Dive Brief:
- Pinterest and Airbnb teamed up on a travel guide for spring and summer that includes travel hacks and trends for different types of vacations, according to a Pinterest blog post. The companies also released insights on how consumers use their platforms.
- Nature travel is a top trend for 2019, with Pinterest searches for "nature travel" up 88%, and Airbnb reports a 539% year-over-year increase on nature-related bookings, 367% on meditation and 655% on hiking. Pinterest has also seen a 693% increase in searches for adventure travel, like swimming holes, abandoned amusement parks, cave diving and surprise destinations. Airbnb also reports an increase in adventure and "passion" travel, especially surfing, which led the platform to partner with the World Surf League to unlock 10,000 worldwide surfing experiences.
- "Budget travel" searches have increased 64% on Pinterest, "space travel" 70% and "sustainable travel" 56%. "Dog-friendly vacation" searches are up 146% on Pinterest, and Airbnb offers 1.3 million pet-friendly locations worldwide. "Cold to warm travel outfits" searches are up 152%, and the Airbnb destinations seeing the most growth in bookings include Monterray, Mexico (678%), Carolina, Puerto Rico (643%), Santos, Brazil (432%), San Juan, Puerto Rico (392%) and Dapa, Philippines (380%).
Dive Insight:
Pinterest and Airbnb collaborating on a travel guide seems like a natural fit and is well timed, as travelers are planning spring break and summer vacations. The brands have found synergy, as Pinterest continues to serve as an inspiration for users, helping them to discover new products and places, while Airbnb offers millions of listings that to help travelers turn their inspiration into a reality.
The insights on users' travel-related searches could inspire brands to partner with Pinterest and target consumers the platform’s more than 250 million users with relevant messages related to these experiences. Seventy-eight percent of people on Pinterest say content from brands is useful, according to the company.
Pinterest continues to roll out new offerings to attract advertisers. The company recently made its content marketing API available to third-party influencer marketing platforms to give marketers and influencers the ability to work more collaboratively. Around the holidays, Pinterest unveiled the Gift Globe experience that offered personalized gift suggestions, which retailers Macy's, Lowe's and Kohl's leveraged to connect with holiday shoppers. Pinterest also launched a virtual gift tag to help shoppers find gifts.
The Pinterest-Airbnb partnership comes as Pinterest's CTO Vanja Josifovski will be the new CTO for Airbnb Homes, where he will oversee homes engineering, artificial intelligence, machine learning and data science, according to Venture Beat. Airbnb continues to snap up executives as it is growing as a tech company with plans to go public this year. In October, Airbnb snagged Aristotle Balogh from Google to become CTO of Airbnb's overall platform.
