The Middle East business travel market is going from strength to strength. This is a key finding of the BDRC Middle East Hotel Guest Survey 2005, an annual study conducted by London-based research agency BDRC.
The 2005 survey reports that the typical business traveller in the region has increased their number of business related hotel stays to just over 22 nights per annum, a 14% rise on the year before. Just under a third of business travellers in the region are classified as frequent travellers by virtue of the fact that they spend 21+ nights per annum in hotels. This elite group accounts for 71% of business volume.
International travel is prolific within the region, with three in four business travellers staying in hotels internationally and the majority of bed nights (77%) accounted for by international travel. Nevertheless, Egypt and Saudi Arabia continue to demonstrate sizeable domestic markets.
“Given their contribution to business volume, encouraging brand loyalty in the frequent stay segment must be a focus for hoteliers in the region,” said Linda Findlay, research director of BDRC, commenting on the findings.
“This is particularly challenging for hotel companies operating in the Middle East, where the market is characterised by brands in the upper full service and at the luxury end of the market and where standards of service are typically high. Nevertheless, consistently high levels of service delivery are critical, given that 45% of business travellers tend to return to hotels where they have had a good experience in the past. Hoteliers need an in-depth understanding of the needs, expectations and behaviour of frequent stay guests to ensure that their brand remains relevant in today’s competitive market,” Findlay added.
While business travellers are almost exclusively male, the research suggests that, although still a small proportion of the total, a growing number of new market entrants, that is people who have only begun travelling for business reasons within the past two years, are female.
Interestingly, distribution channels have not moved on as quickly in the Middle East as in other world markets. While 25% of travellers in the Middle East now use the internet to source information on hotels, by far the most popular information sources are guides, such as tourist guides and hotel directories, used by 52% of travellers, closely followed by travel agents (47%). While almost half (49%) of all information sources used are hotel controlled, scope certainly exists for hoteliers to promote more effectively the value and convenience of the internet.
The study reveals that hotel loyalty programmes are becoming more focused in their market penetration. While participation in such programmes across the total business travel market remains low at 13%, it is considerably higher amongst the key target market of frequent travellers, at 22%. Furthermore, in the last year there has been an increase from 5% to 9% of business travellers who say that their membership tier is at an elite or above entry level. The BDRC survey revealed that Starwood’s Preferred Guest programme is the leading hotel loyalty programme in the region, followed closely by IHG’s Priority Club and Hilton’s HHonors.
The BDRC Middle East Hotel Guest Survey 2005 comprises 503 in-depth face-to-face interviews with business travellers and tracks 45 hotel brands on key measures.
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