Four destinations received a sharp upsurge in interest from British holidaymakers after they were featured in the ITV talent show, the X Factor, at the weekend.

Morocco, the destination for Cheryl Cole and her prodigies, was the biggest beneficiary from a prime time airing.

Flight searches to Marrakesh were up 43 per cent in the days after the show compared to the same month last year.

Italy received a 21 per cent increase in searches after Lake Como featured, while Los Angeles was 17 per cent up and Dubai 7 per cent, according to travel retailer Flight Centre.

Rival website Travelsupermarket.com has also seen a massive uplift for the destinations featured in the show.

Lake Como flight searches were up 355 per cent on the previous week, Marrakesh up 196 per cent and Dubai up 193 per cent, while LA saw no discernible uplift.

Duncan Barraclough, travel expert at travelsupermarket.com said: “In the past we have seen that films can inspire people to travel to a destination, for example we saw an uplift in flight searches for India following the release of Slumdog Millionaire, Greece following Mamma Mia and Australia following the film Australia.

“People love to day dream about visiting the destinations of the stars and it seems the X-factor locations last weekend really caught the publics’ imagination.”

Accommodation searches for the four destinations also received a boost. The trends are reversed though, with Dubai receiving the greatest interest according to accommodation-only retailer, HotelConnect.

It claims hotel searches for Dubai were up 100 per cent in the past week, Los Angeles was up 76 per cent and Marrakesh up 61 per cent.

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