photorandy2023 The Traveler

Chapter Thirty-Five–How Social Media Has Affected Travel

From researching destinations to booking flights and hotels, social media has become an integral part of the travel experience for millions of people around the world. Not only do travelers find inspiration on Instagram and TikTok and check reviews on Facebook, but they also use the same platforms to book their hotels and activities.

Social media has changed the way people approach their trip planning. According to Statista, 36.5% of travelers said they used social media to find travel inspiration or ideas. The trend is more prevalent among young travelers. About 60% of Generation Zers and 40% of millennials report they use social media for travel purposes.

Many of these travelers might plan entire trips around specific destinations or activities they found on social media — especially if they saw it on their favorite influencer’s profile. Instagram and Facebook are especially influential platforms — 46% of Gen Z travelers say Instagram influences their travel decisions, while 50% say Facebook posts do the trick.

This is because there’s an abundant amount of travel content available online. Many travelers find that sharing vacation photos on social media is an essential part of their trip. In fact, 90% of millennials share photos while they’re on vacation. The “#travel” hashtag alone has over 670 million posts on Instagram.

Social media has revolutionized the way travel brands reach and engage with their customers — and in turn, changing the way those customers research and book their trips.

How social media has changed the way people research and book travel

In the past, travelers would rely on travel agents, guidebooks, and brochures to plan their trips. Now, travelers are much more likely to use visual social media platforms like Instagram and Facebook to find destination inspiration, research hotels, and plan activities.

A customer might come across a unique hotel on Instagram and add it to a “bucket list” folder. By the time they’re ready to plan a trip, they might plan an entire vacation centered on staying at that one hotel.

When travelers are ready to book, social media has also made it easier for them to do so. Now, customers can click on a tour operator’s website from Instagram and book an excursion right then and there, without ever having to switch devices.

The impact of user-generated content and reviews on consumer decision making

All your customers will likely look up reviews before booking with you. In fact, 98% of people say they read online reviews for local businesses.

Outside of standard review platforms, 35% of consumers use YouTube to find information about local businesses, 32% use Instagram, 20% use TikTok, and 35% consult local news outlets.

Reviews are just one form of user-generated content (UGC) that helps influence a customer’s decision to book. Photos and comments shared on social media allow travelers to view the real-life experiences of others, giving them the confidence to book.

Your customers are more likely to trust information that comes from other customers rather than your brand. UGC and reviews provide an authentic, unbiased perspective that can help with their decision-making

The importance of having a strong online presence as a tour business

Whether they’re checking a review platform or TikTok, the internet is often the first place your customers go to research and book travel. 

Having a strong online presence can help your tour business reach a wider audience, build brand awareness, and increase bookings.

Through search engine optimization (SEO), social media marketing, and online advertising you can reach customers in all stages of their planning process. You can attract them to your social media pages when they’re finding inspiration and bring them to your website when they’re ready to book.

Moreso, having a strong online presence helps you establish credibility in your niche. Your website and social media platforms give you space to display customer reviews, awards, and certifications to build trust with potential customers.

And this can all give you a competitive advantage over other operators in your field. Tour businesses that invest in their online presence can differentiate themselves from competitors and attract more customers.

How tours and attractions can capitalize on social media’s rising influence on travel

Here are some of the most common ways that travel and tourism brands capitalize on social media:

Let’s explore the different ways your travel brand can capitalize on social media’s rising influencer on travel.

Establish a consistent presence on any social media channels where your ideal customers hang out

If your customers are finding travel inspiration online, you want to find out what platforms they’re hanging out on.

It might help to create a buyer persona, which is a detailed description of someone who represents your target customer. Your buyer persona should include audience characteristics like location, age, travel preferences, and where they get their travel information.

You should post consistently and engage with your customers on the channels they use the most.

Create engaging content that resonates with customers

What kind of content should you post? Here are a few tips to help you build a strong social media presence that attracts the right customers and drives more bookings:

  • Know your audience: As we mentioned above, knowing your audience is key to building a strong online presence. Building a buyer persona will help you understand what kind of experiences your customers are looking for and what motivates them to book. Then, you can create content that fits within those boundaries.
  • Use visuals: Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok are visual platforms. Some travelers may prefer to learn about your brand through visuals over long blog posts or articles on Google. This is because photo and video content is engaging, easy to consume, and shareable.
  • Tell a story: A compelling narrative is a great way to capture your audience’s attention. Consider sharing behind-the-scenes content or customer anecdotes to connect with your audience on an emotional level.
  • Be authentic: Social media is a great place to make your brand’s personality shine through. Show your customers that you’re more than just a faceless logo. Write captions that reflect your brand’s values, use humor when relevant, and interact with customers in a genuine way.

Leverage UGC from customers

There are endless ways to leverage UGC from customers, including:

  • Displaying positive reviews on your home page 
  • Reposting positive reviews on social media
  • Encouraging users to share their photos or videos with a special hashtag on Instagram
  • Sharing customer photos on Instagram and Facebook
  • Displaying happy customer photos on your website
  • Using positive feedback and/or ratings in an advertising campaign

Get more reviews and UGC content on social media

Getting more reviews on social media can help improve your online reputation.

Let’s say that most of your customers find you through Facebook, so you want to build up your review pool on the platform. 

The first step would be to provide clear instructions on how to leave a review on your Facebook page. After a customer joins you for a tour, don’t be afraid to ask them to leave a review. At this point, make sure to include a link to your Facebook profile to make it as easy for them as possible.

When you receive a positive review, don’t hesitate to share it on your social media profiles and website. This can help build social proof and encourage more customers to leave reviews.

Responding to both positive and negative reviews also shows customers that you value their feedback and are committed to providing excellent customer service. Customers will be more included to leave reviews for a company that appreciates their feedback than one that ignores them.

Organic vs. Paid Social: When to use each one

Organic social media refers to the free, non-paid content that travel brands post on their social media accounts. This kind of content is used to build brand awareness, engage with followers, and foster a community around your brand.

It’s best used when a business wants to establish a strong social media presence and build long-term relationships with its audience.

On the other hand, paid social media ads are sponsored posts or advertisements that you would pay for on social media platforms. This strategy is great for increasing your reach, driving customers back to your website, and generating new leads and bookings.

Paid ads are best used when a business wants to achieve specific marketing objectives, such as promoting a new tour or targeting a specific audience.

The best approach depends on your tour business’s specific goals.

In many cases, a combination of organic and paid social media may be the most effective strategy.

Social media has revolutionized travel, acting as a powerful source of inspiration, a tool for planning, and a platform for sharing experiences, significantly influencing how people discover, plan, and experience travel. 

Here’s a more detailed look at how social media has impacted travel:

  • Inspiration and Destination Discovery:Social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok have become go-to sources for travelers to find inspiration and discover new destinations and unique experiences. 
  • Trip Planning:Social media facilitates trip planning by allowing users to research, book, and manage their itineraries seamlessly, with integrated booking features and targeted ads. 
  • User-Generated Content and Reviews:Travelers can access firsthand accounts and authentic feedback from fellow travelers, which helps them make informed choices and shape travel decisions. 
  • Influencer Marketing:Social media influencers have become a driving force in the travel industry, with their recommendations influencing travel decisions, especially for Gen Z and luxury travelers. 
  • Direct Communication and Feedback:Social media platforms enable direct communication between travelers and tourism businesses, allowing for immediate feedback and personalized interactions. 
  • Booking and Deals:Social media has made it easier to book travel, with platforms offering exclusive deals, promotions, and streamlined booking processes. 
  • Sharing Experiences:Social media allows travelers to share their experiences, photos, and videos, creating a sense of community and inspiring others to travel. 

Social media, while inspiring travel, can negatively impact the travel experience by contributing to overtourism, leading to overcrowding, unrealistic expectations, and a focus on documenting rather than experiencing. 

Here’s a more detailed look at how social media can negatively affect travel:

Overtourism and Crowding:

  • Increased Popularity:Social media platforms, especially Instagram, have made it easy for destinations to become “trending” and attract large numbers of visitors, leading to overcrowding.
  • Overwhelmed Infrastructure:Popular destinations, once able to handle a manageable number of tourists, are now struggling with infrastructure issues like traffic congestion, garbage problems, and strained public transport.
  • Loss of Authenticity:Overcrowding can diminish the authenticity of a place, making it feel less unique and more like a tourist trap. 

Unrealistic Expectations and Superficial Experiences:

  • “Instagrammable” Focus:The pressure to capture perfect photos for social media can lead travelers to prioritize finding the best photo spots over experiencing the local culture or enjoying the moment. 
  • Focus on “Likes” over Experience:Some travelers become more concerned with documenting their experiences for social media validation rather than fully immersing themselves in the destination. 
  • Following Trends:The pressure to follow popular hashtags and trends can lead people to overcrowded tourist spots, rather than exploring less-known but equally beautiful places. 

Impact on Local Communities:

  • Disruption of Everyday Life:The influx of tourists can disrupt the daily lives of locals, leading to increased noise, traffic, and litter. 
  • Rising Costs:Increased demand can lead to higher prices for accommodation, food, and other services, making travel less accessible for locals and budget travelers. 
  • Environmental Damage:Overcrowding can also lead to environmental damage, such as pollution and resource depletion. 

Other Negative Impacts:

  • Misinformation:Social media can be used to spread misinformation about destinations, which can deter travelers and negatively impact the tourism industry. 
  • Privacy Concerns:Companies need to be aware that privacy laws vary from country to country and that user data can be collected and used for marketing purposes. 
  • Alienation from the Environment:When travelers are more focused on their devices than the destination, they can become alienated from their surroundings. 

How Social Media Is Ruining Travel — and Why We Should All Care

The never-ending quest for posting the best photo of your vacation is causing more problems than you can imagine

By Hudson Lindenberger 

Somewhere along the way, we forgot why we travel. It wasn’t that long ago when a vacation meant disconnecting, immersing yourself in a new culture and embracing the unknown. Now, often, it’s just another photo shoot. Our social media feeds, especially Instagram, are filled with sun-kissed influencers perched precariously on cliff edges or lounging on pristine beaches, seeking the perfect shot to rack up likes. 

But behind those filtered images is a less glamorous reality: over-tourism, shallow experiences and disrespectful behavior. The magic of travel is slowly being eroded, one selfie at a time. Let’s call it the “Instagram effect.”

A 2023 study published by Statista found that social media platforms, especially Instagram, have profoundly influenced travel behavior. More than 75% of travelers look to their social media channels for inspiration, and almost 50% travel to destinations to show them off on their feeds. That has led to crowds overflowing in picture-perfect spots like Athens, Venice and Bali, all searching for the perfect snapshot.   

That influx, in turn, is creating what we’ve come to know as overtourism, where destinations are being loved to death. Streets in places like Barcelona are packed year-round. Residents in many places that were once proud to showcase their cities to visitors are now fleeing, and their home cities have turned into backdrop sets. In fact, in some locations in Japan, selfies are being banned altogether to curb unruly behavior. Santorini and other idyllic spots have imposed restrictions on visitors who trample vineyards and disrupt everyday life to get their perfect photo. 

But it’s not just about crushing flora or clogging city streets. This obsession with capturing travel through a lens means people are often missing the bigger picture — literally and metaphorically. Travel used to be an experience of the senses, something that unfolded as you engaged with a new place, its smells, sounds and people. Yet today, a traveler is more likely to be glued to their phone, snapping photos of their every move, than connecting with the culture they’re in.

“Pulling your phone out almost instantly disconnects you from whatever setting you are in. It immediately demands your attention,” says Don George, a long-time travel journalist and editor at large for National Geographic. “When you are focused on shooting pictures on your phone, you miss so much of what’s happening around you. A selfie pretty much closes the door to a personal connection with people. It’s all about you.” 

Instead of being immersed in a new culture, many travelers are more concerned about framing the perfect shot for their followers back home. This shift has affected more than just the traveler. Once the heartbeat of a destination, locals now feel like they’ve been reduced to mere props for Instagram. George says it best: “These are everyday human beings going about doing their thing, yet more people than ever seem to feel that they are props for their photos.” In other words, the cultural richness of a destination is often lost on travelers who are too busy posing.

The recent rise of influencers has elevated this trend to dizzying heights. It’s not enough for some to travel — they need to be seen doing it, often to the detriment of the place they’re visiting. It’s as if influencers have become pseudo travel agents dictating where their followers should go and what they should do. In doing so, they perpetuate the cycle of overtourism as others seek to match their experiences online.  

While influencers are often seen as the main culprits, it’s not just them. Social media has bred a culture where everyone, not just those with millions of followers, feels the pressure to document every moment. We’ve all seen tourists perched precariously on cliffs for the sake of a selfie or those glued to their phones while standing in front of a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

But there’s more to the story. While social media may damage how we experience travel, there are growing signs of pushback. A recent Washington Post article highlighted how younger generations, including Gen Z, opt for disposable cameras instead of smartphones on their travels. There’s a reason behind this shift. The deliberate limitations of disposable cameras force you to be present, to wait before you capture a moment and to think twice about the value of your photo.

At its core, travel is meant to be a transformative experience, one that leaves you fuller than before you embarked upon it. 

“Travel forces you to be present and deal with new experiences, not siloed off only focusing on getting the next picture but instead engaging with the environment you are in,” says Rachel Levitt, the managing editor of Fodor’s Travel. “I think that because we in Western cultures feel an entitlement to the places we travel to, we often unknowingly exhibit bad behavior (antagonizing animals, damaging historic structures, being rude to residents). It’s something we need to be aware of and act to change. Too often, it is exhibited in our obsession to get the perfect picture regardless of the people and places around us.” 

We’ve reached a point where a significant percentage of tourists visit the same few destinations, clogging iconic landmarks like the Eiffel Tower or the Taj Mahal, while vast swathes of the world go unexplored. According to a recent report from McKinsey, 80% of travelers visit just 10% of the world’s tourist destinations. The world is vast, yet we’re all obsessed with the same few places, thanks to the viral images that flood our feeds.

So, what’s the solution? It starts with intention.

“I think there is something to be said with the fact that everybody has a camera in their pocket,” says JoAnna Haugen, an ethical marketing consultant and the founder of Rooted. “Everybody can take the photos; everybody can share the photos. But to what end — why are we doing that and why does that have to define our travel experience? If you are going somewhere just to grab some photos and then leave, why go?” 

This isn’t to say that photography doesn’t have a place in travel — it always has and always will. But there’s a difference between capturing a moment and letting the moment pass by because you’re too busy curating it for others. The true magic of travel is in those unfiltered moments that can’t be captured on the phone, let alone turned into a social media post. It’s in the interactions with locals, the spontaneous discoveries and the feeling of being in a place so different from home that it changes you.

Here are 10 expert tips on how to travel responsibly while still shooting some memorable shots. 

Shop local: Make sure your dollars have a local impact. According to Dr. Lauren Seigel, a senior lecturer and researcher on tourism at the University of Greenwich, many tourists spend their money at international chains and shops, which leads to the money immediately leaving the neighborhoods where they are located. She suggests seeking out local businesses to ensure they reap the benefits of your visit.

Show reality: Often, the stunning images that capture your attention online are not reality. Instead, they hide the crowds of people queuing to score their own human-free shot of an image they saw online. Haugen suggests posting pictures that show the reality of popular locations with chaos, crowds and trash to provide context to people looking at your feed.  

Captions: According to George, too often in our rush to post, we ignore one of the most important features offered in our social media platforms: the caption. Use it to turn your one-dimensional image into a three-dimensional adventure, building in a background to your shot and the people and places surrounding it. 

Go phone-free: George is a huge proponent of spending a day in a new place without your phone. It forces you to interact directly with residents and often leads you into unplanned adventures. If a whole day seems too much, start small. Leave it behind for a few hours or turn it off for half a day if you bring it along for emergencies. 

Research: Every individual I spoke to for this article stressed the importance of doing your research before heading somewhere. That means diving in deeper than someone’s post. Guidebooks, travel writers and online articles (Fodors‘ annual no-go list is a prime example) will give you a much more detailed picture of where you are headed, along with local customs, rules and a heads-up if they have any sustainability issues. Plus, visiting in the offseason is a boon for most spots. 

Obey local rules: There is a reason why localities post signs and impose rules on visitors. As guests in their homes, we should obey them and offer them the respect they are due. Don’t be that person who tramples someone’s flowerbed or hikes to the edge of the cliff, ignoring posted warnings. 

Ask permission: In today’s world, with the ability to instantly shoot an image, sometimes we forget that not everyone wants their picture shared with the world. Levitt suggests asking permission before you shoot pictures of individuals, especially children. It will go a long way towards cementing goodwill with residents. 

Rethink your geo-tagging: Just remember that it only takes one photo to change a place’s fortunes. Many experts argue that not specifically tagging a location can help keep a flood of visitors away. Haugen said that Jackson Hole, Wyoming, has been asking visitors to avoid specific locations and instead tag a general area to keep the pressures down on the wildlife and ecosystem. 

Go further afield: Everyone wants to see the Eiffel Tower; we get it, but realize there are 19 other arrondissements in Paris than the one where most tourists head. Go visit some of those to bring much-welcome spending power and experience a more realistic view of the city. Leavitt suggests applying this same mentality across the board and searching out the places where the crowds aren’t headed. The chances are high that you will shoot some amazing pictures and create your own adventure. 

You’re a guest: In today’s interconnected world, it’s often easy to forget that you are a guest in someone else’s home when traveling. Most of the biggest stories about lousy tourist behaviors come from people acting foolishly. When you are shooting a picture, don’t expect everyone to stop for you. George says always to remember that residents and other travelers are not there to cater to your picture-taking needs.