AI-driven tools and strategies enable more precise targeting, personalisation, and optimisation of campaigns, so there has never been a better opportunity to reach travellers at every stage of their journey. 

Tools to embrace AI.

Our teams leverage several advanced AI-driven strategies to deliver better ROI and accelerate growth from paid advertising. Below are some of the standout approaches we recommend to elevate your campaign performance and drive impactful results.

1. Google Things To Do
2. Performance Max
3. Demand Gen
4. Meta Ads Advantage+

How to use Things to do to your advantage.

Maximise your SERP real estate: Things to do Ads occupy an incredibly privileged position on search results pages, often in the top carousel. Sources suggest that where a carousel serves, roughly one-third of traffic further down the page is lost. We recommend combining Things to do with paid search to dominate search and occupy a huge proportion of the SERP real estate.

Ensure your tracking is up to scratch: Things to do ads rely on signals and smart bidding with a Target ROAS bid strategy. Ensure your tracking is accurate as Google uses your conversion data to help you target high-intent users and hit your Target ROAS goals.

Partner with Google’s approved partners: We’ve found that direct integration with Google can be tricky for individual attractions. Instead of partnering with an online travel agent and paying commission, we’ve seen great success in using Google approved partners like ResPax or Magpie. These partners offer subscription-based services to easily manage your feed with no commission fees involved.

Capture local intent: With nearly half of Google searches having local intent, Things to do ads provide a cost-effective way to capture local traffic without the need to bid on expensive, broad keywords.

Optimise and test your feed: Experiment with high-quality images of your attractions to capture users' attention. Regularly test and optimise your creatives to find what resonates most with your audience and drives the best engagement.

Align your feed and landing pages: Ensure prices and information are consistent between your attraction feed and landing pages to avoid Google disapprovals. We’ve also found that including traveller ratings on your landing pages can boost credibility and improve click-through rates.

How to use Performance Max to your advantage.

Focus on high-intent users: Set clear conversion goals, such as bookings for a specific destination or service. For example, if you're offering Caribbean cruises, set your goal to track cruise bookings. Use Smart Bidding to target high-intent users who are actively searching for terms like "best Caribbean cruises" or are visiting comparison websites. Ensure your tracking is properly set up, and let Google’s AI adjust bids dynamically to reach users most likely to convert. 

Test Call To Actions: Test different calls to action to see which ones prompt more conversions. For example, test "Book Your Dream Vacation" against "Find Your Perfect Escape" to see which resonates better with your audience. Analyse the performance of your creatives and refine your ads regularly.

When creating your Performance Max ads, we’ve found that it’s important to:

• Suggest compelling headlines and descriptions to grab attention and highlight the unique selling points of your business.
• Include high-quality images. Visually appealing and professional images help make a strong impression and can lead to higher conversions.

If you're managing Hotels you can use Performance Max for travel goals campaigns and:

• Create your property lists directly in Google Ads or link a Hotel Centre account to access your existing property lists. This ensures that your ads are automatically populated with up-to-date property information. 
• Measure performance for each hotel in the campaign separately through property-specific reporting. This granular level of reporting helps you understand which properties are performing well and which may need adjustments.

How you can use Demand Gen to your advantage.

Audience insights: Use Google’s audience insights to build custom audiences who have previously interacted with your website, social media channels, or travel-related content. We’d recommend segmenting them based on specific travel interests like adventure, luxury, or eco-tourism, and then creating tailored ads for each segment.

Expand your reach with Lookalike Segments: Upload lists of past customers who booked specific hotels or trips, then create lookalike segments of similar prospects. Refine these segments with demographics (age, income, interests), location, and behavior signals—like recent searches for flights, destinations, or hotel deals—to reach high-intent travelers most likely to convert.

Leverage seasonal trends: Adjust your targeting based on seasonal and regional travel trends (e.g., summer vacations or ski trips) to capture high-intent traffic and conversions.

Maximise visual impact: Use Demand Gen’s emphasis on immersive visuals to showcase travel destinations with high-quality images and engaging videos. Focus on storytelling to create emotional connections and excitement.

How to use Meta Ads Advantage+ to your advantage. 

Set clear conversion goals: Define specific conversion goals for your travel campaigns, such as flight bookings, hotel reservations, or tour sign-ups. Clear objectives help Meta's AI focus on what matters most to your business.

Leverage Meta Ads Advantage+ for scale: If your campaigns already generate 50+ conversions weekly, activating Meta Ads Advantage+ can significantly amplify results. With a high-volume of conversions, the better Meta's AI and machine learning will be at ensuring your ads reach those most likely to convert.

Maintain fresh and engaging content: Regularly assess your top-performing offers and make adjustments to ad creatives, such as updating images, headlines, and call-to-action buttons, to keep content engaging. Fresh creatives help maintain audience interest, enhance click-through rates, and reduce ad fatigue over time.

Retarget previous visitors: Set up a retargeting campaign for users who visited your site or engaged with your content without booking. Use Advantage+ to reach these users with tailored ads that include discounts or exclusive offers on destinations they viewed. Test different offer types (e.g., “10% off for a limited time”) and monitor ad performance to refine messaging and increase conversions.