Hotel World Map
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I just visited the initiator (Vincent) of HotelWorldMap. It’s a full screen google maps interface mashed up with a Hotel database of over 60.000 hotels worldwide. You can search a hotel by ‘going’ to a city or area, zoom in and click on one of the available hotels.
It’s a nice feature, but still a bit buggy (the search box doesn’t work in FF, its pretty slow). Vincent told me that still a lot has to be done to make it more useful, but the first reactions were good.
Although I don’t see a real big market here for Vincent, it is a nice new way to find hotels. It probably fits better to a large travel agency or e.g. tripadvisor, than as a standalone service.
I hope Vincent keeps developing to give the visitors a great experience. All the best
Uri L. said,
Wrote on September 14, 2006 @ 2:29 pm
I had a chance also to look at HotelWorldMap, and the idea is certainly nice. Map based search for hotels/accomodation can be much more useful and productive for some people, including me.
The immediate reference I had was the Spanish great YP map search - http://callejero.paginasamarillas.es/home.asp
I used the Callejero to find a hotel in Barcelona, 5 days before the 3GSM begun, then the whole city was fully booked. I managed to find a great place right at the city centre (near Placa Sant Jaume), which I couldn’t find any other way - becuase this hotel is a family guest house that doesn’t use internet bookings at all. So normal bookings sites wouldn’t show it. Only a map connected to a wide database of guest houses managed to solve my needs and the result was fantastic.
So for last minute booking - map based search for hotels could be very useful. But it does need to provide an added value upon the usual travel sites/mappy.com/YP directories, and integrate a bigger enough venues database.
Travel is a veteran and crowded vertical search sector, with huge players, but there’s still a place for innovation in UI and search experience.
It’s a bit early to decide where HotelWorldMap can be positioned, but from my short look at it I would guess there are 2 angels where it can possibly find strengths:
1. For Last minute bookings, especially for big events, it might provide the extra crucial value needed for late/lousy/lazy hotel bookers (like me :). However it needs to show also the places that aren’t connected to the dominant online booking services.
2. For a different search experience. If the site could present a catchy and easy map based search for hotels, and combine it maybe with other exclusice features, there’s an opportunity to build a differentiation, attract users who are already looking for this type of search, and following this - develop advertising and sponsored links monetization.
The map based view also opens new ways for advertising plans - using the visual interface of the map.
The common method today in search engines is buying sponsored text links spots in the results page. But with a map view, you can come with interesting graphic representations over the map that could attract viewers and drive more clicks. Like a bigger or flashing pin icon, a “+” sign, or other creative ajax magics.
Btw, the Dutch YP also have a very nice web 2.0 look, with cute ajax implementations.
Vincent said,
Wrote on September 14, 2006 @ 3:41 pm
Thanks for the feedback guys, appreciate it. I see the project as a working beta for a new hotel search/browse interface, and it was developed out of my own frustration with the existing travel portals. They require too many steps to find out even the basic information. The big portals show you a cluttered interface, they try to sell you not just the hotel but also the flight and the car and they constantly push you toward certain offers.
Hotel World Map is a more neutral browsing experience. It doesn’t push you to certain offers and it’s easier to find a hotel close to the beach, or near a venue because you can immediately see it’s location. And switch to the satellite imagery.
Some features that I would like to add are Points of Interest (plot the tourist attractions, airports, conference centers, etc. on the map) so that it’s easier to locate your hotel relative to those. And pricing for the hotels in the pop-up window. You’ll be seeing those enhancements very soon.
Paul said,
Wrote on September 14, 2006 @ 3:42 pm
Hey Patrick!
Leuk initiatief man! Hoe gaan de zaken? Spreken snel weer ff af om bij te praten, ben benieuwd.
Grtz
patrick said,
Wrote on September 14, 2006 @ 3:54 pm
HI Uri,
Thanks for your extensive comment. I totally agree with you on the examples you gave. We’re gonna see a lot more map based search UI’s. Let’s keep on developing!
patrick said,
Wrote on September 14, 2006 @ 4:18 pm
@paul
offtopic–
Hi Paul, It’s going quite fine :) drop me an email and we’ll make an appointment for a coffee. Are you still in the music DNA business?