In the final part of our AI-driven personalization series, it’s essential to highlight some of the outdoor and travel brands that have launched successful campaigns, leveraging AI to achieve impressive marketing results.
These brands understood the benefits that were possible while staying mindful of the challenges.
This post is intended to inspire you to take the next steps in your AI marketing journey, which will always be a moving goal post. The key is to learn what works for brands similar to yours, so you can invest in strategies that yield results while adding your own flair, creativity, and unique offerings.
AI Personalization in Marketing and Real-World Applications
The internet is full of headlines that link the use of AI to travel and tourism applications.
When focusing on business travel, data shows that 44% of corporate travel managers believe AI will “have a significant effect on their programs” across the next five years, while 22% believe it will transform and reshape the industry at its core.
Six Flags: A Theme Park That Built an Industry-First Digital Assistant
Six Flags is an American amusement park company that has developed an AI-powered assistant to enhance customer service while advancing marketing objectives. This digital assistant can answer questions, helping guests plan their entire stay.
Capabilities across AI, analytics, and infrastructure are being implemented to enhance operations, personalization, and the overall customer experience. By collecting data for the company website, app, and sales platforms, it plans to make more informed decisions about guest experiences.
Hotelplan Suisse: An Evolving Use of Generative AI Solutions
Hotelplan Suisse is a prime example of a brand that sought to break free from the travel market, which is bogged down by mass tourism and a high prevalence of standardized package deals.
This travel company decided to build a chatbot using large language models to provide travelers with real-time, detailed information. If the chatbot was unable to answer questions, they were escalated to a travel expert. With each answer, the model improves, creating a feedback loop that enhances its future capabilities.
The brand is now taking this one step further, creating expert content at scale with generative AI. This content is AI-generated, but it is based on personal experiences from travelers at Hotelplan Suisse locations around the world, providing a more personalized and timely exploratory path tailored to traveler interests.
KAYAK: Predictive Analytics for Personalized Flight, Hotel, and Amenity Searches
KAYAK is a travel search engine that utilizes AI and machine learning to analyze vast amounts of data, providing personalized recommendations. Users receive personalized flight, hotel, and amenity searches. By utilizing an AI-powered price prediction model, the website enables travelers to determine the optimal time to purchase, ensuring greater value.
The company also uses first-party data for targeted advertising strategies on and off its platform. This data helps improve user experience while increasing conversion rates. For example, if a traveler often books four-star hotels, the search engine will prioritize those options in search results. Users may also see bundled offers that are personalized based on their preferences.
Travelers can also take advantage of KAYAK.ai — the brand’s game plan for the future of travel search.
Airbnb: Custom Lodging Options for Users
Airbnb is known for revolutionizing travel digital marketing through storytelling, focusing on creating personal experiences. This brand is heavily rooted in the experience-driven era within travel and tourism marketing.
The successful platform uses AI to personalize the user experience, matching travelers with ideal lodging options based on search behaviors, ratings, and past bookings. Meaning, search results are not static — they are customized to each user, as are descriptions, personalizing highlights based on the type of guest. For example, a business traveler may value high-speed internet, whereas a family may look for a yard, kitchen space, or pet-friendly accommodations.
The brand is now testing deeper AI-driven personalization, rebuilding its tech stack to focus on services and experiences.
Promoting Outdoor Activities and Destinations via VR
Virtual reality (VR) and AI technologies are taking outdoor brands to the next level, especially in terms of outdoor sports and travel-related activities. An example is the town of Sallanches in the French Alps. It uses VR for promotional campaigns, focusing on outdoor activities like paragliding and water sports.
Another is Lynchburg, Virginia, a city that’s using SportsVR and TourismVR to showcase its athletic facilities, attractions, and outdoor events. The city’s target audience is sports planners.
These examples provide personalized, immersive experiences.
Another example is when Paris used AR experiences in the Olympics app. Fans could explore landmarks in a more personal way — just as there are instances of 360-degree videos to let people “demo” vacation destination tours. For example, Visit Panama City Beach embraced VR with its innovative 360° virtual tour.
Successful Use Cases: Your Brand Could Be Next
Now is the time to start experimenting with AI, especially in terms of segmentation and personalized marketing. If you’re unsure where to start, Watauga Group would be happy to assist you in taking that initial step.