Search Engine Consumer Journeys: Exploring and Segmenting Click-Through Behaviors

The consumer online search journey is viewed as one of the key determinants toward consumer purchase decisions. Using a unique disaggregated query-level data set collected from a leading Chinese search engine, we employ a latent-class, two-stage logistic regression model and identify the existence of three distinct consumer segments in the hospitality industry. Each group represents a unique stage of the consumer experience along a typical search journey, leading to a set of click-through behaviors. The consumer search and click-through insights garnered from this study provide hotel marketers with deeper understandings and actionable guidelines to the development of their search advertising campaign and (re)targeting strategies. The segmentation model and the empirical insights also demonstrate the possibility that a segment-specific ad assortment approach could improve advertising efficiency, enrich consumer's search experience, and eventually create a win-win situation that benefit all entities involved in the hospitality-related, search advertising domain.

Automated summary

This study identifies three distinct consumer segments in the hospitality industry using a unique disaggregated query-level data set collected from a leading Chinese search engine. The insights obtained from consumer search and click-through behaviors provide actionable guidelines for hotel marketers, demonstrating the potential for a segment-specific ad assortment approach to improve advertising efficiency and enrich consumer search experience.