New research from Propellic shows that travel operators pay too much for customer acquisition during peak bookings | News
Propellic, the leading full-service travel marketing agency, today released its Propellic Travel Industry Paid Media Benchmark Report, which provides a comprehensive analysis of travel advertising performance in the global travel industry.
The report, which is based on more than $250 million in observed ad spend across more than 120 travel brands, shows that tour operators often pay premium advertising fees during peak booking periods for travelers who switch. This points to a structural inefficiency in travel marketing that is still largely under-optimized.
According to Propellic, peak season campaigns deliver an average ROAS (Return on Ad Spend) of 2.6x, while low season campaigns achieve an average ROAS (Return on Ad Spend) of 6.3x. In other words, brands achieve more than double returns during periods of lower demand.
The research also shows that travelers who book during low season spend within a range of 5% of travelers who book during peak periods. This indicates that operators are not selling cheaper products during these periods, but rather the same type of trips to similar customers at a significantly lower purchase cost.
This inefficiency is especially pronounced in the multi-day travel segment due to longer booking periods. Multi-day travel purchases often involve weeks or months of research, comparison and consultation before conversion. As a result, brands are essentially paying peak season premiums for clicks that don’t convert any faster than cheaper traffic generated during slower periods.
“Imagine July, when 50 tour operators are bidding on the same keyword, such as ‘Kenya safari tours.’ A click that cost $3 in February may cost $11 during peak season, but it is no more likely that the traveler will switch immediately,” said John Matson, Chief Revenue Officer at Propellic. “The longer the cooling-off period, the more auction premiums in the high season become detached from the actual booking results.”
Key findings also include:
● Travel sector performance varies significantly by category: the performance gap between average operators and top-performing brands is 68% across OTAs and marketplaces, 31% across day trips and experiences, and just 4% across multi-day trips.
● Non-branded searches dominate spend but underperform in attribution models: In travel, 83-90% of paid media budgets are allocated to non-branded search terms, yet these campaigns generate disproportionately fewer attributed conversions. On multi-day trips, non-branded campaigns account for approximately 90% of spend but only 74% of attributed conversions, indicating a measurement gap between early-funnel activity and ultimate conversion tracking.
● Many travel brands underestimate top-of-funnel campaigns: According to the report, attribution systems often overestimate brand searches while failing to capture the influence of previous non-brand discovery touchpoints.
“The brands that outperform the competition are not necessarily spending more aggressively, but rather implementing a more sophisticated attribution infrastructure capable of measuring the entire customer journey across discovery, consideration and conversion,” Matson concludes.
Outlook 2026: Geopolitical instability changes travel demand and paid media efficiency
Looking ahead to 2026, Propellic highlights that geopolitical instability is shifting demand to perceived safer destinations on shorter distances, while persistent inflation and rising fuel costs are driving up travel prices and lengthening booking cycles. Together, these factors widen the gap between peak demand and actual conversion efficiency.
At the same time, increased health and safety sensitivity is driving increased volatility in segments like outdoor and adventure travel, while AI-driven search disruptions and the rise of zero-click experiences are reducing the number of available discovery touchpoints and intensifying competition for paid inventory, resulting in higher CPCs across the industry.
The full Travel Paid Media Benchmark Report 2025 is available at propellic.com/research.
