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OTA’s spent $5.2B on marketing last quarter and are moving that money to social

Phocuswire this week reported on marketing spend in Q2 for the top 4 OTA’s in travel (Airbnb, BKG; Expedia; Trip) coming out of their earnings reports and that figure was a staggering $5.2B

From the Airbnb viewpoint, CEO Brian Chesky was quoted as saying: ““One of the things we're noticing is that a lot of travel is switching from desktop to mobile and from Google search to social media. And so increasingly, people are spending time on social media, and social media is gradually taking over as the number one place for travel search from Google. And travel is becoming more of an inspiration base than a high intent search based, destination platform,”

They are moving their money from TV ads to social so the can, as Ellie Mertz the company CFO put it, “continue to use performance marketing “surgically.””

There are a number of traditional ways you can attack social.

You can create your own corporate ads and then pay to get them seen
You can get a social native creator to create a dedicated piece of content and white label that as the ad and then pay to get it seen. This increases the authenticity.
You can do the same with an influencer who will then post it natively to their audience to give your brand social proof. This is both content & recommendation. If you are not happy with how many people saw it (largely out of the creators’ hands) you can then pay to boost it or white label it as an ad under the brand account.

Working with creators is work. You’ve got find them, vet them, negotiate with them, follow up on deliverables, measure outcomes. It’s a lot of work.

At Videreo we are looking at a 4th way where you can engage a number of relevant creators who will all tell the story of your brand in their own way but where you pay only on a CPM basis (cost per thousand views).

We find them.

We vet them.

The price is fixed. (It is cheaper than Meta charges you for CPM’s.)

We deliver the reporting.

Oh and we measure right through the funnel from awareness (views, likes) to consideration (how many customers put their hand up to want to hear more, how many took actions, how many shared this with their travel companions) and of course conversion – sales!

As they say – follow the money and social is where the big boys are moving it to. But do it smart.

Videreo is the place for brands and creators to meet & create a new sales pipeline together.

Contact me to learn how we can make this happen for you.

This content is provided by the (interim) newsletter sponsor Videreo.com

Will AI take your job? These guys think the answer is maybe…..

It’s not the subject many people want to talk about. Will AI take jobs? This post from Paul Roetzer gathered together the thoughts of some of the people prepared to say the hard thing out loud. Here is a summary:

“Artificial intelligence is going to replace literally half of all white-collar workers in the U.S. AI will leave a lot of white-collar people behind.” — Jim Farley, CEO, Ford – ouch.

It’s hard to know exactly where this nets out over time, but in the next few years, we expect that this will reduce our total corporate workforce as we get efficiency gains from using AI extensively across the company.” — Andy Jassy, CEO, Amazon

"We think that next year, 40% of the people at this conference will have an AI agent and the remaining 60% will be looking for work.” — Robert F. Smith, CEO, Vista Equity Partners`

Others like NVIDIA and EY see their workforce growing.

I think the most sensible thing presented in the post and something I know Paul himself is passionate about was this from Toby Lutke at Shopify: “Frankly, I don't think it's feasible to opt out of learning the skill of applying AI in your craft; you are welcome to try, but I want to be honest I cannot see this working out today, and definitely not tomorrow.”

As I continue to visit companies as part of the consulting, I do around getting companies up to speed on AI adoption in their business, I’d say I’m generally pretty worried by the current level of literacy I see in about 90% of people in those companies.

That number seems pretty consistent – and at least those companies have made some move by asking me to come in and its one of the first things we start working on.

I worry most for the employees in companies where the CEO or other decision makers are not subscribers to this or other AI newsletters, are not talking about it or thinking about it in their business. They are dragging their employees into the dark ages.

I think those mid office, mid-life and mid-career and particularly susceptible.

On that happy note…….

Practical AI tools and use cases for travel agents

Karryon are trying to do their bit to keep their core community of retail travel agents in Australia, updated.

They put out this week this free masterclass on practical, easy to get started, no technical knowledge required ways to help specifically in their job.

Tips included:

Weekly AI catch-ups ensure new material is fed into the system for improved future outputs.
Real-time document handling (PDFs, brochures) with speed-read, extract fine print, compare options, and generate tailored summaries.
Build topic-specific GPTs (e.g., Japan, family travel, luxury cruising) to serve as dedicated specialists.

Lots more in there. Get in there!

95% of AI pilots fail

We tackled this a little bit last week with our spotlight on our Marketplace with Ivan Verkalets but I saw this great piece in the Every newsletter that also came up with a theory.

The TL;DR is that people are rushing to extract value before the value is actually created.

High failure rate in AI adoption: A large majority of corporate AI initiatives stall or fail when pushed toward quick ROI.
Short-term ROI pressure as a root cause: Firms chase near-term metrics, which undermines long-term, scalable AI value.
Stag hunt dynamics: Individual incentives to harvest quick wins undermine collective, sustained AI progress.
Leverage points for transformation: Real change comes from deep systemic interventions rather than surface-level solutions.

I definitely think there is some merit in this, but I also think there is a gap in expectation around how far AI alone can get you right now versus the reality.

AI stuff is almost never production ready. You need to do things with it, via its API’s and tying it down, and adding your own data and lots of other things before its “ready”.

What it is absolutely ready for, right now is prototyping an idea in your head into a workable piece of software you can use to demonstrate the idea in your head rather than just talk about it.

Is that a failed pilot? Not in my book. Do all those ideas go to production? No. Is that failure? Also no.

If every Friday afternoon at your office is a few beers and an impromptu AI hackathon (or show your hack) then you are in a company that is heading in the opposite direction to failure IMO, even if only one or 2 of those ideas ever make it to production.

Frankly, that’s the company you should be hoping you work at.

Has Max Starkov been kidnapped or hacked?

I love following contrarians on LinkedIn as they keep you grounded in your own perspective and can jolt you out of your bubble. In the hotel industry, Max Starkov is my favourite.

At least once a week I’ll come across some post from Max reminding everyone of the teeny tiny % of traffic that LLM’s are sending to websites. Whilst he always stops short of suggesting AI is a crock, he is also generally far from bullish.

I nearly fell off my chair this week when I saw Max’s post explaining how AI agents are going to completely change everything for hotel booking.

“Within the current AI transformation, I believe Agentic AI will have the single biggest impact on the hospitality industry.”

“This isn’t about your “old fashioned” AI assistant – it’s about fully autonomous AI agents that perform complex tasks in real time, interface with other AI Agents, while taking into consideration their “masters’” personal preferences, likes and dislikes, travel history and past experiences, etc.

The booking path via the Personal AI Agent will be very simple: the traveler tasks via voice or typed prompts their AI Agent to find a hotel within certain parameters (location, dates, price range) and, based on all of their “master’s” preferences, the AI Agent finds and books the hotel and all necessary auxiliary services.”

I don’t know Max personally, but if you do, please check in he is OK.

Sabre partners with Travelin.ai

Sabre have partnered with Travelin.ai to help get their own AI innovations plugged into TMC’s, starting with Europe.

According to the article Travelin customers will have “access to the SabreMosaic Travel Marketplace, including traditional airfares, NDC offers, low-cost carrier content and lodging options, as well as Sabre’s Lodging AI capabilities.

They will also benefit from AI-powered capabilities that drive hotel attachment, as well as the ability to book leisure and corporate travel in one booking flow.

Sabre’s Lodging AI analyses property attributes, trip context and traveller preferences to give personalised accommodation options, recommend alternatives when a chosen hotel is sold out, and suggest accommodation when flights are booked without a hotel.”

Driving more accom sales (within policy) through this process rather than outside seems the end goal and that seems like a decent plan.

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Marketplace Spotlight: Propellic

Did you attend the webinar this week on the research done by Propellic and other partners on Google’s AI mode? I’m guessing a few of you did given it was the most clicked article in last weeks edition.

Now the webinar is over, the full report is also now out and you can find it here.

There was some good early news for suppliers who received the bulk of the recommendations direct from Google’s AI. But it wasn’t necessarily direct to the website…

You might want to make sure your Google business listing is very tidy, has the best pictures and videos and is chock full of amazing reviews……

If you have a B2B business underpinned by AI and looking for people to notice you, you can sign up to the marketplace for peanuts (top right corner, 5 mins, bring your logo).

I’ve priced for bootstrapped startups but also accepting larger companies too.

Google anti-trust findings and their effect on travel

Not really AI specific but also not something I heard or saw a lot about this week (despite its significance) was what the flow on effect of Google’s antitrust case finding might be for travel.

I found this article which painted a future rosy picture for the OTA’s.

“The 2025 Google antitrust ruling marks a pivotal, if incomplete, shift in the OTA landscape. By curbing Google’s exclusive control over search distribution, it has created opportunities for OTAs to diversify their traffic sources and reduce costs.”

The article explains further “Previously, Google’s exclusive contracts ensured its search engine remained the primary gateway for travel queries, effectively taxing OTAs for visibility. Now, OTAs can negotiate directly with OEMs to preinstall their apps and capture search traffic. For instance, Booking Holdings could pay Apple or Samsung to handle queries like “Hotels in Paris” without routing traffic through Google, bypassing the “Google tax” and reducing reliance on a single distribution channel.”

The article does actually touch into AI saying “The ruling’s data-sharing requirements could enable new entrants and AI-driven platforms to erode OTA margins. For example, generative AI tools like ChatGPT and Grok are already altering user behavior, with travelers using conversational interfaces to plan trips, bypassing traditional search engine. Meanwhile, hotels are leveraging direct bookings and social media to circumvent OTAs entirely, as seen in Booking Holdings’ own strategy to boost direct traffic.”

Bolding emphasis is my own.

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Most clicked last week was … I already spilled the beans on this!

That’s it – you’ve made it to the end of this edition. I’ll be putting the result of the most clicked post in next week’s edition so you can see where others are focusing. If I’ve missed something, you’ve got a tip or any feedback at all – you can simply reply to this email and it will come straight to me. I’m doing this for You so please don’t be shy to tell me what you think

Glossary

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Artificial intelligence leverages computers and machines to mimic the problem-solving and decision-making capabilities of the human mind. (source IBM)

Generative AI (GAI) is a type of AI powered by machine learning (ML) models that are trained on vast amounts of data and are used to produce new content, such as photos, text, code, images, and 3D renderings. (Source Amazon)

Large Language Model (LLM) is a specialized type of artificial intelligence (AI) that has been trained on vast amounts of text to understand existing content and generate original content.

ChatGPT – Open AI’s LLM; sometimes referred to by its series number GPT3; GPT3.5 or GPT4. These are used by Microsoft & Bing.

Gemini – Google’s suite of LLM.

If wanting to go even deeper into the AI lexicon – check out this handy guide created by Peter Syme for the tours & activity sector