Leisure travel is picking up, but economy clouds outlook: Inflation, continued COVID-19 challenges raise concern about longer-term demand.

This year, 120.0 million US adults will book travel via digital channels. While that figure is up 29.7 million from 2020’s pandemic low, it’s 6.2 million fewer digital travel bookers than in 2019.

US consumers pined for pre-pandemic pleasures in Q4 2021, with the delta wave receding and omicron just entering the frame—and it showed in their search behavior. Organic Google search visits to travel sites increased 41% year over year that quarter. Meanwhile, retail and consumer goods took a hit: Visits to those sites decreased 14% as the prospects of in-store shopping improved.

Telemedicine is not the way most US adults prefer to access care. For only two healthcare needs—flu or cold treatment, and prescription refills—live video visits held an edge over in-office visits in 2021, and this margin was slim. US adults were more inclined to travel to their providers for mental health services, annual checkups, and physical therapy.

TikTok could be the savior of the box office and travel counter: Pandemic-challenged industries have embraced the social media app in the hopes of fueling their recovery.

Half of US adults plan to fly in the next six months as of October 2021, up 14 percentage points from October 2020.

Rising prices have US adults lowering their costs, and 51% of these cost-cutters are spending less on dining out. Other expenses are in their crosshairs as well: 47% are shelling out less for clothing, toys, travel, and entertainment.

Online consumer spending in the US was flat in Q1 2022 from the same quarter a year prior, as shoppers pivoted away from their pandemic-driven digital spending habits. While brick-and-mortar saw growth, the increase was just 3%.

But the country remains highly dependent on tourism and faces an uncertain economic outlook as a result, particularly due to the omicron variant. Even if life inside Thailand largely normalizes this year, retail spending will still disappoint if foreign tourism remains at its current low levels.

On this episode of Brand Anatomy, where we get exclusive looks inside leading brands, Briefings director Jeremy Goldman sits down with Dorothy Dowling, CMO of Best Western, to discuss the changing needs of today’s travelers given rising inflation and pent-up post-pandemic demand, and the importance of loyalty programs to better serve customers.

Tripadvisor used conversational AI technology for a campaign executed on voice assistants like Alexa and Google Assistant with the goal of maintaining engagement during the pandemic, according to Adam Ochman, global head of marketing at Tripadvisor.

The past two pandemic-driven years have accelerated digital transformation and consumer behavior. Here are our top 10 trends to watch in 2022.

Digital ad spending across several industries in the UK has been up-and-down the past two years. There will be across-the-board growth this year, but at uneven rates, ranging from 33.0% for travel to 7.8% for automotive.

Given the uncertainty surrounding the delta variant of the coronavirus, we don’t expect travel ad budgets to rebound by all that much next year either.

After a complicated 2020, most industries in Germany will accelerate their digital ad spending growth in 2021. The rebound for travel and auto will underwhelm, but retail spend will soar.

The pandemic has caused the US automotive industry to reduce its digital ad spending by 18.2% in 2020. As car sales plummeted, dealerships closed, and manufacturing slowed, marketers backed off from performance initiatives and focused on branding efforts.

The coronavirus has upended the US travel industry. Fears of infection, governmental measures restricting travel and access to public places, and the economic downturn will depress bookings, sales and ad spending in 2020 and beyond.

The pandemic has greatly affected the distribution of digital ad spending across industries. The bottom fell out of the travel industry, as will ad spending in the sector, while retail will consolidate its dominant position in digital ad spend this year.

Few industries have been hit as hard by the coronavirus as travel. Recovery will be slow, with many sectors not returning to pre-pandemic levels until at least 2022. Some pandemic-related trends, like increased local “staycations,” may persist.

Curated by eMarketer, this special collection of interviews will help you understand how the travel industry is recovering post-COVID and planning for what’s ahead.