Summer in the Mediterranean is at its peak and we can already start evaluating the latest travel trends across your favorite destinations with Data Appeal Studio, our all-in-one territory analysis platform.
For this summer analysis, we’re putting the spotlight on Spain, Greece, France and Italy.
This month, we’ve chosen to focus on traveler sentiment and the perception of the destinations over the first half of the summer (mid-June to late-July 2022) compared to the same period in 2021.
How have things changed? Which destinations are most appreciated and criticized by visitors?
Summer Travel in the Mediterranean: Very positive sentiment, yet on the decline
Over the last month, all the Mediterranean countries under analysis recorded an excellent Sentiment Score, a KPI which measures the level of satisfaction by visitors across hotels, restaurants, attractions and short-term rentals.
There’s a general decline in all destinations, yet Greece remains the reference point with the highest Sentiment. The decreased traveler satisfaction goes hand in hand with an increase in online content (reviews, ratings, etc). Upon further analysis, we detect a disruption in the visitor experience due to crowds, long waiting times and queues.
From 2021 to 2022, Sentiment decreases:
- In Spain from 85.8 to 85/100
- In France from 84.7 to 83.3/100
- In Italy from 87.8 to 86.3/100
- In Greece from 89.8 to 88.9/100
Online reviews and the growth of non-domestic tourism
The growing number of reviews written by foreign tourists is a direct result of open borders and international travel. While domestic markets triumphed in 2021, this year European tourists have rebounded. Visitors from the UK, France, Italy and Germany are the most consistent source markets to varying degrees.
Germans and Brits alone wrote 15% of total reviews over the last month. The overall content posted by non-domestic travelers went:
- In Italy from 31.9% in 2021 to 45.3%
- In Greece from 77.7% to 86.7%
- In Spain from 26.9% to 46.9%
- In France from 24.6% to 52.6%
Greece again is an outlier with 86.7% of reviews posted by foreign travelers, a distribution much higher than its competitor destinations.
Spain and Italy travel in parallel
Among the countries examined, Spain and Italy are the ones with the most in common. The variation in the number of content published between June and July differs very little from last year, confirming that both destinations were not strongly impacted by the Covid-realted restrictions in 2021. In both countries, the volume of non-domestic reviews – mostly from German, French and English visitors – grew by around 20%.
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