Sojern's Q3 Global Travel Insights Report Offers Winter Travel Predictions and Reviews Last Quarter's Key Trends

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September was the most popular month for booking trips, with 37 percent of all the quarter's booking taking place that month. Globally, the most searched destinations during the third quarter of the year were: the United States , Spain , the United Kingdom , Italy , France , Germany , Turkey , Thailand , Portugal and Russia . Thailand re-entered the list after a quarter's hiatus, replacing Greece . Jeddah , the main gateway for the Hajj pilgrimage, sees a ninety percent increase in travel volume the week of the Hajj compared with the week prior, dominating forty percent of all travel interest in Saudi Arabia during Hajj week.

From the beginning of the year through the end of September, in North America and Europe , increasingly more travellers searched for tickets seven days or less from the departure date and significantly fewer travellers searched for tickets sixty days or more before the departure date. These fluctuations are in line with the seasonal trends: in Q1 travel planning is in full swing for the summer break, while in Q2 and Q3 travellers look for destinations closer to home and book tickets closer to the departure date. In Latin America , search lead times remain largely stable quarter on quarter.

December 19 is shaping up to be the most popular date to travel across Europe , Asia-Pacific and Latin America and the second most popular date to travel in North America , after December 23 . Boxing Day is currently set as the second most popular date to travel for Europeans.

The top destinations for the 2015 Holiday season are: Singapore for Asia-Pacific travellers, Bangkok for Europeans, Madrid for Latin Americans and, for North Americans, New York. New York City has overtaken London this year as the second most popular destination for European travellers this winter. This holiday season, European travellers are looking to take slightly longer trips with two-thirds (66%) searching for trips of eight days or more.

European travellers searching for winter holidays earlier in the year (Q1 and Q2 2015) were more driven by potential warm weather destinations such as Miami and Tenerife, at positions three and four, compared with travellers searching closer to their departure date, who planned trips to cities such as London and Paris .

Download the full Global Travel Insights report and infographic.

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Sojern is travel's leading data-driven performance marketing engine. Through its Sojern Traveler Platform and billions of traveler intent signals across online and mobile channels, Sojern puts more heads in beds and travelers in town for its clients worldwide. Currently one of the fastest growing travel tech companies, Sojern works with top travel brands and independent hotels in North America , Latin America , Europe , MEA and APAC. The company is headquartered in San Francisco , with key offices in Dubai , London , New York , Omaha and Singapore . For more information, please visit www.sojern.com.