Tag Archives: Sojern

Sojern and Profitroom announced a new collaboration. In today’s era, where hotels closely monitor their budgets, the collaboration aims to equip hotels worldwide with a powerful combination of advanced booking technology and data-driven marketing solutions. This will enable hoteliers to effortlessly reach travellers searching for a place to stay and drive direct bookings on their website, ultimately leading to increased revenue. “With travellers increasingly relying on multiple digital channels to discover, plan and book their trips, the hospitality industry is undergoing a profound shift,” said Josh Beckwith, Managing Director, Global Strategic Accounts and Partnerships, Sojern. “This collaboration between Sojern and Profitroom is perfectly timed to address the evolving needs of hoteliers of all sizes, helping them navigate the complex landscape of digital marketing and guest acquisition, and ultimately drive measurable results while boosting profitability. In an exciting year for Sojern, we are thrilled to partner with Profitroom to empower hotels with the tools and insights they need to succeed in today’s competitive market.” As a leading provider of hospitality technology solutions, Profitroom boasts one of the highest-converting booking engines on the market, complemented by powerful marketing automation tools, an advanced channel manager, and a website builder. By integrating these offerings with Sojern’s digital marketing capabilities, hoteliers can optimise their online presence, attract high-value guests, and streamline operations. Furthermore, Sojern recently introduced its suite of Guest Experience Solutions through the acquisition of VenueLytics. Sojern’s enhanced Travel Marketing Platform now enables hotels to engage with guests throughout their entire journey. “We are excited to join forces with Sojern and help hoteliers accelerate growth while increasing direct online revenue,” said Samantha Williams, Commercial Director, Profitroom. “By leveraging each other’s strengths, we will equip …

Sojern announced the acquisition of VenueLytics, the hospitality industry’s most integrated guest experience platform serving independent hotels, resorts, chains and casinos. Sojern will incorporate VenueLytics’ capabilities as an extension of the Sojern Travel Marketing Platform. Sojern has long been a direct bookings driver for hotels—providing comprehensive digital advertising solutions that help travel marketers find, attract and convert new travelers, re-activate existing guests to build loyalty, and maximize net revenue per available room (RevPAR). This acquisition expands Sojern’s Travel Marketing Platform to engage across the entire guest journey with VenueLytics’ cutting-edge technology that includes an Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered virtual concierge, real-time guest feedback and digital reputation management tools, and a guest marketing suite for email and text promotions. VenueLytics’ solutions help marketing, operations, and front-desk teams better serve their guests with less resources required, drive incremental revenue, and maximize profit. With these additional features, Sojern can now help marketers find, attract, convert and engage travelers throughout their journey. “This is an exciting step forward for our customers as we can empower hoteliers beyond advertising alone, expanding our offerings to be a true end-to-end marketing platform,” said Mark Rabe, CEO of Sojern. “We are dedicated to providing the travel industry with innovative solutions that leverage data, AI and technology to drive results. VenueLytics’ expertise in analyzing, unifying and activating data from various hotel management and marketing systems will allow Sojern to deepen our relationships in hospitality. This addition helps us to advance toward becoming the #1 travel marketing platform.”   One of VenueLytics key customers is Grupo Posadas, the largest hotel company in Mexico with over 180 resorts and hotels. Posadas Director of Quality, Standards and Innovation, Leslie Gomez, commented, “By using …

Sojern announces the latest version of its Sojern Travel Marketing Platform with enhanced Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered audiences. Sojern has leveraged its long-standing AI capabilities to provide expanded support for more than 10,000 travel marketers annually. Customers include hotels and resorts of all sizes, destinations, attractions and airlines. “Our customers needed to respond swiftly to the rapidly evolving digital marketing landscape, so during the pandemic, we expanded our automation and AI capabilities. It all begins with data, specifically the Sojern Traveler Ecosystem™, which powers our platform with billions of travel intent signals from thousands of travel brands in every corner of the globe,” said Kurt Weinsheimer, Chief Solutions Officer at Sojern. “While AI is making headlines now, we’ve been harnessing its capabilities for years and are excited to announce these new updates. We have competitors that are just now building AI functionality, and I can tell you firsthand that it takes several years to develop and refine the sophisticated AI models that power our platform. Our 15 years of experience and deep technological expertise gives us a significant advantage in delivering results with AI-powered audiences in the latest iteration of our Platform.” Sojern’s AI-powered audiences offer travel marketers a strategic advantage in optimizing their marketing investments. By leveraging AI technology, marketers can make informed decisions on resource allocation, effectively targeting the right customer segments for maximum return on investment and business impact. Through automated audience segmentation and optimization, brands engage with relevant audiences in real time, achieving greater precision, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness. In response to increasing demand for personalized experience, and 71% expressing their expectation of personalization from companies, Sojern’s data-driven approach enables brands to deliver highly tailored campaigns at scale …

Sojern shares its latest data highlighting that the Middle East continues to build on its strong 2022 travel momentum. With relatively quick bouncebacks from COVID-19 in the UAE, and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) seeking to secure its place on the tourist map with an ambitious visitor push, it’s looking like strong travel intent to the region will continue well into 2023. As of February, Sojern sees that 2023 flight searches are up year on year (YoY) globally; 72% from APAC, 48% from EMEA, 36% from US & Canada, 30% from LATAM and 23% from Caribbean. With last year’s FIFA World Cup boosting travel recovery in the region, Sojern looks at the current state of play for travel now that the tournament dust has settled. Demand for Regional Hotels Up on 2019 Levels in Many Middle Eastern Countries Several recent reports highlight that Middle East destinations are leading global travel recovery, in part boosted by Dubai’s 2020 Expo and last year’s World Cup. Sojern’s latest lodging data supports this positive picture and sees that 2023 interest from most origins to the region is high and even above January 2019 levels. Inbound travel demand from African, Asia-Pacific (APAC), and Latin American (LATAM) markets continue to grow with KSA showing one of the most marked increases in demand. The country sees a 541% increase in 2023 versus 2019 international lodging searches from Africa, 358% from Europe, 279% from LATAM, 251% from the United States and 2,547% from Canada. This uplift suggests that their tourist ambitions to draw 100 million visitors annually by the end of the decade appear to be off to a strong start. Qatar continues to ride the World Cup …

As summer begins in the GCC, Europe once again maintains its top spot as the most travelled destination. In a recent interview with Chris Gregory-Pasha, Senior Sales Director, MEA, Sojern shared, “As we move into the Q3 peak summer months we’re pleased to see travel confidence has regained in the region. For travellers from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and Bahrain, regional travel is proving popular to Istanbul, Dubai and Abu Dhabi, all appearing in the top five destinations across these markets. International travel is also making a strong return as destinations such as London – United Kingdom, Paris – France, and Bangkok – Thailand all appear in the top fifteen, with London the top destination. We know that the cosmopolitan cities of London and Paris with their historical sights, comfortable climates and some of the most sought after luxury brands in the world have long been favourites of regional travellers. With the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT)* working to strengthen Thailand’s presence as the preferred tourist destination among Middle East travellers, we also expect to see sustained interest in visiting the vibrant cities and beautiful beaches the ‘Land of Smiles’ has to offer.” He further reiterated, “looking at today’s traveller profile well over half of travellers from the UAE (72.7%), Saudi Arabia (55.9%), Kuwait (69.6%), Qatar (70.3%), Oman (71.1) and Bahrain (68.1%) are solo travellers, with an average across the six markets of 63.1%, with approximately 27.4% of people travelling as a family and 9.5% as a couple. We also see that the majority of trips are seven days or longer, with over 50% of trips coming out of the UAE (53.93%) and Kuwait (50.27%) 15 days or …

Sojern announced an extension of their partnership with the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi (DCT Abu Dhabi) to drive further traveller demand into the Emirate using its Co-Op Marketing Programme. Following a successful pilot of the joint marketing programme, which has reached more than 3 million people so far, Abu Dhabi hotels have been able to increase direct bookings through a highly targeted, digital display and social media advertising campaign. The hospitality industry has been heavily impacted by the pandemic but DCT Abu Dhabi has worked closely with the UAE government to launch a series of stimulus initiatives to support the recovery of the tourism industry. “We were looking for ways to support the hospitality industry and navigate the economic challenges presented by the pandemic, and the partnership with Sojern helps us do just that, by supporting hotels in Abu Dhabi to drive direct bookings and improve room profitability,” said HE Ali Hassan Al Shaiba, Executive Director of Tourism and Marketing at DCT Abu Dhabi. “DCT Abu Dhabi is committed to collaborative efforts between the private and public sectors within the local tourism industry to continuously support and drive tourism growth to the capital. Our efforts are aligned with the overall strategic objectives and vision — to support the evolution of Abu Dhabi into a world-class destination, while also reinforcing the capital’s position as a forward-thinking tourism destination.” Sojern’s Co-Op Marketing Programme is designed to help Destination Marketing Organisations (DMOs) and their partners increase the effectiveness of their marketing initiatives through collaboration, and drive revenue for the travel industry, at scale. “Hotels in Abu Dhabi were looking to improve their direct booking volumes and reduce commission from …

At Sojern we have access to real-time traveller audiences and unmatched visibility into global travel demand, we’re in a unique position to share the current travel trends at the forefront of marketers’ minds. In this we will take a look at the data in Middle East in order to aid travel marketers in their assessment of this worldwide event. They can use these trends to inform their marketing strategies during this period, as the industry stabilises. These insights are based on data collected on the November 10, 2020. We are reviewing our data on a regular basis in order to provide an accurate view of trends and patterns in consumer behaviour. Sojern’s insights are based on over 350 million traveller profiles and billions of travel intent signals, however it does not capture one hundred percent of the travel market. United Arab Emirates (UAE) residents from specific countries, and tourists entering Dubai, are required to present negative COVID‑19 Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) tests prior to their flight, or on arrival in the country. The uncertainty around travel, and the ever-changing restrictions as a result of the pandemic, continue to have a negative impact on the economy across the region. For instance, in the second quarter of 2020 the Saudi economy shrank by 7% and unemployment rose to 15.4%. It has been suggested that the Dubai economy may take until 2023 to recover to 2019 levels. In order to combat these negative figures Dubai has introduced a one-year remote working visa for tourists, and Bahrain plans to extend visit visas for free until January 2021.

Sojern announced the addition of metasearch to its multichannel digital marketing platform designed for hotels, attractions and destinations. Now travel marketers can access all major digital marketing channels from a single provider: metasearch, display, native, video, connected TV, search, and social. For more than a decade Sojern has built tools to help customers drive more direct bookings to their websites. Underpinned by proprietary data science and machine learning technology, Sojern’s Traveller Platform leverages travel data sourced from thousands of partners around the globe to provide unprecedented insight into the traveller path to purchase. This information is then used to optimise digital marketing campaigns in real time to reach travellers in the right channel at the right time. “Like everyone in travel, Sojern was significantly impacted by COVID-19. It hasn’t exactly been ‘down time’ for us, but we used the past few months to focus our business strategy and double-down on what’s working: building a robust suite of solutions to drive bookings for hotels, attractions and destinations,” said Kurt Weinsheimer, Chief Solutions Officer. “Putting it simply: We built the most intelligent multichannel digital marketing platform for travel in existence today.” “We believe travel will come back even stronger than before, so we’re investing now to make sure we can be the best partner to our customers worldwide long after the pandemic has ended,” said Goulden.

Sojern announced its Co-Op Marketing Program designed to help Destination Marketing Organisation (DMOs) drive traveller demand in Asia Pacific, Middle East and Europe. The program, which first launched in North America in September 2019, is also expanding in scope. Marketers at DMOs and their partner organisations can now reach customers directly with multichannel digital advertising across video, display, native, Facebook and Instagram. The COVID-19 pandemic has had a massive impact on travel and tourism. This program enables collaboration on digital marketing campaigns between the DMOs, hotels and attractions, to support market recovery together. Early adopter, Linn Totland, Head of B2C Marketing, Fjord Norway, said, “As a DMO, we have been looking for a solution that would make us better equipped to measure the direct impact of destination marketing on the bottom line for the tourism businesses in our region. The tourism industry has been massively affected by Covid-19, and now, more than ever, we need to make sure that our marketing budget is spent wisely and is generating a positive ROAS.” Venessa Chen, Regional Consumer Marketing Manager, Asia at Tourism New Zealand, said, “What sets Sojern apart from other display channels is its strong remarketing capabilities to drive conversions. During tactical campaigns, Sojern effectively remarkets to our audience, pulls them down the purchase funnel and delivers the highest conversions for us and our airline partners.” “With the industry now seeing some early signs of recovery as some destinations gradually re-open travel both domestically and regionally, coordinated cooperation between all industry stakeholders is needed now more than ever in order to build a more resilient, responsible, and sustainable travel and tourism industry,” said Dr. Mario Hardy, CEO, Pacific Asia Travel Association …

According to the latest Sojern report; there will undoubtedly be a continued increase in demand for inbound travel over the coming weeks as more restrictions have been lifted in UAE, Saudi Arabia, & Egypt. The reopening of recreational activities, summer camps, spas and massage centres, indoor theme parks, and sports facilities; and with a wealth of activities available to locals, residents, and tourists, and the country now being branded as ‘open’ will facilitate more tourists in the coming months. Saudi Arabia has recently announced Hajj health measures for pilgrims (domestic only), and travel to Abu Dhabi is still restricted, with proof of a negative COVID-19 test required to enter the Emirate. That said, global flight bookings to key MEA markets remain down year-over-year. However, we are beginning to see steady growth for Saudi bookings, and improvement in travel confidence to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Egypt. Commercial flights are set to resume from Kuwait International Airport from 1st August. Over the coming weeks and months, this will likely have a considerable impact on intent and confidence to travel to the country, as well as on outbound travel. It is important to note that although searches are increasing for trips in August, they are still down 39% on searches made at the same time last year. Locals are taking advantage of hotel facilities, and turning their 2020 trips into staycations. Domestic searches have risen by 32 points when indexed to 12th April – a low point in search and booking levels to the region. Domestic bookings have also grown considerably since this period. Unsurprisingly, international searches for UAE hotels continue to decline, but bookings have risen above the levels experienced …