priority post-pandemic, with 11,000 travellers and 1,100 industry professionals contributing insights across 11 markets.