Bleisure travelers: who are they, how to capture them, and how geofencing can help

Bleisure travel is helping revitalize the hospitality industry. Discover the impact that 'bleisure' travel is having on the market, how hotels are enhancing their offerings to attract this segment, and how geofencing technology can help your hotel capture a larger share of these travelers.

What is bleisure travel?

Bleisure travel is the growing trend among corporate travelers who make most of their work trips, traveling with partners and extending their travel dates to explore local attractions. Mixing business and pleasure, Allied Market Research reports that the global bleisure travel industry was estimated at $315.3 billion in 2022, and is anticipated to hit $731.4 billion by 2032. Generationally, millennials “...held the highest share in 2022, holding nearly half of the global bleisure travel market revenue, and is projected to rule the roost by 2032.”

Bleisure travel helps minimize travel costs for corporate workers, boosts their work-life balance, and improves their overall well-being. It's a win-win for corporations and employees. The rapid growth of this segment has led hotel marketers to develop special deals and offerings tailored specifically for bleisure travelers.

What hotels are doing to help capture bleisure travelers

Hotels have nestled themselves into the bleisure travel journey by first, creating accommodations incentivizing bleisure travel and, equally as important, bringing awareness to these offers. Webrezpro notes that hotels have started to offer corporate rates to guests seeking to extend their stay for 2-3 days. This prolongs hotel occupancy and gives guests a great deal for their stay. Hotels also help foster an appetite for local attraction sites by compiling collateral featuring recommended places to visit and even spotlighting these locations on their website. The article also shares that some hotels also offer a “kids stay free, dine free” policy along with other family-friendly perks.

After creating bleisure accommodations, hotel marketers will then broadcast these benefits to raise awareness for their offers. Hotel marketers can highlight their bleisure deals and offers on their website, send targeted emails to their repeat customers, and append those offers to pre-arrival booking confirmations for corporate guests. Leaving collateral in guest rooms can help further educate guests and prime them to book an extended stay for their next work trip. In short, hotel marketers have a multitude of internal marketing opportunities to capture the attention of corporate travelers.

How geofencing can help you capture bleisure travelers

Geofencing allows hotel marketers to create virtual boundaries around specific geographic locations, such as conference centers or popular business venues. By geofencing a convention center, hotel marketers can identify and target the feeder communities of repeat travelers who frequently attend events at these locations.

Hotel marketers can then target this audience through unskippable streaming TV ads on over 200 platforms such as Sling TV, ESPN, Hulu, and more! With a 98% completion rate, these unskippable ads mean that you can essentially force your prospective hotel guest to sit through your entire commercial ad. 

Streaming TV ads for bleisure travelers can focus on promoting the hotel's amenities as well as its proximity to local attractions. By showcasing the hotel's unique offerings and the appealing aspects of the surrounding area, these ads can whet the travel appetite of corporate workers and influence them to extend their stay.  The goal is to nurture these potential guests over time, keeping the hotel top-of-mind as this market segment plans their next annual business trip.

If you're looking for more hotel marketing ideas on how to amplify awareness for your hotel, schedule a quick call with us and see how other hotels are leveraging geofencing!