State of Destination Marketing 2025
At a glance
What the report covers
Sojern's 2025 report examines the state of destination marketing through insights from nearly 200 global DMOs and industry experts. It explores the strategic, operational and technological challenges facing destination marketing organizations, including budget allocation, performance measurement, programmatic adoption and emerging tactics like always-on campaigns and AI-driven personalization. The report aims to equip DMOs with actionable insights and best practices for 2025.
Key findings
Budget resilience masks measurement gaps. According to the report, 85% of DMOs are either maintaining or increasing their digital advertising budgets, reflecting confidence in digital channels. However, this investment does not translate uniformly into confidence in outcomes: 54% struggle to demonstrate clear ROI, indicating a disconnect between spending and measurable results. This tension suggests budgets persist due to perceived necessity rather than proven performance.
Programmatic adoption outpaces analytical capability. The report finds 83% of respondents have adopted programmatic advertising, signalling industry-wide recognition of its efficiency and precision benefits. Yet this technological shift has not solved the underlying attribution problem. 37% cite tracking and attribution as significant challenges, suggesting that programmatic tools alone do not guarantee visibility into campaign impact across channels.
Metric misalignment undermines strategic clarity. The survey reveals 60% of DMOs prioritize clicks as their primary performance metric. This click-centric focus, common in digital marketing, may not reflect actual business outcomes such as bookings, visitor spend or destination engagement, contributing to the broader ROI demonstration challenge identified across the sector.
Personalization remains nascent despite technological readiness. Although programmatic and data infrastructure are widely deployed, only 15% of DMOs utilize advanced personalization techniques. This gap represents a substantial opportunity for differentiation, as personalized campaigns typically drive higher engagement and conversion rates than generic messaging.
Always-on campaigns gain traction as awareness tool. 52% of DMOs favour always-on marketing strategies rather than seasonal peaks, seeking to maintain brand presence and traveller consideration year-round. The report suggests these campaigns enhance brand awareness, implying that continuous messaging outperforms burst-based activity for top-of-mind positioning.
Key numbers
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Survey respondents (DMOs and industry experts) | nearly 200 |
Figures as published in the source; forecasts and survey results are labelled as such in the note.
Why it matters
DMOs & destinations
The report reveals a critical gap between investment and accountability. While 85% increase budgets, 54% cannot prove ROI—a risk in budget cycles. The low personalization adoption (15%) signals an untapped lever for competitive differentiation. Always-on campaigns (52% adoption) suggest a strategic shift away from seasonal marketing, requiring operational reorientation and continuous content production.
Hotels & hospitality
DMO marketing efforts directly affect hotel demand and booking patterns. The attribution and tracking challenges identified (37% citing difficulty) imply co-marketing partners struggle to quantify destination campaign impact on property performance. Hotels relying on DMO co-op or commission-based partnerships need clearer visibility into how destination investment drives incremental bookings and ROI.
Travel tech & distribution
The report highlights acute demand for better measurement and personalization solutions. 83% use programmatic tools yet 54% cannot demonstrate ROI, indicating that platform and data infrastructure alone are insufficient. Travel tech vendors addressing attribution gaps, audience segmentation and advanced personalization—especially for DMOs—have substantial market opportunity.
Methodology and limits
The report is based on a survey of nearly 200 destination marketing organizations globally, supplemented by expert interviews. Respondents were asked about budget allocation, performance metrics, technology adoption and marketing strategy preferences. The survey captures self-reported data on practices and challenges in 2025. This brief is based on the publicly available summary and landing page; the full report contents are behind a registration gate and not provided in the source text.
Official source
The report is © Sojern. This brief is an original editorial summary by TourismIntel — it quotes only figures published in the source and never reproduces the document.
Check the official statistics on Pulse
Related reports
A joint study by Mindtrip, Sabre, Sojern and MMGY Travel Intelligence reveals a significant gap between traveller AI adoption and destination marketing organisation readiness.
Sojern's Co-Op Marketing Guide for Destinations examines how destination marketing organisations can leverage collaborative marketing partnerships to recover from COVID-19 and optimise tourism spending.
Sojern's report examines Connected TV as a transformative channel for travel marketers, positioning it as a bridge between television's emotional engagement and programmatic advertising's precision.
Sojern's guide for hoteliers addresses website optimisation as a driver of direct bookings and profitability.