The share of visitors to travel websites increased 10% in the third week of April compared to the same week last year according to the latest market figures.
The figures, from internet tracking company Hitwise, showed travel websites overall took a 4.69% share of all internet visitors.
They also revealed that while the top 20 internet travel agencies saw an increase in visitors of about 5% the online agency market lost about 6% market share overall.
Hitwise director of research Heather Hopkins said: “Visitors are consolidating among the top sites. 55% of visitors to online travel agencies go to the top 20 sites.”
Hopkins also said search engines were increasingly important with about 40% of visitors to travel sites in March originating from sites such as Google and Yahoo.
She said: “Search engines accounted for about 5% more visitors in March compared with last year.”
With the increasing dominance of search engines consumers also seem to be doing less searches across multiple travel sites.
Visitors to travel websites originating from other travel sites decreased 8% year-on-year according to the figures.
Report by Linda Fox
