If Only I Could Create the Perfect Travel Website (2008)
1. If only I could make the
perfect travel website
Jason Till, Digital Production Director, Designate
2. It would
• Know what I like • Alert me
• – e.g. architecture, kite surfing, good • via a widget, gadget, or RSS feed
food – and make suggestions when a deal which was relevant to me
• Provide believable reviews appeared
• from people like me • Know my budget
• Have multimedia • but know when I’d be prepared to
break it.
• - a short video documentary of the • Know where I lived
destination. IPIX and photo gallery
• Show me an interesting events calendar • and be able to calculate the price of
my train ticket to the airport and
• which could be personalised to me compare this with different airport
and integrate with my Outlook diary locations and the total holiday cost
• Give me a map-driven itinerary • Provide group travel functionality
• with local transport information which I • (which could integrate with Facebook).
could download using to my mobile • Have a “wish list / shortlist”
device, display on a map and share
with other people by bluetoothing it to • which other people could login to and
them – with GPS see and add to.
• Be beautiful to look at • Be easy to use
• Never break
3. There’s no such thing as the
perfect travel website
- but most of the functionality I’ve mentioned
already exists across a number of them
4. Legacy systems can
constrain how travel sites
work
But you still have a lot of
control over brand (selling,
imagery) and usability
5. Today
• A quick anatomy lesson
• Audience research – what this tells us about what people
want
• The importance of the brand and communication
• The (broken) customer journey
• Some dos and don’ts
• Building blocks you need, process and specialist skills
7. Basic anatomy of a home
page Clearly-placed contact number
Brand logo
Hero shot
with deals
Search
Promos
Newsletter
registration
Listed deals / offers
8. Behind the scenes it can be complex
SEO
Travel search Templates
Booking CRM
Booking Content
Destination “Selling”
Inventory Weather Events UGC
Guides content
Sign up
Content
XML / Webservice XML / Webservice XML / Webservice
Management
RSS
XML / Webservice
Secure
Multimedia
payment Email
gateway
5 3rd party 3rd party 3rd party 3rd party
4
3
2
1
Analytics
3rd party
3rd Party data
3rd party
9. What is perfect?
Traveller (generic) The challenge is
to tie these
Price Location Inspiration together
Flexibility Rich Content
Childcare Choice E-commerce Director
Extras Fun Optimised for SEO
Data capture
Luxury
Conversion High margin
Deals
Low booking latency
Low click to book
Low cost of maintenance
Performance Easy upkeep
11. Examining Travellers’ primary motivations
Safety, security and
privacy guarantees
Family
Childcare
motivated
Efficiency
Flexibility 26%
Control
Unknown brand
Compare/contrast
Career results and details.
motivated
Social computing 43%
Slow-to-load Web sites
Audio, video, colour
Elaborate Flash-based
Virtual tours intro screens
Highly impulsive – Not enough detail
excellent target for
cross selling and last
minute offers – RSS
feeds etc.
Poor design
Entertainment
Too much text motivated
31%
Source: Forrester's Technographics Q2 2007
European Benchmark Mail Study” &Designate
Communications
12. Travel research is among the most popular online activity
Use free Web-based email (e.g.,
50%
Hotmail)
Research holiday destinations 50%
Prepare trips online (maps, directions) 48%
Read news online 46%
Use IM 40%
Use reference sites 39%
Look up sports information 28%
Base: Online Europeans leisure travellers
(multiple responses accepted)
Source: Forrester’s Consumer Technographics® May 2007
14. European “Lookers and Bookers” are an elite group
Offline leisure Online leisure
travellers travellers
Age 54 39
% Male 45% 53%
Education (upper) 14% 37%
Income (upper) 19% 41%
# leisure trips/year 4.8 5.5
Base: Online European leisure travellers
Source: Forrester’s Consumer Technographics® May 2007
17. New customer journey
“Iterative Ideation”
Looking Decided On location Back home
a destination OR experience
Travelling
Travelling
experiencing
sharing memories
research communicating
thinking about
Inspiration the next trip
19. “Advertising at its worst has been killed by the Internet”*
• Sites don’t differentiate brands or tailor their product
offering to suit people’s needs nearly enough
• Competition is still largely focussed on price and volume
represented as “choice”
• As the research shows, customers want more
*(Maurice Saatchi)
20. emotional
Research has shown that strong
online branding increases
purchase intent but only if the
site meets basic usability
standards.
Rational /
practical
21. Design for the emotional and rational
The company I buy leisure travel from Lookers 25% Trust -online than 2/3 need
All More
doesn't matter as much as getting the leisure
Bookers 33% reassurance
absolutely lowest fare/rate travelers
Staying within my budget is more important 46% More than ½ could be inspired
Bookers
than going to my first-choice destination 37% to spend more
I will pay above-average prices for better 31%
1/3 will pay more for quality
quality travel products or service 37%
I will pay more for travel products that save 36% More than 1/3 people will pay extra if the
site can dynamically package and the
me time and hassle 41%
usability is good
Price is more important to me than brand 50% An interesting split – shows that people will
names 50% shop around if they don’t get what they want
46% You can attempt to get 2/3 of
Travel is an area in which I indulge myself
65% people to indulging themselves
Base: Online Europeans leisure travellers
(multiple responses accepted)
Source: Forrester’s Consumer Technographics® May 2007
22. Aligning user and brand
Site effectiveness – Your Site efficiency
differentiation – the Your “hygiene factor”
opportunity the fundamentals
User Emotional Rational / practical
• Adventure • Where is it?
• Escape • Who do I call?
• Romance • How do I get there?
• Luxury • Does the site work properly?
• Spa • Is it in my price range?
• Nightlife • Can I get a refund?
• Sport
• Culture
• Food
Brand Image Action
(brand position) (brand delivery)
• Is the proposition supported by the content? • Does the site support the user goals (e.g. book / register /
• E.g. if it promises the “best holidays” is this search)?
backed up by a an engaging, rich / rewarding user • Is the site language easy to understand?
experience? • Are the icons and graphics easy to understand?
• Does multimedia and imagery support promise? • Does it meet accessibilty requirements?
• Is the imagery / layout / aesthetic appealing for • Does it display and the functionalitywork in all main browsers
the target audience?
• Language – tone of voice, clarity, lack of jargon.
23. Get the emotional proposition right - The
Creative Brief
• What’s your proposition?
• What are your objectives?
• What’s the market insight?
• What are the consumer insights?
• What’s the single most important thing to say?
• Reasons to believe (compelling truths)?
• What do you want them to do?
• How do you want them to feel?
26. … to creating an emotional proposition that resonates
with people’s interests
• Kayaking
• Gardens
• Surfing
• Country and
• Kitesurfing
coastal walks
• Coasteering
• Country parks
• Mountain
biking
• Museums and galleries
• Performing arts
• Arts and crafts
• Food and drink
27. Think about how the BBC has
repackaged Ski Sunday
• More lifestyle
• More like Top Gear
• Not just the racing and results
• Placing normal people in the picture, not just
super-athletes
• More magazine-like – features on
food, adventure, wildlife, trekking, training
• More inclusive
29. Get the practical / rational stuff right: apply a user-centred design
approach and achieve true usability
• Design for real people
• Create personas (pen portraits) and think about their objectives
• Use these to help model your route through the Website
• Test your assumptions with real people
• Increases ROI No single rule of thumb, but…
• Case studies for e-commerce sites after a usability-led redesign have seen over 100%
increase in revenue.
• Investment generally considered to payback 10:1
• Increase transactions / purchases
• Increases traffic
• Retains customers
• Attracts more customers
• Increases user satisfaction
• http://www.usabilityprofessionals.org/usability_resources/usability_in_the_real_world/
roi_of_usability.html
30. Get it working in ALL main browsers
31/1/2008 W3 Counter.com
32. ✗Unclear proposition – no anchoring
✗Confusing / unclear
Brand logo statement or strapline ✗No emotive
categorisation
photography
RSS feeds
Contact
Search
✗ Menu 2 X
too long – Promos
needs to be
kept to 6 or
7 items for
usability
List of Deals
Some “inspiration” (if limited)
33. ✗ No brand positioning ✗ no strapline ✗ imagery could be better
Brand logo Contact RSS feed
Deals
✗
Benefits
not sold
Search
Socialboo
k-marking
Sign up
Award
Offers
Inspiration
34. ✗ no positioning ✗ no strapline ✗ limited imagery ✗ no sign up
✗ no differentiation ✗ no contact
Search
Brand logo Deals
RSS
Offers
35. Inspirational “hero shot”
Clear positioning
✗Text too
dense –
Simple
needs to
navigation
be broken
menu
up
Clear layout; good use of imagery
36. Inspirational “hero shot”
Good anchoring statement (if wordy) and good use of imagery
Simple
navigation
menu
✗no deals ✗no contact number
Clear layout ✗positioning could be stronger
– maybe a strapline
37. Beautiful hero shot with
Excellent positioning strapline inspirational message
Text
resizer –
good
usability
accessibility
User
generated
content
Clear layout and
design
38. Beautiful hero shot with
Excellent positioning strapline inspirational message
✗deals
could be
pushed
Good
inspiration /
Clear selling copy
layout and
design
40. Clear brand proposition
Excellent positioning statement
Beautiful imagery
Categorised
by experience
- with
inspirational
copy - it’s not
all about
price and
location
Official
logos
inspire trust
✗even though it’s a “quality” Website, offers could be pushed
41. Clear brand proposition with Excellent positioning statement
Not afraid to Beautiful imagery with simple, emotive copy
sell offers
Award
winning –
builds trust
Categorise
d by
experience –
more
inspirational
42. Beautiful imagery
Clear anchoring
Emotive selling / seasonal offer
statement
Search
help
clearly
appeals to
how real
users think
✗E-mail
sign-up
below “the
fold”
48. Getting more out of mapping
Search returns further results within Results
a 10 mile radius Distances from categorised by
accommodation type of
shown in miles experience
65. Traditional Website Map
About Contact Help T&Cs
Home
Search / Destination
Deals / offers Reviews Booking
results guides
66. Understanding your site within context of the customer
journey will make your site work harder
Inspiration
Planning Share
Booking
Search
Search Offers Experience
results (detail)
Group Booking
travel Assistance
Country form
Browse pages
Product (maps,
pages climate,
travel tips
etc.)
Online Call centre
Promos
Getting to a simple result can be complicated…
Home Form Post
Booking contents tour
Flow to call Email
Brief itin. How would centre
you like to
City pages book?
Full itin.
Maps Callback
Corporate
Hotels Community
T&C Jobs
Press Create your
Tours Photo /
releases Dates own brochure Reviews
reunited video gallery
Telephone
Green Opening
issues hours Tell a Online
Wallpapers
friend Qstnre
Call me
User utilities
Personal
Insurance sales
consultant
Travel Currency
Extras converter
Your personal pages
Pre holiday During holiday Post holiday
Personal Family Hotel
Items for Question
My info sales and Day’s itin contact
dist naire
consultant friends details
67. Surface
Visual design is
late in the
Skeleton
process.
Structure
Scope
Strategy
By Jesse James Garrett of Adaptive Path - http://www.jjg.net/ia/
68. How to get there
Understand marketing objectives, target
audience, benchmark the competition and Benchmarks
create the proposition. and KPIs
Discover
Define
Design
Delivering
the project
Develop
Iterate / apply learning Deliver
Delivering the User
Experience Surface
Skeleton
Structure
Scope
Strategy
Apply to ongoing site improvement
Create audience personas Testing, iterative Lifetime testing
– pen portraits of people prototyping, focus groups
69. Key performance factors - usability
• Is the essential content available where needed?
• Is essential function available where needed?
• Are category and subcategory names clear and mutually exclusive?
• Does the site use language that’s easy to understand?
• Does the site use graphics, icons, and symbols that are easy to
understand?
• Is text legible?
• Are interactiveelements easily recognizable?
• Does the site perform well?
70. A “recipe” for creating the perfect travel Website
• Establish a clear brand proposition: differentiate
• Make sure this comes through in all content – words, pictures, moving images
• Get to know how people think about holidays – experience – take your top 20
destinations and re-categorise all the holidays into “experiences”
• Test with real users before you commit to a final design
• Think about where your Website sits in the overall customer journey and what
features you can employ to extend it’s reach, and where you can push information to
them, and pull them back in to create content for you.
• Employ an Information / User Experience Architect (from a usability or design
agency)
• Keep an eye on the detail – small issues can irk big time
• Make sure it works in all main browsers and doesn’t rely on Javascript
• Keep benchmarking your site against others.
• Keep testing your site for performance - fix it if it breaks