IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/toueco/v27y2021i1p129-148.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Forecasting tourist arrivals: Google Trends meets mixed-frequency data

Author

Listed:
  • Tomas Havranek

    (Charles University, Prague)

  • Ayaz Zeynalov

    (197946University of Economics, Prague)

Abstract

In this article, we examine the usefulness of Google Trends data in predicting monthly tourist arrivals and overnight stays in Prague during the period between January 2010 and December 2016. We offer two contributions. First, we analyze whether Google Trends provides significant forecasting improvements over models without search data. Second, we assess whether a high-frequency variable (weekly Google Trends) is more useful for accurate forecasting than a low-frequency variable (monthly tourist arrivals) using mixed-data sampling (MIDAS). Our results suggest the potential of Google Trends to offer more accurate predictions in the context of tourism: we find that Google Trends information, both 2 months and 1 week ahead of arrivals, is useful for predicting the actual number of tourist arrivals. The MIDAS forecasting model employing weekly Google Trends data outperforms models using monthly Google Trends data and models without Google Trends data.

Suggested Citation

  • Tomas Havranek & Ayaz Zeynalov, 2021. "Forecasting tourist arrivals: Google Trends meets mixed-frequency data," Tourism Economics, , vol. 27(1), pages 129-148, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:toueco:v:27:y:2021:i:1:p:129-148
    DOI: 10.1177/1354816619879584
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1354816619879584
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/1354816619879584?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mahalia Jackman & Simon Naitram, 2015. "Research Note: Nowcasting Tourist Arrivals in Barbados – Just Google it!," Tourism Economics, , vol. 21(6), pages 1309-1313, December.
    2. Eric Ghysels & Arthur Sinko & Rossen Valkanov, 2007. "MIDAS Regressions: Further Results and New Directions," Econometric Reviews, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 26(1), pages 53-90.
    3. Nikolaos Askitas & Klaus F. Zimmermann, 2009. "Google Econometrics and Unemployment Forecasting," Applied Economics Quarterly (formerly: Konjunkturpolitik), Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, vol. 55(2), pages 107-120.
    4. Jaroslav Pavlicek & Ladislav Kristoufek, 2015. "Nowcasting Unemployment Rates with Google Searches: Evidence from the Visegrad Group Countries," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(5), pages 1-11, May.
    5. Peng, Bo & Song, Haiyan & Crouch, Geoffrey I., 2014. "A meta-analysis of international tourism demand forecasting and implications for practice," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 181-193.
    6. Fondeur, Y. & Karamé, F., 2013. "Can Google data help predict French youth unemployment?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 117-125.
    7. Ghysels, Eric & Santa-Clara, Pedro & Valkanov, Rossen, 2006. "Predicting volatility: getting the most out of return data sampled at different frequencies," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 131(1-2), pages 59-95.
    8. Clark, Todd E. & McCracken, Michael W., 2001. "Tests of equal forecast accuracy and encompassing for nested models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 105(1), pages 85-110, November.
    9. Ulrich Gunter & Irem Önder & Stefan Gindl, 2019. "Exploring the predictive ability of LIKES of posts on the Facebook pages of four major city DMOs in Austria," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 375-401, May.
    10. Bangwayo-Skeete, Prosper F. & Skeete, Ryan W., 2015. "Can Google data improve the forecasting performance of tourist arrivals? Mixed-data sampling approach," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 454-464.
    11. Ghysels, Eric & Wright, Jonathan H., 2009. "Forecasting Professional Forecasters," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 27(4), pages 504-516.
    12. Yan Carrière‐Swallow & Felipe Labbé, 2013. "Nowcasting with Google Trends in an Emerging Market," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(4), pages 289-298, July.
    13. D’Amuri, Francesco & Marcucci, Juri, 2017. "The predictive power of Google searches in forecasting US unemployment," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 801-816.
    14. Han Liu & Ying Liu & Yonglian Wang & Changchun Pan, 2019. "Hot topics and emerging trends in tourism forecasting research: A scientometric review," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 448-468, May.
    15. Thomas B. Götz & Alain Hecq & Jean‐Pierre Urbain, 2014. "Forecasting Mixed‐Frequency Time Series with ECM‐MIDAS Models," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 33(3), pages 198-213, April.
    16. Kwiatkowski, Denis & Phillips, Peter C. B. & Schmidt, Peter & Shin, Yongcheol, 1992. "Testing the null hypothesis of stationarity against the alternative of a unit root : How sure are we that economic time series have a unit root?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1-3), pages 159-178.
    17. Long Wen & Chang Liu & Haiyan Song, 2019. "Forecasting tourism demand using search query data: A hybrid modelling approach," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 309-329, May.
    18. Egon Smeral, 2019. "Seasonal forecasting performance considering varying income elasticities in tourism demand," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 355-374, May.
    19. Hong, Wei-Chiang, 2011. "Electric load forecasting by seasonal recurrent SVR (support vector regression) with chaotic artificial bee colony algorithm," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 36(9), pages 5568-5578.
    20. Dean Fantazzini & Nikita Fomichev, 2014. "Forecasting the real price of oil using online search data," International Journal of Computational Economics and Econometrics, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 4(1/2), pages 4-31.
    21. Kuzin, Vladimir & Marcellino, Massimiliano & Schumacher, Christian, 2011. "MIDAS vs. mixed-frequency VAR: Nowcasting GDP in the euro area," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 529-542.
    22. Fantazzini, Dean & Toktamysova, Zhamal, 2015. "Forecasting German car sales using Google data and multivariate models," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 170(PA), pages 97-135.
    23. Francis X. Diebold & Roberto S. Mariano, 1991. "Comparing predictive accuracy I: an asymptotic test," Discussion Paper / Institute for Empirical Macroeconomics 52, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
    24. Claveria, Oscar & Torra, Salvador, 2014. "Forecasting tourism demand to Catalonia: Neural networks vs. time series models," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 220-228.
    25. Andreou, Elena & Ghysels, Eric & Kourtellos, Andros, 2010. "Regression models with mixed sampling frequencies," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 158(2), pages 246-261, October.
    26. Girardin, Eric & Joyeux, Roselyne, 2013. "Macro fundamentals as a source of stock market volatility in China: A GARCH-MIDAS approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 59-68.
    27. Athanasopoulos, George & Hyndman, Rob J. & Song, Haiyan & Wu, Doris C., 2011. "The tourism forecasting competition," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 822-844, July.
    28. Hyunyoung Choi & Hal Varian, 2012. "Predicting the Present with Google Trends," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 88(s1), pages 2-9, June.
    29. Song, Haiyan & Li, Gang & Witt, Stephen F. & Athanasopoulos, George, 2011. "Forecasting tourist arrivals using time-varying parameter structural time series models," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 855-869.
    30. Vanja Dukic & Hedibert F. Lopes & Nicholas G. Polson, 2012. "Tracking Epidemics With Google Flu Trends Data and a State-Space SEIR Model," Journal of the American Statistical Association, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 107(500), pages 1410-1426, December.
    31. Harvey, David & Leybourne, Stephen & Newbold, Paul, 1997. "Testing the equality of prediction mean squared errors," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 281-291, June.
    32. J. Isaac Miller, 2016. "Conditionally Efficient Estimation of Long-Run Relationships Using Mixed-Frequency Time Series," Econometric Reviews, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(6), pages 1142-1171, June.
    33. Law, Rob & Li, Gang & Fong, Davis Ka Chio & Han, Xin, 2019. "Tourism demand forecasting: A deep learning approach," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 410-423.
    34. Robert F. Engle & Eric Ghysels & Bumjean Sohn, 2013. "Stock Market Volatility and Macroeconomic Fundamentals," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 95(3), pages 776-797, July.
    35. Katerina Volchek & Anyu Liu & Haiyan Song & Dimitrios Buhalis, 2019. "Forecasting tourist arrivals at attractions: Search engine empowered methodologies," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 425-447, May.
    36. Akın, Melda, 2015. "A novel approach to model selection in tourism demand modeling," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 64-72.
    37. Hadavandi, Esmaeil & Ghanbari, Arash & Shahanaghi, Kamran & Abbasian-Naghneh, Salman, 2011. "Tourist arrival forecasting by evolutionary fuzzy systems," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 32(5), pages 1196-1203.
    38. Rivera, Roberto, 2016. "A dynamic linear model to forecast hotel registrations in Puerto Rico using Google Trends data," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 12-20.
    39. Paul Smith, 2016. "Google's MIDAS Touch: Predicting UK Unemployment with Internet Search Data," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(3), pages 263-284, April.
    40. Gonzalez, Pilar & Moral, Paz, 1995. "An analysis of the international tourism demand in Spain," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 11(2), pages 233-251, June.
    41. Maximo Camacho & Matías José Pacce, 2018. "Forecasting travellers in Spain with Google’s search volume indices," Tourism Economics, , vol. 24(4), pages 434-448, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Tihana Škrinjarić, 2019. "Time Varying Spillovers between the Online Search Volume and Stock Returns: Case of CESEE Markets," IJFS, MDPI, vol. 7(4), pages 1-30, October.
    2. Patrik Kajzar & Radim Dolák & Radmila Krkošková, 2021. "Using Google Trends in International Tourism: A Case Study of the Czech and Slovak Republics," Academica Turistica - Tourism and Innovation Journal, University of Primorska Press, vol. 14(2), pages 205-216.
    3. Marta Crispino & Vincenzo Mariani, 2023. "A tool to nowcast tourist overnight stays with payment data and complementary indicators," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 746, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    4. Tianxiang Zheng & Shaopeng Liu & Zini Chen & Yuhan Qiao & Rob Law, 2020. "Forecasting Daily Room Rates on the Basis of an LSTM Model in Difficult Times of Hong Kong: Evidence from Online Distribution Channels on the Hotel Industry," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(18), pages 1-17, September.
    5. Hatice Öncel Çekim & Ahmet Koyuncu, 2022. "The Impact of Google Trends on the Tourist Arrivals: A Case of Antalya Tourism," Alphanumeric Journal, Bahadir Fatih Yildirim, vol. 10(1), pages 1-14, June.
    6. Wanhai You & Yuming Huang & Chien‐Chiang Lee, 2024. "Forecasting tourist flows in the COVID‐19 era using nonparametric mixed‐frequency VARs," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(2), pages 473-489, March.
    7. Silva, Emmanuel Sirimal & Hassani, Hossein, 2022. "‘Modelling’ UK tourism demand using fashion retail sales," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    8. Juan Manuel García Sánchez & Xavier Vilasís Cardona & Alexandre Lerma Martín, 2022. "Influence of Car Configurator Webpage Data from Automotive Manufacturers on Car Sales by Means of Correlation and Forecasting," Forecasting, MDPI, vol. 4(3), pages 1-20, July.
    9. Abay,Kibrom A. & Hirfrfot,Kibrom Tafere & Woldemichael,Andinet, 2020. "Winners and Losers from COVID-19 : Global Evidence from Google Search," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9268, The World Bank.
    10. Nava, Consuelo R. & Osti, Linda & Zoia, Maria Grazia, 2022. "Forecasting Domestic Tourism across Regional Destinations through MIDAS Regressions," Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis. Working Papers 202207, University of Turin.
    11. Nicolas Woloszko, 2020. "Tracking activity in real time with Google Trends," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 1634, OECD Publishing.
    12. Gang Xie & Xin Li & Yatong Qian & Shouyang Wang, 2021. "Forecasting tourism demand with KPCA-based web search indexes," Tourism Economics, , vol. 27(4), pages 721-743, June.
    13. Abay, Kibrom A. & Ibrahim, Hosam, 2020. "Winners and losers from COVID-19: Evidence from Google search data for Egypt," MENA policy notes 8, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    14. Ahmed Shoukry Rashad, 2022. "The Power of Travel Search Data in Forecasting the Tourism Demand in Dubai," Forecasting, MDPI, vol. 4(3), pages 1-11, July.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Havranek, Tomas & Zeynalov, Ayaz, 2018. "Forecasting Tourist Arrivals with Google Trends and Mixed Frequency Data," EconStor Preprints 187420, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    2. Zeynalov, Ayaz, 2017. "Forecasting Tourist Arrivals in Prague: Google Econometrics," MPRA Paper 83268, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Gang Xie & Xin Li & Yatong Qian & Shouyang Wang, 2021. "Forecasting tourism demand with KPCA-based web search indexes," Tourism Economics, , vol. 27(4), pages 721-743, June.
    4. Zeynalov, Ayaz, 2014. "Nowcasting Tourist Arrivals to Prague: Google Econometrics," MPRA Paper 60945, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Benedikt Maas, 2020. "Short‐term forecasting of the US unemployment rate," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 39(3), pages 394-411, April.
    6. Ulrich Gunter & Irem Önder & Stefan Gindl, 2019. "Exploring the predictive ability of LIKES of posts on the Facebook pages of four major city DMOs in Austria," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 375-401, May.
    7. Li, Hengyun & Hu, Mingming & Li, Gang, 2020. "Forecasting tourism demand with multisource big data," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    8. Song, Haiyan & Qiu, Richard T.R. & Park, Jinah, 2019. "A review of research on tourism demand forecasting," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 338-362.
    9. Eden Xiaoying Jiao & Jason Li Chen, 2019. "Tourism forecasting: A review of methodological developments over the last decade," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 469-492, May.
    10. Long Wen & Chang Liu & Haiyan Song, 2019. "Forecasting tourism demand using search query data: A hybrid modelling approach," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 309-329, May.
    11. Yang, Yang & Fan, Yawen & Jiang, Lan & Liu, Xiaohui, 2022. "Search query and tourism forecasting during the pandemic: When and where can digital footprints be helpful as predictors?," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 93(C).
    12. Serhan Cevik, 2022. "Where should we go? Internet searches and tourist arrivals," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(4), pages 4048-4057, October.
    13. Petropoulos, Fotios & Apiletti, Daniele & Assimakopoulos, Vassilios & Babai, Mohamed Zied & Barrow, Devon K. & Ben Taieb, Souhaib & Bergmeir, Christoph & Bessa, Ricardo J. & Bijak, Jakub & Boylan, Joh, 2022. "Forecasting: theory and practice," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 705-871.
      • Fotios Petropoulos & Daniele Apiletti & Vassilios Assimakopoulos & Mohamed Zied Babai & Devon K. Barrow & Souhaib Ben Taieb & Christoph Bergmeir & Ricardo J. Bessa & Jakub Bijak & John E. Boylan & Jet, 2020. "Forecasting: theory and practice," Papers 2012.03854, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2022.
    14. Ling Tang & Chengyuan Zhang & Tingfei Li & Ling Li, 2021. "A novel BEMD-based method for forecasting tourist volume with search engine data," Tourism Economics, , vol. 27(5), pages 1015-1038, August.
    15. Doris Chenguang Wu & Shiteng Zhong & Richard T R Qiu & Ji Wu, 2022. "Are customer reviews just reviews? Hotel forecasting using sentiment analysis," Tourism Economics, , vol. 28(3), pages 795-816, May.
    16. J. Isaac Miller, 2014. "Mixed-frequency Cointegrating Regressions with Parsimonious Distributed Lag Structures," Journal of Financial Econometrics, Oxford University Press, vol. 12(3), pages 584-614.
    17. Miller, J. Isaac, 2018. "Simple robust tests for the specification of high-frequency predictors of a low-frequency series," Econometrics and Statistics, Elsevier, vol. 5(C), pages 45-66.
    18. Bangwayo-Skeete, Prosper F. & Skeete, Ryan W., 2015. "Can Google data improve the forecasting performance of tourist arrivals? Mixed-data sampling approach," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 454-464.
    19. Katerina Volchek & Anyu Liu & Haiyan Song & Dimitrios Buhalis, 2019. "Forecasting tourist arrivals at attractions: Search engine empowered methodologies," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 425-447, May.
    20. Schaer, Oliver & Kourentzes, Nikolaos & Fildes, Robert, 2019. "Demand forecasting with user-generated online information," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 197-212.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    forecasting; Google Trends; mixed-frequency data; tourism;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C53 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Forecasting and Prediction Models; Simulation Methods
    • L83 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Sports; Gambling; Restaurants; Recreation; Tourism

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:toueco:v:27:y:2021:i:1:p:129-148. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.