New global study examines changing role of technology in travel

A new MMGY Travel Intelligence study examines technology’s growing impact on travel from two distinct perspectives: the traveler and the marketer

The comparative study, titled Emerging Technologies in Travel & Tourism™, explores innovations such as artificial intelligence, virtual assistants and augmented reality through the lens of the travel industry.

Key takeaways

• Overall, travelers are open to incorporating emerging technologies as part of the travel experience, especially for research and planning purposes;
• Travelers’ top three choices were the Internet of Things (47%), Virtual Assistants (41%) and Virtual Reality (17%). Destination marketers, on the other hand, were most enthusiastic about the prospects for Generative Artificial Intelligence (70%), Virtual Assistants (32%) and Augmented Reality (31%);
• Just over half of the DMO leaders surveyed said that they are already using Gen AI (56%) in their marketing efforts (most often for content management), and 46% are likely to use the technology to help make marketing decisions in the next year;
• For some, travel planning is an important and personal part of the process, and platforms such as Gen AI threaten to homogenize the experience;
• Three out of every 4 travelers surveyed expressed concern with protecting their personal data and privacy in relation to using new technology.

Purchase the study at MMGY Global