Branding For Traveltech Matters Now More Than Ever
Travel tech, hospitality tech, destination tech — playgrounds for those who love to blend innovation with the human passion for exploration.
These industries buzz with both established players and startups promising to improve operations, optimize user experience, and make traveling easier, cheaper, and more enjoyable.
But here’s the issue: when it comes to spending on marketing, especially brand-building, the leadership teams in these sectors often tighten purse strings or discard brand altogether.
But whatever has branding done to deserve such cold treatment?!
The Product and Growth Obsession in Travel Tech
Leaders of tech companies are often laser-focused on two things: product development and growth.
There’s a common belief that if you build a stellar product, users will naturally gravitate toward it, and the numbers will tell the rest of the story.
Growth teams are tasked with acquiring users quickly and efficiently, often through performance marketing— shiny tools that have immediate, trackable ROI. It feels tangible. You can measure every click, conversion, and customer acquisition cost.
So why throw money into what might seem like the nebulous, hard-to-quantify murkiness of “brand” when you could invest in something that delivers quick returns? Why worry about how the logo makes people “feel” when you could be adding features, running A/B tests, or finding new user acquisition channels?
This product-first, growth-at-all-costs mindset often leads companies to overlook the long-term benefits of brand-building.
The truth is, by focusing solely on product and short-term growth tactics, many travel tech companies miss out on huge opportunity.
The Problem With Ignoring Brand
Obviously having a great product is crucial.
If you don’t have a compelling, problem-solving product, all the marketing in the world won’t save you. But ignoring your brand doesn’t do justice to the care and creativity that went into preparing the product.
Branding isn’t just about a flashy logo or a clever tagline; it's about crafting a story, a promise, and a reputation that your users can connect with on an emotional level.
It’s about building trust.
And in a world where new apps and services pop up daily, trust is the most valuable currency. A strong brand helps you differentiate from the crowd, command loyalty, and create a community.
It turns customers into advocates.
Branding is a longer-term investment. When you have a solid brand platform in place, your performance marketing efforts become more effective. Think of Expedia, which doesn’t just bombard you with ads but has built a reliable, recognizable brand that users feel safe with when booking travel.
Here’s How Brand Helps:
Building Emotional Connection: The travel tech space is awfully competitive. A strong brand sets you apart. Airbnb’s brand is more than just a platform for booking rooms—it’s about belonging and exploration, and now unique experiences. An emotional connection is what differentiates them from countless other accommodation platforms.
Creating Memorable, Sticky Brands: Being memorable matters in an industry where consumers are bombarded with options. Branding builds recognition and recall, essential for driving loyalty. Booking.com has spent years cementing its brand as a trusted and reliable platform for travelers, with a playful tone that stands out.
Developing a Personality Beyond Product: Your product is important, but your brand gives your company personality. A clear brand voice and personality can create lasting relationships with customers. Hopper, with its adorable bunny mascot and stress-free flight prediction app, has built a brand around fun, simplicity, and reliability. It’s not just about cheap flights; it’s about an enjoyable booking experience.
Moreover, brand plays a critical role in scalability. Think about it—users might try a product due to a targeted ad, but they come back because of what the brand represents.
Hipcamp is a great example. By building a brand around adventure, nature, and sustainability, their messaging, imagery, and partnerships all speak to their core values, which resonate deeply with their target audience. It’s not just about booking a campsite; it’s about a movement to reconnect with nature.
For travel tech, brand loyalty can be the difference between being a clever startup and becoming the next big thing.
Setting the Stage for Brand Investment
Budgets are *always* tight, especially for startups still trying to find their footing. But it’s essential to set aside resources— both time and budget— for branding.
This doesn’t mean you have to hire the priciest agency right out of the gate. Starting small, being authentic, and gradually building a brand that aligns with your company’s mission and vision can be inexpensive and relatively painless.
Or maybe you’ve already done a brand but the results were… suboptimal, or just aren’t working anymore. In the insane sprint to get a product to market, maybe the initial branding efforts were rushed. Messaging can be unclear, positioning muddled, and logos and websites might look like they were designed by your cousin’s roommate’s “creative” buddy.
If so, you might be able to get away with just a light rebrand. There’s no shame in rebranding, and it’s usually easier and less expensive than starting from scratch, while signifying maturity, clarity of vision, and growth.
TripActions did just that and evolved its brand. Originally focused on booking and managing corporate travel, TripActions rebranded as Navan to reflect broader capabilities, like expense management. The new brand identity was clearer and more aligned with their expanded offering.
And also Rome2Rio, the platform that finds users the best way to get from point A to point B, regardless of whether it involves flights, trains, buses, ferries, or driving. Rome2Rio’s brand is centered on simplicity and comprehensiveness, with an easy-to-use interface and exhaustive options.
You Want Investment, Don’t You?
One often-overlooked advantage of strong branding is its impact on investors.
A well-articulated brand signals long-term value and stability. Investors are more likely to back companies that have a clear, differentiated brand because it suggests the company is thinking beyond short-term wins.
Investors are not just interested in a company’s product or technology; they want to know the bigger picture— where the company is heading and how it fits into the broader market. A clear and compelling brand helps tell that story.
When a startup presents a cohesive brand through a well-crafted pitch deck, with a strong narrative and value proposition, investors can more easily understand the company's long-term potential. The brand essentially becomes the framework through which the product, market, and growth strategy are communicated, helping investors envision how the company will carve out a unique position in the market.
Investors are looking for companies that demonstrate not just innovation, but also clarity in how they will attract customers and scale over time. When a company’s brand aligns with its product and vision, it signals maturity and long-term sustainability.
Yes, these are key factors investors look for when deciding where to allocate capital.
Nobody Puts Brand in a Corner
For travel tech, hospitality tech, destination tech and all their techy cousins, the road to success is paved with more than just stellar products and performance metrics.
It’s about building a brand that resonates and inspires trust and loyalty. While it might be tempting to funnel every dollar into immediate user acquisition or feature development, remember that a strong brand will support and amplify all your other efforts.
So, if you’re in the executive suite and worried about your budget allocation, here’s a friendly nudge: consider brand investment not as a cost but as an essential ingredient for long-term success.
What You Can Do Next:
Prioritize brand investment early. Bite the bullet and allocate a portion of the budget and mental space for brand-building, knowing it will lay the foundation for long-term growth and customer loyalty.
Get the execs on board. Make sure your executive team understands the importance of brand strategy in differentiating from competitors, gaining market share, building lasting consumer relationships, growing with the market, etc.
Don’t fear the rebrand. If your current brand is messy or isn’t resonating with your audience or aligning with your product evolution anymore, a rebrand or a light brand refresh might make it work.
Align brand with business strategy. Create the cohesive narrative that ties your product’s functional benefits to an emotional brand story that resonates with customers, investors, and others who will pay attention.
Consult the experts for guidance. Don’t panic! Call in a specialized brand strategy agency that can help you craft a unique, memorable identity that scales as your company grows.