It’s a great day for the local travel industry. According to Google, inbound travel demand to Malaysia is well on its way to pre-pandemic levels, hitting 83 per cent of what it used to be in 2019. In fact, a whopping 75 per cent of travel within Southeast Asia is attributed to Singapore and Malaysia.
Overall, travel within Southeast Asia is looking up, especially since the uptick we’re seeing since the fourth quarter of last year. Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore are already incorporating more welcoming policies for international travellers, heralding a return to a healthy tourism economy. In fact, Malaysia is already on the road to further woo international travellers, beginning with India.
Even domestic travel in Malaysia is back to its standard rate, with Google data indicating interest in this area has reached 100 per cent of what it used to be. Google’s Asia-Pacific sector lead for vertical search and travel Hermione Joye cited the ease of “international border restrictions” for the recent spike in both domestic and international demand.
“In March [2022] across Southeast Asia, we saw a huge reopening of restrictions. Governments are starting to get much more comfortable with the idea of people travelling and the need to travel, and demand is picking up,” she said.
Although Malaysia is lagging a little bit behind when it comes to inbound travel demand compared to the Philippines and Indonesia (which respectively had an inbound travel demand of 118 per cent and 105 per cent), the country’s domestic travel is doing significantly better compared to the two countries, with Singapore matching its 100 per cent mark.
How post-pandemic travelling is different
Although it’s looking up, we are seeing a slight change in travelling behaviour. “The reality is that travel is just taking longer, it’s taking 20 per cent longer than it did pre-Covid to book because of the logistics,” Hermione added.
There is a 4 times increase in searches within Malaysia for travel insurance, a requirement for some locations; and a 500 per cent in travel requirements searches. Both of these contribute to the length of travel planning time. For Hermione, the solution to this is for businesses to focus on a seamless experience for the traveller in order to build customer loyalty.
Featured image credit: Unsplash; hero image credit: Mohd RASFAN / AFP