When consumers travel today, they want to see a high social return in the way of their efforts.

This means that travelers take social media into account when they go about planning their trips. They will choose where they travel to based upon what they think the feedback will be like from social media regarding their travel posts.

Depending on where you go, where you stay, what you eat, and what activities you engage in etc, it all contributes to the travelers overall feeling of a social return, say researchers.

This refers to the amount of positive social feedback that they anticipate to receive online in regards to the travel posts about their experiences.

And researchers say that marketers might be able to use this data to help to craft a positive sense of social return for visiting a certain country or area. The more positive that travelers believe their vacation-related posts will be received on social media, then the more likely they are to visit that destination.

The social return for those posts is measured in the way of likes, shares, and comments.

According to a recent study by researchers at the University of Georgia, many travelers today are choosing their vacation spots based upon its instagrammability, their perception of this social return.

And this isn't the first time that researchers have suggested that social media sites like Instagram might be playing a very big role in our decision making process when it comes to the places that we choose to visit around the world.

Not only does social media seem to influence where people want to travel but it also seems to be influencing how often they want to travel as well. Researchers have repeatedly suggested that the fear of missing out plays a critical part in this and previous surveys have found that many social media users are using those sites, like Facebook and Instagram etc, for their vacation and travel inspiration.

Those involved with the present study at the University of Georgia have said that future research in this area could benefit from considering a broader range of travel destinations and then comparing those anticipated social returns across a variety of them.

Following concern for the instagrammability of a location, the other concerns that travelers place at the top of their list before going to a place are things like cost and availability for alcohol, sightseeing opportunities, cuisine options, and more.

In one recent drunk vacation study, that came from vacation rental search engine Holidu, they sought to analyze social media posts for certain travel destinations and to decipher the percentage of posts that contained alcohol, they arrived at a list of what are considered to be the drunkest destination spots.

Top 5 drunkest cities analyzed were found to be: Portland, Denver, New Orleans, Los Angeles, and Austin.

Aside from the alcohol factor, other research suggests that one of the most Instagrammed cities in the entire country happens to be Miami. It comes behind Los Angeles which is seen to be in 2nd place and New York City which has first place as the most Instagrammable city in the US.

In 2016, it's estimated that there were something around 148 million posts to Instagram alone regarding New York City. Other popular cities on social media are Las Vegas, Chicago, Atlanta, San Diego, Boston, Seattle, and Houston.

Pics:
Pixabay
tenor via tenor.com/view/family-vacation-family-vacation-photo-selfie-gif-9150036
via theinternetboost.com/contact.html
tenor via tenor.com/view/plane-flight-sky-skies-gif-8189973

Sources:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S026151771730184X
http://www.independent.co.uk/travel/instagrammability-holiday-factor-millenials-holiday-destination-choosing-travel-social-media-photos-a7648706.html
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jimmyrohampton/2017/03/26/does-social-media-make-millennials-want-to-travel-more/2/#470af94a74fe
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/10/04/national/japan-tourism-group-builds-social-media-presence-new-instagram-account/#.WegknnQUmpo
http://www.olapic.com/resources/the-impact-of-social-media-on-travel-inspiration_blog-p1aw-f1tr-v1th-t1sm/
http://austin.blog.statesman.com/2017/09/27/austin-5th-drunkest-vacation-destination-in-instagram-post-study/
http://www.alcoholic.org/identify/drunk-vacations/
http://www.miami.com/miami-news/miami-is-one-of-the-hottest-instagram-cities-in-the-u-s-can-you-guess-why-173796/
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/features/fl-fea-miami-most-instagrammed-cities-20170817-story.html

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