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Beware of the quiet ones. Choice ran no US national TV ads in 2021 and Virgin Voyages was absent for the first seven months of last year. However, both brands rose to leadership positions in 2022.
Dennis Schaal
You couldn’t find a Choice Hotels national TV ad in the U.S. for all of 2021 and the first three and a half months of 2022, but then the Maryland-based franchisor moved past every other travel brand — not just hotels — to capture most of the voice for the first seven months of the year.
That’s the word from TV measurement and analytics firm iSpot.tv, which estimated that Choice Hotels commanded 7.19 percent of the voice among travel brands by TV ad impressions, which is when a user watches an ad.
Choice, according to a report by iSpot.tv, was edged out by Connecticut-based online travel agency Priceline (6.99 percent) and its Amsterdam-based sister company Booking.com (6.97 percent).
“From January 1 to July 31, TV and travel industry impressions grew 61.1 percent year-over-year, while estimated national TV ad spending doubled [130.3 percent] to $608.6 million,” said iSpot.tv.
Here were the top 10 most-watched travel brands on US national TV in the first seven months of 2022 by share of voice measured by impressions, according to iSpot.tv.
Here are iSpot.tv’s estimates of travel ad spending among the top 10 travel brands, as measured by TV ad impressions through the first seven months of 2022:
- Choice of Hotels: $23.0 million
- Price: $22.5 million
- Booking.com: $39.9 million
- Expedia: $48.1 million
- Disney World: $27.9 million (this is media value since it’s not paying full price to Disney networks)
- Trivago: $19.0 million
- Royal Caribbean: $41.3 million
- Vrbo: $31.1 million
- Airbnb: $52.0 million
- Celebrity Cruises: $11.6 million
As can be seen, iSpot.tv estimated that Airbnb was the biggest spender with $52 million among the top 10, but it came in ninth place in terms of impression sharing during the first seven months of 2022.
“Advertisers take a variety of approaches to TV depending on their goals and the pricing of the programming they want to focus on, so ad impressions and spend won’t always correlate,” said Tyler Bobin, a senior analyst at iSpot.tv. “For example, a large share of Airbnb impressions were during premium programming with major programs men’s college basketball (6.79 percent of ad impressions), NFL (4.7 percent), NBA (4.6 percent), American Idol (2.9 percent), This is us (2.4 percent) and Bachelor (2.3 percent).
Bobin said the major broadcast networks air these programs, sometimes in prime time, and they come at a higher cost, but the goal is to reach “large, engaged audiences that are less likely to interrupt commercials.”
With Choice catapulting to the largest share of voice among travel brands in the first seven months of the year, its ad called “Always a Reason to Book” generated 47.7 percent of Choice’s TV ad impressions from April 20, when Choice began running its first US national television commercial since 2020 through July 31, 2022.
Among other standouts in the first seven months of 2022 were online travel websites and cruise lines.
Booking Holdings’ brands Priceline (18.3 per cent) and Booking.com (18.25 per cent), essentially underdogs, dominated the online travel agency sector in the first seven months of 2022 in terms of ad impression share national television in the USA. according to iSpot.tv ratings. Booking Holdings sees Booking.com as its flagship brand and has worked hard for several years to increase its share of US travel bookings.
Booking.com focused on prime-time broadcasts, which generated almost a third (31 percent) of its ad impressions during the period, according to iSpot.tv.
Overall, among US travel industry advertisers, Fox News (6.18 percent) owns the highest share of TV ad impressions, followed by NBC (5.99 percent) and CNN (4.85 percent).
National Basketball Association (1.44 percent), National Football League (1.37 percent) and television series Friends (1.36 percent) were the top three programs when measured by TV ad impressions during the first seven months of 2022, iSpot.tv said.
After not sailing in 2020 when the pandemic wreaked havoc, cruise lines ramped up TV advertising again in the first seven months of 2022, although their spending was heaviest in the first three months. Royal Caribbean (24.98 percent), Celebrity Cruises (20.46 percent) and Virgin Voyages (15.93 percent) were the leaders in share of U.S. national television ad impressions from Jan. 1 to July 31, 2002, iSpot.tv found.
Like Choice Hotels, Virgin Voyages ran no US national TV ads in the first seven months of 2021, but grabbed a third of the ad impressions from January 1 to July 31, 2022 by running the most airings among any line navigation. Virgin Voyages focused on cable networks, which accounted for almost all (97.1 percent) of its ad impressions.
Among airlines, Southwest (41.76 percent) and Delta Air Lines (32.54 percent) were the top two generators of ad impressions during the first seven months of 2022, according to iSpot.tv estimates, and Turkish Airlines was a distant third (5.17 percent). .
Turkish Airlines focused its advertising on broadcasts during sports programs – it received more than half of its ad impressions during the February 13 Super Bowl in the US during broadcasts in English and Spanish.
Southwest focused its national U.S. television advertising on syndicated programming rather than new shows and events, iSpot.tv said.
Most Admired Ads
The most popular U.S. national TV commercials by travel companies during the first seven months of the year, according to Ace Metrix’s creative ratings polls, were Walt Disney World’s “Feel the Magic,” Royal Caribbean’s Rise to the Vacation – The Year of Yes , and sandals celebrating 40 years – drink.