Case Study – Travelodge
As the UK’s leading hotel group for value, Travelodge is an outstanding business success story, with revenue growth of almost one thousand per cent since 2012. Critical to this success, has been the importance of its digital marketing channels which deliver over 70% of all bookings.
While the existing digital experience and team had enabled this growth, in mid-2015 the senior team realised that action was quickly needed to transform and mature Travelodge’s digital set-up and capabilities, given an increasingly sophisticated ‘digital customer’ and significant competitor investment in digital.
With rapid change required, Digital Works Group built and executed a clear five step digital maturity plan:
- Restructuring the digital team and enabling rapid talent growth suitable to Travelodge’s needs and investment strength
- Laying out a clear transformational digital roadmap for 2016 and beyond, focused on customer-facing assets
- Digital Works Group then worked with the senior team to formulate a budget and take into account opportunity cost factors
- Enhancing the breadth and performance of Travelodge’s digital marketing approaches, through all parts of the acquisition and retention cycle
- Developing and maturing the digital analytics and insight function
- Working with other adjacent teams to mature internal working practices, including the move from ‘waterfall’ to hybrid/agile
Within 12 months months, Digital Works Group successfully delivered on all aspects of the plan:
- The digital channels and customer experience of Travelodge.com were significantly improved, resulting in a 22% revenue growth over the following 5 years.
- The new customer experience, particularly on the mobile channel, contributed toward an EBIT increase of 26%, raising their valuation for their IPO plans.
- A new hiring approach was delivered, growing the ecommercial digital team from eight to nineteen, including developing new skills in digital product management. By focusing on moving key aspects of the digital delivery in-house, a 40% reduction of external spend was achieved, significantly improving ROI.
“Digital Works Group has helped us strengthen our foundations for ongoing success.”
Sales & Marketing Director, Travelodge
