Expedia Brand Revamp Arrives in Time for Travel Demand Reset

Anticipating consumers’ pent-up demand to travel amid rising Covid-19 vaccinations, online travel agent Expedia is unveiling a product update and brand refresh to ease travelers back into airplanes and hotel rooms. The company is changing the look on its app and 70 websites, giving them a significant, yet subtle redesign. Ads touting Expedia’s brand refresh also reflect the company’s global appeal. The new spots make their debut during Sunday's Oscar's broadcast and across all media. The ads feature American actor, writer, director and producer Rashida Jones magically saves a lone woman traveling abroad by magically transforming disastrous flight and hotel snafus in the nick of time. And it's all done to the tune of the 1970s "Me Decade" anthem, All By Myself (sung here as "All By Yourself"). Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, Expedia’s U.K. spot stars English actor Naomie Harris. In a conversation with Adweek about the brand revamp, Shiv Singh, svp/GM for Expedia Brand, said his team used the decline in travel to reflect on the meaning of the 25-year-old company and launch a new marketing and product focus. Looking back to Expedia’s founding in 1996, the goal was to “democratize transactions and give people control over their travel,” Singh said. After all, it was the earliest days of the internet for most consumers, who were booking trips over the phone or seated in a travel agent’s office surrounded by brochures. Fast forward to 2020 and the pandemic. For most consumers, the focus was on the speed of booking and finding a really, really good deal on a flight and/or hotel. “We don't need to talk about how dramatic a moment it was for us all personally, but it was a moment of reckoning for the travel industry,” Singh said. “However, it served as an opportunity for us to take a step back. We did massive amounts of research to understand what matters to our consumers.” 'Global travel deprivation study' After conducting a “global travel deprivation study,” Expedia developed a new look and approach to loyalty. Expedia used its place as a comparison search engine and itinerary holder to rethink the information it provided, including changing its app to improve ease of use. “A lot has changed in terms of our expectations and how much we care about travel or more consciously,” Singh said, noting that sustainability is a crucial issue for flyers in 2021. “We consider this a new chapter in the Expedia history. And it's really anchored in the belief and the insight that we want to be your ultimate travel companion.” The promise of Expedia’s brand refresh is “to support the travel every step of the way.” In fact, the company’s new tagline is “It matters who you travel with.” That’s what Jones represents in Expedia’s ads. The character she’s playing is “very travel-savvy” and functions as a travel companion, Singh said. “She plays roles where she sort of has your back and supports you,” he said. “She's optimistic, she's caring. So, we use her in the launch and creative film as embodying Expedia and having your back at every step of the way. It’s that association we’re striving for here." Charting a new course Thanks to changes to Expedia's website and mobile app, travelers can now see all the details of their trip in one spot. The intention is to save users time, but also make it easier to plan future travel on Expedia. To that end, the mobile app offers a new “keep planning” feature, allowing travelers to pick up where they left off by replaying recent searches. This feature shows recent bookings to help travelers complete a trip. Expedia will soon introduce a new package of “pre-bundled products” (e.g., "flights + accommodation + activities"). The tool comes with upfront total pricing and other features to bring more clarity to a user's travel experience. “This is our largest brand spend in five years,” Singh said. “But it's not just another campaign. It's not a spring campaign. It’s a major product update alongside a brand refresh. We're not dipping our toes in the water and trying to see if travel is coming back. We're all in on this.” An emotional appeal—at the right price Consumers may look at their first 2021 booking with a bit more sentimentality than in the past. Thoughts of making up for lost time are front of mind for every traveler. But while Expedia users may have a more visceral reaction to completing a purchase or searching for new flights, price consciousness is still going to be a primary driver. But, Expedia isn’t just trying to find hidden deals for customers. It is vowing to expose hidden fees. It is also going to offer comparisons between one lodging’s amenities versus another. “Is breakfast included? Is this a room with a view? When you're comparing one hotel to another, we’re going to show this to you on the same screen,” Singh said. “This is a first of its kind and it’s something no one else has done.” Function over form In terms of the brand makeover, Expedia didn’t feel the need to go too extreme. There's no flattening of its logo. Its colors aren't desaturated to seem either retro or futuristic (or both at the same time). “We actually love our brand colors and we've done a lot of research to show how they resonate,” Singh said. “There's strong, positive associations with them. We also really like our logo. We didn't feel we needed to change it for the sake of changing or trying to be topical.” Again, the enhancements to the logo were focused primarily on function over style. “It's even more app-friendly than it may have been in the past,” Singh said. “We are fundamentally an app business in the way Facebook may be. We wanted to make sure everything works well in that context and catches users’ eyes the right way.” Expedia’s Quirky Ad Encourages Cooped-Up Consumers to Turn Travel Fantasies Into Reality

Travel Advertising News

Expedia’s Brand Refresh Arrives in Time for ‘The Great Travel Demand Reset’

The online booking agent aims to be the ultimate companion

David Kaplan

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David Kaplan