As stated by PhoCusWright’s Social Media in Travel 2012: Social Networks and Traveller Reviews (Juman,
2012), more than 75% of travellers use social networks to find shopping-related deal, while 30% specifically seek
out travel-related deals. Fifty-two percent of Facebook users said their travel plans were affected by seeing pictures
of trips posted by friends. Fifty-two percent of travellers who had already made travel plans changed some part of
their plan after checking out what was being said on social media channels – 33% changed their hotel, 10% changed
their resort, 7% changed their destinations, and 5% changed their airlines. According to the study, travellers are
looking for tips and inspiration on social media. Mobile devices are visitor’s most important device; the number of
mobile subscriptions jumped by 173 million in 2013, and the number of active mobile subscriptions around the
world now equates to roughly 93% of the world’s population (SDMW, 2014). Fifty-two percent of Facebook users
said their friend´s photos inspired their holiday plans. Forty percent of visitors post restaurant reviews on social
media, 46-% post hotel reviews. Seventy six-percent visitors post post-vacation photos and 55% of all Facebook
users like pages specific to vacations. According to research from Stikky Media (2014), visitors are relying on social
media more than ever to decide where to go for holidays and what to visit. Forty percent of online visitors visit
social networking sites to influence destination selection, 70% of visitors trust online recommendations while only
14% trust advertisers. Facebook has the greatest influence on 24-34 year olds’ holiday choices, and the greatest
influence over men, TripAdvisor had the greatest impact on female booking habits.