Have you ever wondered why your travel agency isn’t showing up on the first page of Google?
If you created your website in the past 10 years, it’s likely that you use ‘SEO’ [search engine optimisation] to increase your online visibility.
This strategy was widely considered fundamental to boosting engagement, often involving keywords that potential customers were likely to type when searching online.
However, the rise of AI is rapidly changing the game.
Artificial intelligence is now transforming SEO by powering search algorithms to understand the user’s intent better; for example, a query about an ‘adults-only luxury hotel’ would register the intent behind those words, and then match the request with properties that have descriptions like ‘romantic,’ ‘peaceful’ or ‘secluded.’
According to a new landmark study on AI by Spotlight Communications, advisors must adapt to keep up with this evolving technology in order to stay relevant to clients.
“Travel agents, as travel suppliers, are brands that must inspire trust and loyalty to stand out in the world of AI search,” said Lucy Clifton, founder of Spotlight Communications.
“Algorithms now read brand personalities so they should look to generate credible content that not only thoroughly answers questions, but ensures AI systems can quote their expertise!”
If you’ve ever wondered how to use AI to kickstart those bookings, here are four top tips.
Build authority
The first step to building authority is to get your name and brand out there in as many ways as you can.
When travel agents are mentioned in other forms of non-paid marketing, it increases reliability. This can include backlinks, quotes and citations. Research has suggested that algorithms favour credibility so coverage needs to be frequent in trusted sources.
Travel agents should focus on gaining coverage in a variety of sources such as press quotes, trusted backlinks, expert recommendations and client reviews.
Quotes and citations in non-paid forms of marketing would be helpful in establishing your brand. This could be in the form of writing opinion pieces in consumer magazines, writing hotel reviews for newspapers or writing guest posts for blogs.
Although the content might not necessarily be about your website, your brand can be plugged after the post or linked back to you after being quoted.
Make your site more ‘crawlable’
If you’ve ever seen those common ‘404’ errors when trying to access a website, you know the links are dead.
But what does it mean for your website when they pop up?
Having too many ‘404’ messages may lead to poor SEO (search engine optimisation) and clients won’t trust your brand leading to a reduction in bookings.
As your website needs to be easily interpreted by AI, fast speed and correct linking is integral. Bots should be able to navigate your site with ease so it can be indexed and ranked accordingly.
All the links on your site therefore need to strategically connect with each other, creating an authoritative crawl path. The sitemap shouldn’t contain any errors and outdated links should be removed.
The site formatting also needs to be as streamlined as possible so URLs shouldn’t be too long or difficult for bots to understand.
Use structured data
Do you know what structured data is and how you can use it to get your website to show up on Google?
If not, read on.
Structured data, which refers to how the content is formatted, is essential to AI visibility.
Search engines like Google prioritise structured data that clearly defines pricing, availability and customer ratings. This can also help generative AI produce accurate data.
Websites can use SEO HTML practices such as heading tags, bullet-pointed lists and comma-separated values in text.
This enables that data to pass through filters and validation, making the data easily auditable. Using structured data ensures that when AI pulls the information, it is correct and consistent.
For travel agents, this could mean dividing up sections of the landing page of your website with clear headings that lead on to different sections of the website.
You could categorise according to destination, holiday type or ways to travel. When listing inclusions on specific tours, you could use bullet points to structure this information.
Prioritise mobile optimisation
There has been a shift to reliance on mobile devices for travel bookings, with research by ATA finding that 54% of travellers are using apps to book directly with airlines.
More smartphone bookings mean your mobile website needs to be of the same standard as your desktop website. If your website refuses to load properly on your phone, users can get frustrated and move on to another agency.
