AI and Machine Learning in the Travel Industry – new global study

The Travel industry leans increasingly on ecommerce to sell. According to the report “Leading With Next-Generation Key Performance Indicators,” leaders in the travel sector use machine learning (ML) not only to improve business outcomes but also to redefine what those outcomes should be.

ML is helping travel marketers learn more about what outcomes should matter most – in particular about their customers much faster. ML is making travel marketing analytics more predictive. The recent global executive study of strategic measurement reveals 70% of marketing executives in travel have incentives or internal functional (marketing-specific) KPIs to encourage the adoption of ML technologies to drive marketing activities, and 79% report that they invest in new skills or training to make marketing more effective in its use of automation and ML.

Readers will recall that President Ramaphosa in this month’s SONA mentioned the need to promote more tourism and pointed out the advantages in the local economy. Tourism continues to grow strongly in SA, particularly from Asia.