In travel alone, one-third of the bookings in major countries around the world are now coming from mobile devices. With the rise of mobile bookings, clear winners and losers have surfaced, proving that there is real competition in the space and a strong thirst from consumers for a better experience.

Criteo also recently teamed up with Phocuswright to release The Mobile Effect white paper, which looks at the strongest performers in mobile  airline and hotel bookings. It is interesting to note the gap that remains between mobile winners and losers.

In other Criteo data, we see average booking values on mobile sites aligned with desktop and mobile apps, but conversion rates on mobile sites are half of those on desktop and mobile apps.

This suggests that travelers value convenience when booking, but are missing it from their mobile web experience.

After analyzing thousands of sites, we identified some major differences. While in the US the top quartile of travel merchants see 33% of bookings via mobile on average, the lowest quartile is stuck at about 10%.

In looking at conversion rates, there is a 110% uplift when travel sites are optimized for mobile.

The following are examples of non-optimized mobile experiences in the hotel booking space that travel firms need to get right. The lessons apply across all verticals.

· Maps integration

Does your hotel’s mobile page have an easy to find, easy to activate map view? Maps on mobile is like wifi  in hotels – sure, you can operate a hotel without it, but when everyone else offers wifi, you need to as well.

For any user on the road, it is essential to know where things are located- from transportation to meeting locations, hotels and restaurants.

· Photos

Due to the small form factor, mobile sites need large photos. Ideally, full-width, and with easy navigation controls. But, don’t mess with quality. Why? Because some devices have a crisp, high definition screen, which make low resolution images look lousy. With touch controls, tapping or sliding should be enough to move to the next photo. A crowded interface will only frustrate a user.

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