We’ve seen this train coming for a long time: modern travelers have traded “why not?” for “is it worth it?” Gone are the days when travelers expected cheap thrills via their favorite discount airline; in fact, those discount airfares have largely disappeared. Travel today isn’t about doing more; it’s about choosing better. We are navigating an era of fewer travelers taking fewer trips, but with much higher expectations. AI is taking market share on vacation planners, social advocacy has usurped traditional SEO, and solo trips are the new babymoons. Meaning, as travel marketers, we have our work cut out for us.

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Our CMO, Kristina Canada, recently returned from Austin, Texas, after attending MediaPost’s Brand Insider Summit: Travel & Hospitality. Grounded in the theme “The Traveler Is in Charge Now: How to win loyalty in an era of choice, caution and culture,” the event brought together industry leaders to tackle what today’s traveler actually wants, the personalization and data infrastructure behind every great experience, and how loyalty gets built when points programs alone won’t cut it.

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Reflecting on three days of candid dialogue with brand marketers and media strategists, including our co-hosted roundtable on agency-client operating models and a keynote presentation alongside our partner Kim Salter from the Nassau & Paradise Island Promotion Board (NPI), a clear reality emerged: winning modern travel demand requires breaking out of traditional performance silos.

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When we pair our discussions in Austin with the freshly released findings from our 2026 MORE Intelligence Consumer Pulse Survey, three essential takeaways stand out for travel and hospitality CMOs setting their strategic focus for 2027:

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1. Own the Conversational "Why," but Build a Frictionless Validation Loop

Emerging media surfaces, specifically conversational AI environments, require a total shift in how we approach discovery. As we discussed during our Austin roundtable on approval loops and non-traditional channels, travelers are moving away from static keyword bidding ("Caribbean beach resort") toward describing complex contextual intent ("quiet luxury with direct flights and local culinary experiences").

Our latest research reinforces why this matters: 69% of luxury travelers say AI recommendations expand their consideration sets, introducing them to new brands that persuade them to switch. In fact, NPI put this into practice by testing early-stage conversational ad placements in ChatGPT, matching ads directly to context hints rather than broad keywords.

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However, AI is a tool for early idea generation, not final booking delegation. 98% of luxury travelers cross-check AI recommendations across traditional, human-validated sources before committing, with official brand websites remaining the #1 trusted destination for fact verification (58%).

So going into 2027, CMOs should ensure their brands deploy generative engine optimizations (GEO) alongside their SEO strategies to capture high-intent travelers at the exact moment they articulate why they want to travel. At the same time, ensure your official website and digital infrastructure offer frictionless, mirror-image confirmation of pricing, specs, and local experiences so you don't lose them during the mandatory cross-verification phase.

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2. Bridge High-Impact Offline Media with Dual-Screen Capture Nets

Standard digital feeds are increasingly noisy, expensive, and plagued by audience fatigue. In our Consumer Pulse Survey, 54% of luxury travelers report aggressively tuning out, skipping, or blocking digital ads due to relentless frequency and irrelevance.

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To overcome this, travel leaders must intercept consumers in receptive, low-clutter moments outside standard feeds. NPI demonstrated the power of this "tactile interception" in top feeder markets: by placing custom-branded NPI bags directly into Whole Foods Market/Amazon grocery deliveries in NYC and Miami and retargeting those exact households on Amazon Prime CTV, they generated a +167% search lift in Miami and a +100% web traffic lift in NYC. Similarly, deploying dynamic live-score DOOH billboards during major tournament windows drove a +110.5% search lift in Atlanta.

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The secret behind these activations is second-screen synchronization. 90% of luxury travelers regularly engage with a second screen while watching TV, and 36% immediately search for a brand on mobile after seeing its ad on a big screen. To make this happen, brands should avoid running high-impact offline, OOH, or streaming TV campaigns in an isolated vacuum. By pairing physical and streaming brand experiences directly with immediate digital capture nets on mobile, using deterministic household matching, CAPI integration, and aligned paid search, brands can convert second-screen attention instantly.

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3. Kill Last-Click Bias to Protect Upper-Funnel Incrementality

One of the loudest points of consensus from our Austin roundtable was that traditional operating models and last-click attribution metrics actively stall innovation. When every dollar must prove immediate day-one ROI against standard last-click performance benchmarks, brands systematically starve the upper-funnel bets that build long-term demand.

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This disconnect is particularly dangerous in today's economic climate. 53% of travel consumers report spending more time researching purchases before booking. Yet, financial discipline has become an act of personal agency: 64% of consumers explicitly state they will pay more if a purchase saves them time, stress, or hassle.

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As travelers become more selective and take longer to decide, judging media performance solely on the final click gives a false picture of what actually drives bookings. Furthermore, as highlighted across our summit discussions, testing emerging media requires a culture that treats failed tests as strategic intelligence, capturing learnings to continuously refine future predictive models.

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So lastly, but certainly not least, CMOs should establish dedicated "test-and-learn" budget allocations backed by fast-tracked internal approval loops across legal, brand, and procurement. Transition your organization from last-click reporting to modern, triangulated attribution frameworks, such as causal incrementality testing, to measure true baseline lift, justify non-standard media investments, and drive sustainable bottom-line growth.

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