Are People Really Booking Your B&B on Mobile?

It’s become a common theme for industry experts to advocate the advantages of mobile optimisation to accommodation providers.

Some relatively concrete facts have emerged in recent years, showing the growth of travelers using mobile to search, plan, and enrich their trips.

It should come as no surprise thanks to every consumer-based industry soon to be dominated by smartphones and applications. They’re seen as the technological way forward, giving society quicker and easier access to the services they want.

But how big is the impact? How fast is the growth? How many people are really booking your B&B on their mobile device? Here’s what we found…

10 fascinating mobile booking statistics

It turns out mobile usage by travelers is growing dramatically and while bookings themselves are increasing too, they’re not quite mirroring the exponential rise of search and planning.

1. Total internet time on mobile has grown from 12% to 51% from 2008 to 2015
2. 40% of Expedia’s traffic came from mobile devices
3. In 2015, 68% of emails were opened on a mobile device
4. Mobile bookings in travel have grown by 1700% between 2011 and 2015
5. While mobile bookings have grown in the past year, there was a decrease of 2% between the third and fourth quarter in 2015
6. Mobile now makes up 27% of all online travel bookings
7. 20% of online travel bookings worldwide occurred on a smartphone
8. Hotels account for 20% of all smartphone travel bookings
9. Some countries report a quadrupled number of mobile bookings since 2011
10. Smartphone bookings most common for travelers under the age of 44

There’s now enough data to definitively say mobile is having a significant effect on traveler booking behaviour, and it’s a trend that will continue to grow.

To make the transition as seamless as possible, small accommodation providers need to start focusing on mobile more than ever. Take a look at these strategies…

3 simple mobile booking strategies

1. All stages of the journey

Many users will jump from device to device as they find inspiration, conduct research, and eventually book a trip.

You have to assume any or all of this will be done via mobile so you must meet the needs of travelers.

You require rich content, concise information, visible rates, and a high SEO ranking.

2. Optimise your website

Your property’s website is often the most influencing factor for securing mobile bookings.

It needs to represent your brand and all necessary information in the same beautiful, but more condensed, way your desktop version does.

High resolution images, accurate repurposing of content, quick load times, and responsive web pages are all vital.

The easiest way to achieve this is to invest in technology that can quickly set up an optimised website which integrates seamlessly with a booking engine and front desk system.

For small accommodation providers, an all-in-one solution is usually the best option.

3. Steer into the curve

If mobile usage and bookings are on the rise, why not encourage even more by offering mobile-exclusive deals and promotions?

Not only will it entice travelers to make quick bookings but it will better allow you to track just how much traffic you receive via mobile.

At it’s most simplistic, adapting to the mobile wave sweeping the travel industry comes down to remaining consistent from desktop to mobile.

Give guests the same information and the same functionality from one device to another.

If you make booking on mobile as easy as it is on desktop, it’s likely you’ll see a higher total number of bookings over time.