Women are more open to researching and booking hotels online compared to men, according to findings of a survey conducted by Google India and TNS Research.

The survey, which covered 3,700 respondents across 12 metros and smaller towns, shows that 50 per cent of the women research and book hotels online compared with 41 per cent men. The report also estimates that the online hotel booking industry’s revenues are expected to grow to $1.8 billion by 2016, as compared to $0.8 billion currently.

Growth potential The findings indicate that an estimated 8.4 million people are likely to book hotels online by 2016 end compared to 3.5 million currently.

“While the overall user base of people looking for information on hotels online was very high, the conversion is still happening offline. There is a high growth potential for online hotel bookings,” said Vikas Agnihotri, Industry Director, Google India.

Smartphone dominance Also, hotel searches on Google using smartphones rose 30-fold from 2011 to 2014.

“We believe that people accessing the Internet through smartphones can grow to 200 million very soon. Today, 40 million people are undertaking e-commerce transactions, which will grow to 100 million by 2016 and 200 million by 2020,” said Agnihotri. He said while travel segments, such as air and rail tickets were early movers in e-commerce, hotel bookings have had a slow start. Google India has come out with the report ahead of the nine-day Great Indian Travel Festival, which begins on April 18, which is similar to the Great Online Shopping Festival. Internet users can find travel deals through various partners such as goibibo.com , cleartrip.com , Jet Airways and others

“While Goibibo will be running exciting offers on all categories, redBus will be announcing launch of new products, including cricket package tours in association with Royal Challengers Bangalore,” said Ashish Kashyap, Group CEO, Ibibo Group.

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