World Cup 2022: What do travellers think of Qatar?
World Cup fever is here! Every four years, this massive event holds every screen and conversation hostage. Media and brands feel the urge to talk about football and we are no exception, but we are going to do it our way. That's why we thought of analysing Qatar as a destination through the lens of travellers from the last four World Cup Champions: France, Germany, Spain and Italy. In this article, we will show you data regarding how travellers from these countries behave and perceive Qatar. Why? Because data and football have one thing in common, they are fun!
Sample selection
Before we start this analysis, let's talk a little bit about the sample that we will use. Since this is a World Cup article, we will assume that the travellers that we select are football fans and want to visit Qatar in the short term. With that in mind, we will analyse travellers from France, Germany, Spain, and Italy that want to visit Qatar within the next three years. Let's dip into the data!
Who are these travellers? The Ultimate Traveller Profile
When looking at travellers from France, Germany, Spain and Italy that want to visit Qatar in the short term, we notice some common traits. Our Ultimate Traveller profile summarises the most frequent answers in each section of the Travellyze survey.
In this case, the Ultimate Traveller is a 35-44 year old man with vocational education. This person shares a home with his partner and doesn't have children living at home. He finds inspiration for travel on Instagram, by consulting with friends or family or in travel TV programmes. His yearly household income is between 18.000 and 35.000 euros. As for his travel budget, it is the same as last year, between 1000 and 3000 euros.
His favourite holiday type is the Sun and Beach, so we will probably find him enjoying the sun on Doha's beautiful beach clubs. He also enjoys Cultural holidays, which means that he will surely enjoy the cultural exchange during his visit to Qatar.
What are the most relevant Travel factors for these travellers?
As for Travel Factors, the first one in most markets is Cleanliness, scoring more than 40% in all of them. The exception is Spain, where the factor with the highest impact is Nature and Outdoor Experiences. Other two factors with very high impact are Nightlife and Fine Dining, both of them which can be satisfied while visiting Qatar.
But what about the World Cup? Only 18% of this sample considers the agenda of sport events a relevant travel factor. The score is even lower if we analyse the Holiday Type Ranking, where only 4% are interested in attending sport events.
How do they perceive Qatar’s image?
The Image Rank is based on a comprehensive algorithm that compares and combines three different indexes: Awareness, perception and experience. The result is a global scoring for the overall image of a destination, regarding both those who have visited and those who haven't.
If we analyse the markets separately, Qatar has the same score in all of the analysed markets, but the position in the ranking varies. In the case of Germany and France, Qatar holds the 11th position; but when we look at the Spanish and Italian markets, it descends to the 23rd position. Other Middle Eastern competitor destinations with similar scores are Dubai, Egypt, and Israel.
But if we analyse the markets together, Qatar is the top Middle Eastern destination in the ranking, standing on the 17th position. The average image score in this analysis is 332 points, almost 20% lower than Qatar's score, 400 points.
What about football fans? The ultimate sport travellers profile
We wanted to know the main characteristics of sport travellers so we analysed people from all of our markets that:
- Prefer sport events as a holiday type.
- Give extreme and great importance to sport events as a destination factor.
This sport traveller is composed mainly by 25-34 year old men with a bachelor's degree. Most of them are married or cohabiting and have children. At least half of them have a travel budget of at least 3000 euros and their average household income is between 36.000 and 59.000 euros. They find travel inspiration in digital platforms like Instagram and Youtube and they also value nature experiences and interacting with locals. The most popular accommodation type in this segment are 3-4 star and luxury hotels and they usually book package trips through travel agency websites. The most popular destination on the Image Rank is United States of America, followed by Scotland and Norway.
Conclusion
We have learned a lot about travellers from France, Germany, Spain and Italy that want to visit Qatar within the next three years. When we look at their favourite type of holiday we can see that they are very compatible with this destination, since they value the beach and cultural experiences. By looking at the Image Ranking, we also learned that most of them perceive Qatar as a leading destination within the Middle East. We also learned a lot about the demographic characteristics of this traveller by checking out the Ultimate Traveller Profile.
What would you like to know about your travellers? Would you like to use data to design your strategies?
