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The study, entitled "Traveller's Road to Decision," revealed that users in both countries are tech savvy and rely on mobiles and videos when making travel decisions. It also provides in-depth data on the consumer behaviour of leisure, business and affluent travellers.
The survey was conducted offline via phone and face to face interviews during March and April 2013. Google researchers polled 1,000 consumers in both the UAE and Saudi Arabia, who have travelled at least once for business reasons or leisure within the past nine months.
Role of the web when it comes to travel
The initial finding from the study is that the web plays a key role in the decision-making process for both leisure and business travellers in the UAE and in KSA. Apart from direct advice from friends and family, the internet is the number one source for trip planning for more than a third of leisure travellers surveyed (39% UAE, 38% KSA). This number rises for business travellers - in the UAE it jumps to 50%, while in KSA it jumps to 48%.
What leisure users are doing online varies from Saudi to the Emirates. In Saudi, leisure travellers rely on social networks and search engines as sources of information; while in the UAE, they rely on search engines primarily, before online videos and maps as sources of information. This mirrors the US where search engines are the leading source for
information.
Travel is mobile
With smartphone ownership and improved connectivity continuing to grow rapidly in the region, it is no surprise that travellers are using their mobile devices when planning trips. Among those that use the internet to plan their travel, 48% have used their smartphone in the past year to engage in a travel related activity, rising to 69% for smartphones or tablets specifically.
Travel related activity includes everything from booking a flight or hotel, to writing reviews on travel sites; checking weather or maps for a travel destination, searching destinations, watching or posting travel videos among other online activities. Saudis lead the way with their mobile usage when it comes to travel - with 50% of travellers accessing the web through smartphones, while it's 35% in the UAE.
Travel industry must catch up with savvy mobile use of Gulf travellers
It is clear that the Middle East travel sector has a great opportunity to engage with mobile using customers. However, travel companies are currently missing out on the prospect to convert these mobile travellers into bookings. The survey showed that although travellers use mobile phones and smart devices to access the internet and research travel options, a very small number complete their booking via mobile devices due to issues with the sites they are accessing.
Across both UAE and KSA, the leading barrier to booking online cited by half of the respondents was that the websites were not mobile-ready - meaning the user experience was poor, the pages were hard to navigate through mobile device and difficult to read.
