Search Campaigns for Travel in 2026: Things to Do and Events Beta
On 8 July 2026 Google announced that Search campaigns for Travel are moving beyond hotels. Two verticals entered open beta: Things to Do (tours, attractions, guided experiences) and Events (ticketed concerts, sports, festivals). Availability is still limited and several parameters remain unconfirmed, but the campaign type is already appearing in accounts — and it is the first time in years that Google Ads has opened a genuinely new Search surface built around one vertical.
This guide covers what Search for Travel does that a standard Search campaign and Performance Max do not, how travel feeds work and what they change in the SERP, what is known about the Things to Do and Events beta, how to structure an account around travel demand, and which mistakes cost the most in this vertical specifically.
What travel feeds are and why they matter
Travel Feeds pull your offer data into the search ad itself: price, dates, rating, image. For hotels Google already opened this to all advertisers — if an account has a linked travel feed, the data flows automatically into both new and existing Search campaigns, and you can opt out at account or campaign level.
The effect is structural: a search ad stops being three lines of text and starts behaving like a product card. Google has claimed CTR lifts of up to 20% for advertisers using the full range of travel feed formats. Treat that as a vendor reference point, not a forecast for your account — in brand-heavy segments the lift is usually smaller, in the long tail of destination queries it can be larger.
The shift worth internalizing: in travel, feed quality now drives Search results the way product feed quality drives Shopping. Ad copy is no longer the only lever you have.
What 2026 actually added: Things to Do and Events
Before July 2026, “Search campaigns for Travel” effectively meant hotels. The beta adds:
- Things to Do — tours, attractions, museums, guided activities. A product with a date, a duration, a meeting point and a per-person price.
- Events — ticketed events: concerts, sports, festivals. A product with a fixed date, a venue and seating tiers.
What Google did not confirm at launch: supported bidding strategies, the asset set, reporting depth, geographic availability, and how the new campaign type interacts with AI Max for Travel. That matters for planning — walking in with a “move the whole budget” hypothesis is reckless when that many variables are undefined.
There is no described application process. The beta is called open but “with limited availability”, which in practice means the campaign type either appears in your account or it does not. Account maturity, region and vertical all feed into that.
Search campaigns for Travel vs standard Search vs Performance Max
| Dimension | Standard Search | Search for Travel | Performance Max |
|---|---|---|---|
| Data source | Keywords and assets | Keywords + travel feed | Feed + audience signals |
| Query control | High | High | Low |
| Ad appearance | Text | Text + price, dates, rating, image | Surface-dependent |
| Seasonality handling | Manual | Partly via feed (dates/availability) | Feed plus automation |
| Reporting | Full search terms | Full search terms | Limited |
The practical argument for Search for Travel is that you keep search term visibility. In a vertical where intent spreads across “where to go”, “tours in <city>” and “buy tickets <specific event>”, query control is worth more than incremental reach. The cleanup method is in our guide to negative keywords and search terms analysis.
Travel feed anatomy: the mandatory minimum
A travel feed differs from a product feed in one decisive way: the critical attribute is not stock, it is availability on a date. That shapes the structure:
- Offer identifier. Stable across exports — otherwise accumulated performance history resets.
- Price and currency. Per participant for Things to Do, per ticket tier for Events. A mismatch between feed price and page price is the number one cause of disapprovals.
- Dates and availability. A slot calendar or a fixed event date. Expired dates must drop out of the feed automatically.
- Location. Meeting point or venue. In this vertical, location is simultaneously targeting data and part of the offer.
- Image. Image quality moves CTR harder in travel than in almost any other category — it is what people buy with their eyes.
- Landing page. A direct link to the specific tour or event, never to a category page.
Update frequency deserves its own paragraph. In Things to Do and Events, inventory changes during the day: a sold-out slot that keeps serving is a wasted click, a support ticket and an accuracy policy risk at once. With dynamic availability, a daily export is not enough — you need partial updates. Rule and supplemental feed logic is in feed rules and supplemental feeds in Merchant Center, and the modern export plumbing in migrating feeds to the Merchant API.
Account structure built for travel demand
The most common error is structuring by product, e-commerce style. In travel, intent splits by stage of choice, and the structure should mirror that:
| Stage | Query shape | What to serve | Expected conversion |
|---|---|---|---|
| Destination choice | “things to do in <city>” | Curated list, top activities | Low — the job is audience building |
| Format choice | “walking tours <city> english” | Category page with a from-price | Medium |
| Specific product | “<tour name> tickets” | Product card with date and price | High |
| Brand | “<your brand> reviews” | Direct landing page | Highest |
The consequence: the top two stages cannot be judged on last-click CPA — they feed the bottom two. Switch them off because the attribution looks bad and two to four weeks later the bottom of the funnel sags as well. How to split budget across those layers is covered in attribution models: DDA vs last click.
Geography: presence vs interest
Travel is the vertical where location settings break campaigns most often. Someone buying a Barcelona tour is physically in Berlin. Target by presence and you cut off all pre-trip demand, keeping only people who already arrived. Target by interest and you catch planners but invite informational noise. Both modes are explained in location targeting: presence vs interest. For Things to Do the working setup is usually two campaigns — an “on location” one targeting presence, and a “planners” one targeting interest in the destination, each with its own offer and bids.
Seasonality and the booking window
In travel the gap between click and trip is measured in weeks, sometimes months. That breaks two things at once: your conversion window and Smart Bidding’s learning.
- Conversion window. The default 30 days often falls short for destinations people plan far ahead. If the window is shorter than the real lag, the system undercounts conversions and underbids exactly where your margin lives.
- Seasonal spikes. Smart Bidding reacts to holiday surges with a delay. For predictable spikes, use seasonality adjustments — the logic is in seasonality adjustments and data exclusions.
- Cancellations and refunds. Events carry a higher refund share than most verticals. Without adjusting conversion value after a cancellation, the campaign optimizes toward bookings that never became revenue.
- Budget planning. The travel seasonal curve is steeper than retail’s: budget you fail to spend at peak is not recoverable later. Allocation approach in seasonality and budget planning.
A four-week plan for entering the beta
- Week 0. Check whether the campaign type exists in your account. In parallel, fix the feed: dates, prices, images, direct landing pages. Without a feed there is nothing to test.
- Week 1. Launch one campaign for one destination or one activity category. Cap the budget at 10–15% of the vertical total. The goal is not performance, it is observing which queries the new type collects.
- Week 2. Pull the search terms report and compare it with your existing Search campaign. If overlap runs above 60–70%, you are cannibalizing yourself — separate them with negatives.
- Weeks 3–4. Compare CPA and the share of bookings with a real travel date. Only then decide about scaling.
One rule for any beta: never migrate the campaign that currently carries your revenue. Beta feature sets change without notice, by definition.
The mistakes that cost the most in travel
| Mistake | Consequence |
|---|---|
| Daily feed refresh with intraday availability | Advertising sold-out slots: wasted spend plus disapprovals |
| Presence targeting for planners | Cuts off pre-trip demand, which is most of the vertical |
| Conversion window shorter than the booking window | Undercounted conversions, underbidding on the best destinations |
| Feed price different from page price | Offer disapprovals and account trust damage |
| Landing page points to a category, not the tour | Expectation gap, conversion rate collapses |
| Cancellations never adjust conversion value | Automation scales the destinations with the worst refund rate |
| Beta gets the main budget | Beta changes hit revenue without warning |
Going international from day one
Travel almost always means several countries, languages and currencies at once. Three things break first:
- Feed currency vs account currency. A mismatch surfaces a price you do not actually offer.
- Ad language vs landing page language. A German user who clicks a German ad and lands on an English page converts markedly worse.
- Local ticketing and refund rules. Page wording has to match reality — this is a policy issue, not just a conversion issue.
Launch sequencing by country and the usual traps are in international campaign launch.
Where AI Max fits
Google has not disclosed how the new campaign type interacts with AI Max for Travel. The practical stance during the beta: do not switch on query expansion and a new campaign type in the same window. Otherwise the results are unreadable — you will not know whether the new surface or the broader matching produced the effect. Expansion mechanics are in AI Max for Search campaigns.
Adjacent scenario for travel advertisers whose product is an enquiry rather than an online booking: collect it inside the ad. Conditions and limits are in today’s companion piece on lead form assets in Google Ads.
When the account itself is the blocker
Access to new campaign types and feed formats in Google Ads is distributed unevenly: account history, verification status, vertical and region all feed into it. A fresh account with no spend and no advertiser verification usually never sees new betas at all. If the goal is to test new surfaces rather than wait six months for history to accumulate, it is faster to start on agency Google Ads accounts that already carry it. Baseline setup checklists live in our Google Ads guide.
Images in a travel feed are not decoration
In most verticals the image is a nice extra. In travel it is part of the offer: people are buying an experience and they buy it with their eyes. That creates requirements rarely written into a feed spec:
- The shot must be recognizable. If the tour is of a specific place, show that place, not a generic cityscape. Landmark recognition lifts CTR more than photographic quality does.
- No text overlays. Captions and watermarks are both a disapproval risk and visual noise in the results page.
- Horizontal framing with margin. Surfaces crop differently; a subject centred in frame survives every crop.
- One image, one offer. A four-photo collage in a small thumbnail reads as a grey smudge.
- Seasonal consistency. A winter photo in a summer campaign undermines trust in the price and dates — people register the mismatch before they can articulate it.
Events deserve their own note. There the draw is the artist or the team, not the venue: a recognizable face or event logo outperforms a wide shot of an empty arena by a wide margin. That immediately raises a rights question — use only what the organizer has cleared.
What a weekly travel report should contain
Because of the gap between click and trip, a standard weekly report lies in this vertical. The minimum set of cuts that tells the truth:
| Cut | Why | Red flag |
|---|---|---|
| Queries grouped by funnel stage | Detect drift toward the top of the funnel | “Things to do” share rising while “buy tickets” falls |
| Conversions by travel date, not click date | See real demand per period | Empty weeks in the calendar while spend stays flat |
| Share of disapproved offers in the feed | Catch problems before impressions drop | Any rise two days running |
| Cancellations and refunds by destination | Stop automation from scaling losses | Best CPA destination with the worst refund rate |
| Brand query CPC and impression share | Track aggregators bidding on your brand | Rising CPC at an unchanged position |
That last line stings in travel specifically: ticket aggregators and marketplaces routinely outbid sellers on their own brand terms. It is not always worth a fight — sometimes the aggregator delivers you the sale anyway — but it has to be measured separately rather than dissolved into blended campaign CPA.
FAQ
What exactly was added to Search campaigns for Travel in 2026?
On 8 July 2026 Google announced an open beta covering two new verticals — Things to Do (tours and activities) and Events (event tickets). Before that the campaign type effectively served the hotel segment.
How do I join the beta?
Google described no separate application process. The beta is called open but with limited availability: the campaign type either exists in your account or it does not. Account maturity, region and vertical influence it.
Is a travel feed mandatory?
For hotels, data flows automatically when a feed is linked, and you can opt out at account or campaign level. For Things to Do and Events, Google did not publicly detail feed requirements at beta launch — plan for a full feed with dates, prices and images.
How much do travel feeds lift CTR?
Google has cited up to 20% for advertisers using the full set of formats. That is a vendor reference point; actual results depend on destination competition and image quality.
Which location targeting should tours use?
Usually two separate campaigns: an “on location” one using presence, and a “planners” one using interest in the destination, with different offers and bids.
What conversion window should I set?
One that covers the real booking window. For far-planned destinations the default 30 days is frequently too short, and the system undercounts conversions as a result.
How often should the feed update?
More than once a day if availability changes intraday. Otherwise you serve sold-out slots and pay for clicks that cannot convert.
Does this campaign type replace Performance Max?
No. It gives query control and transparent reporting; PMax gives cross-surface reach. In most accounts they complement each other but need negative keyword separation to avoid cannibalization.
What should I do about Events cancellations?
Adjust conversion value after a cancellation. Otherwise automation scales exactly the events and destinations with the highest refund rate.
Can I test the beta and AI Max at the same time?
Technically yes, analytically no. Two simultaneous reach changes make the result unreadable.
What budget should the test get?
A reference point is 10–15% of the vertical budget over three to four weeks — enough to read query structure and early CPA, not enough for beta changes to damage revenue.
The campaign is not serving — what do I check first?
Offer status in the feed (dates, prices, currency), price parity between feed and page, landing page correctness, and location settings. In travel, most “no impressions” cases are feed problems, not bid problems.
The takeaway: Search for Travel imports product-feed logic into Search. The winner is not the advertiser with better ad copy, but the one whose feed updates at the speed of real availability.
