Travel advertisers on the Millennial Media mobile network are primarily using mobile advertising to drive downloads of their applications, according to the latest Scorecard for Mobile Advertising Reach and Targeting (SMART) report. Application downloads accounted for 59% of the post-click campaign action mix for travel advertisers in Q1, 17% points higher than the 42% average for the top 250 campaigns on the platform. The report notes that this desire for a sustained presence on consumers’ devices makes sense given the extent of travel research now being conducted on mobile phones. Indeed, April 2012 research from comScore revealed that 1 in 2 smartphone owners are now accessing travel-related content on their devices.
Other popular post-click actions in Q1 included enroll/join/subscribe (22%, far below the 34% average for all advertisers), mobile social media (20%, virtually on par with the 21% average), and site search (15%, slightly below the 19% average).
Sustained In-Market Presence the Top Campaign Goal
Given that many advertisers were pushing device owners to app downloads, it’s not surprising that the primary goal of their campaigns was sustained in-market presence, at 62% of the campaign goal mix, double the platform average for all advertisers. 16% of campaigns were dedicated to boosting site traffic (compared to just 3% for advertisers overall), and 11% to registrations (compared to the 25% average), though just 9% focused on brand awareness.
Booking Agents & Sites Dominate Campaigns
Meanwhile, booking agents and sites accounted for 57% share of travel campaigns run on the Millennial Media network in Q1, with these advertisers using mobile to promote getaway specials and trip ideas. Hotels, resorts, and cruise lines made up the next-largest share, at 18%, with these campaigns mostly focused on brand awareness or garnering immediate reservations via mobile apps.
The remaining share of the vertical mix was accounted for by airlines (11%), tourist attractions and destinations (9%), regional transit (buses and trains – 3%), and rental cars (2%).
Overall, in Q1, the travel vertical experienced a 200% year-over-year rise in ad spend (see link above), taking it to the third spot among the top 10 global advertising verticals on the network.
