8 unmissable data points that will transform your customer understanding

Whether you operate on-site airport parking, manage an off-site car park, or oversee commercial operations at an airport, understanding your customers isn’t just about tracking bookings or counting vehicles.

In 2026, data plays a critical role in delivering true customer intelligence. By connecting the right data points, organisations can uncover patterns, make better decisions, and take targeted actions that drive revenue across the entire passenger journey, from pre-trip and in-airport to in-destination and onward travel.

In this article, we’ll highlight eight critical data points that consistently deliver measurable results, and more importantly, exactly how to use them.

1) Booking behaviour and lead time patterns

The window between when a customer books and when they need your service reveals who to target and when, enabling you to provide a personalised travel experience. For example, business travellers booking within 7 to 14 days need different messaging than leisure travellers booking months ahead.

Use this data to build automated email sequences triggered by booking windows. Someone who just booked a flight four months out should receive a parking offer within 24 hours, emphasising early-bird discounts and long-stay value. Likewise, that same person should get a reminder 14 days before travel with fast-track and lounge upsells.

A business traveller booking two days out needs immediate confirmation of availability and premium options, not discounts. Industry data shows pre-booking converts at 3 to 4 times the rate of day-of sales, but only if you reach customers while they’re still planning. Build your marketing automation around these windows and track conversion by segment.

If your leisure conversion rate is below 12%, your messaging or pricing is wrong. If business travellers aren’t converting above 18%, you’re not emphasising convenience strongly enough.

2) Utilisation patterns and demand forecasting

Utilisation data tells you when to raise prices and when to offer your customers a discount. Track daily occupancy rates over at least 12 months to identify patterns.

If your airport car park hits 85% capacity every summer weekend, you’re leaving money on the table by not implementing dynamic pricing. Conversely, if your data reveals Tuesday mornings in February consistently run at 40% occupancy, that’s when you should test aggressive discounts for corporate customers or run flash sales.

Set your system to increase prices automatically when forecast occupancy exceeds 70% for a given date, and discount when it falls below 50%. Many operators see 15 to 25% revenue increases simply by getting pricing aligned with actual demand patterns. But this requires clean historical data and the ability to predict accurately.

If your forecasts are consistently off by more than 10%, your underlying data has quality issues that need fixing before any pricing strategy will work. Analyse forecast accuracy monthly and investigate when actual performance deviates significantly from the prediction.

3) Channel performance and customer acquisition cost

Every booking channel has a different cost and value profile, but most operators only look at volume.

Calculate true revenue per booking after commissions, processing fees, and marketing costs for every channel. You might discover that bookings from aggregator platforms bring high volume but net 30% less revenue than direct bookings, and those customers rebook at half the rate.

This intelligence should drive specific resource allocation decisions. If direct bookings deliver £8 more profit per transaction and 40% higher rebooking rates, invest in SEO, paid search for branded terms, and email remarketing to previous customers. Reduce or eliminate discounting on aggregator platforms where customers show low loyalty. Track channel performance monthly and set clear targets for direct booking percentage.

Leading operators aim for 60 to 70% direct bookings, because every shift from third-party to direct channel typically adds 15 to 20% to net margin. If you’re below 50% direct, you have a channel dependency problem that’s costing you significant revenue. Build a 90-day plan to shift 10% of volume from your most expensive channel to direct, and measure progress weekly.

4) Customer lifetime value and retention economics

Understanding which customers are worth retaining should shape your marketing investment decisions.

Start by calculating lifetime value by segment: average booking value multiplied by booking frequency over 24 months. Most operators discover that the top 20% of customers generate 60 to 70% of total revenue. These high-value customers justify dedicated retention programmes.

Set up automated win-back campaigns for customers who have booked two or more times but have not returned within six months. Incentivise their third booking with exclusive early access to sales or a targeted discount.

Track reactivation rates and compare the ROI of retention spend versus acquisition spend. Retaining an existing customer typically costs one-fifth of acquiring a new one, yet many operators still spend up to ten times more on acquisition. Use your data to rebalance budgets accordingly.

For customers in their first 90 days post-booking, implement a welcome series that builds loyalty and encourages repeat bookings. Include practical travel tips, reminders about your services, and a next-booking incentive.

When executed well, retention serves as a key growth lever. Operators with strong retention programmes typically see rebooking rates increase by 20 to 30% within 12 months, making retention one of the fastest and most cost-effective ways to drive sustainable revenue growth.

5) Ancillary attachment rates and bundling optimisation

Travel insurance, fast track, and lounges are high-margin revenue, but only if you optimise presentation and timing.

Track attachment rates by product, booking channel, and customer segment. If insurance attaches at 8% when presented on the payment page but 22% when offered immediately after parking selection, move it earlier in the journey. Test different price points and bundle configurations monthly.

Similarly, a parking plus insurance bundle priced at £42 might convert better than selling parking at £35 and insurance at £9 separately, even though the bundle is £2 cheaper. Oftentimes, the psychology of bundling often outperforms the maths. For airport parking operators, analyse which flights or routes show the highest insurance attachment and create targeted pre-departure campaigns for similar bookings. If families flying to Spain convert insurance at 35% but business travellers to Frankfurt convert at 11%, stop wasting marketing budget promoting insurance to the wrong segment.

Use your data to focus offers where they’ll convert. Even a 5-percentage-point improvement in attachment rate can add tens of thousands in annual revenue.

6) Campaign performance and marketing attribution

Most operators run campaigns but struggle to prove what works. Track every campaign with unique codes or UTM parameters and measure three metrics: conversion rate, revenue per booking, and customer quality (rebooking rate).

A flash sale that drives 200 bookings at £25 average looks successful until you realise those customers never return, and you just trained them to wait for discounts. Compare this to a targeted campaign to previouscustomers that generates 80 bookings at £35 average with 45% rebooking within 12 months. The second campaign is far more valuable despite lower absolute volume.

Use this insight to build a testing framework. Every month, run one control campaign (proven approach) and one test (new messaging, offer, or audience). Measure performance after 30 days and after 90 days to understand both immediate conversion and long-term value. Kill campaigns that underperform on customer quality, even if volume looks good. Operators who embrace rigorous testing improve campaign ROI by 40 to 60% within a year because they stop repeating ineffective tactics and double down on what actually drives profitable growth.

7) Product and pricing sensitivity analysis

Understanding price elasticity for different products and customer segments prevents you from leaving money on the table or pricing yourself out of the market.

Test pricing systematically by making small changes (5 to 10%) and measuring conversion impact over 30-day windows. You might discover that premium covered parking can sustain a 15% price increase with only 3% volume decline, generating immediate margin improvement.

Meanwhile, economy parking might be highly price-sensitive, where a 10% increase causes 18% volume drop and a net revenue decline. Use these insights to set pricing rules that maximise revenue per available space.

During peak demand, increase premium product pricing aggressively while holding economy pricing steady to capture price-insensitive customers without losing volume at the entry level. Conversely, during low-demand periods, discount selectively in segments where you’ve proven that elasticity is high. The key is moving beyond gut-feel pricing to data-driven decisions.

Track revenue per space daily and investigate any week where it drops below your rolling 12-week average. Usually, this indicates either a pricing error or a capacity management issue that needs to be addressed.

8) Operational integration points driving commercial decisions

Commercial performance doesn’t exist separately from operations. For airport parking, flight schedule changes, delays, or cancellations directly impact occupancy and revenue.

Build alerts that trigger when flight schedules shift significantly. If three major flights get cancelled, you need to immediately adjust pricing for those dates and potentially release inventory that was being held.

Similarly, if a new route launches with strong load factors, increase parking pricing for those travel dates before demand spikes. Off-site operators should integrate event calendars into their booking systems and set automated pricing rules. For example, if a major sporting event is announced whereby more travellers will be using your airport, pricing should increase automatically for those dates.

Track the correlation between external factors (weather, local events, school holidays) and your booking patterns. This reveals opportunities for proactive marketing. If historical data shows that rainy weather forecasts drive 25% more airport parking bookings as people avoid public transport, set up weather-triggered email campaigns promoting covered parking.

Operators who integrate operational and commercial data forecast demand with 30 to 40% better accuracy, allowing them to optimise pricing, staffing, and marketing spend with confidence rather than guesswork.

Data points only matter if they change what you do. Every insight in this article should trigger a specific action: a pricing change, a campaign adjustment, a process improvement, or a resource reallocation.

The operators who win aren’t those with the most data. They’re the ones who use data to make faster, better decisions than their competitors. Start with one data point, take one action, and measure the result. Then move to the next. This is how you build a genuinely data-driven operation.

Exploring and becoming engaged in the Sandia Mountains in Albuquerque, NM.

Lay the foundation for a data-led approach with our upcoming webinar

Join our upcoming webinar, ‘The Data Strategy Blueprint: Laying the Foundations for Commercial Growth’, featuring Paris Bielby, Data Director at CAVU, and Jamal Karim, Lead Data Engineer at CAVU, on Wednesday, 18 March 2026.

You’ll learn how to define what “good data” really looks like, design cross-ecosystem strategies, build strong data governance, and enable faster, evidence-based commercial decisions.