For Travel Planning, Search Engines May Not Be Your Best Destination

Jul 25, 2010 at 2:59pm ET by Chris Sherman 

It's that time of year when many of us turn to the internet for information, advice and maps to help plan a getaway for some rest and relaxation. Many people start with search engines to help them find travel related sites. Others seek out maps to help plan routes or check out street level images of hotels, restaurants and attractions. Still others turn to social rating and review sites, hoping to benefit from the experiences of others rather than relying on marketing hype from travel service providers.

There are a ton of great resources out there to help you research and plan your holiday. But there is no single, comprehensive source that will give you everything you need to know. And some sites with some really excellent resources are sadly lacking in tools or information easily found elsewhere.

This is the first of a two part series looking at the best travel search resources on the internet. I'm going to start, naturally, with the three major search engines. Of the three, just Bing and Yahoo have prominent and rich travel verticals (but don't count Google out—more on its apparent plans in the travel space later).

Next I'll look at the online versions of popular travel guides featured prominently at your favorite bookstores. Like their print kin, these are generally rich with information, photos, maps and advice. Some leverage the interactive potential of the web, offering tools, customization, mobile apps and more. Others are essentially online brochures.

I'm purposely avoiding the major online travel agencies like Expedia, Priceline, Travelocity,Orbitz, Kayak and others. They're useful sites, but their primary function is to either sell you a travel product or refer you a seller's site. Rather, I'm going to focus on sites that either help you search for travel information, or help you plan and assemble an itinerary independently of how you intend to travel.

So let the journey begin.

Travel planning with Bing, Google & Yahoo

Many people almost reflexively begin travel planning with the major search engines. And why not? All three offer good mapping services—in fact, Hitwise ranks Google Maps as the #1 travel site with a 15% market share, nearly double the share of #2 Mapquest and 5 times third place Expedia.

But as useful as the major search engines can be in helping you plan a trip, they all have strengths and weaknesses when it comes to travelers aid.

General travel queries

For a query like "duluth vacation," each search engine offers a very different set of results. Both Bing and Google results for the query "duluth vacation" (Bing, Google) skew toward heavily SEO'd property and rental sites, with a few links to information resources. Both also offer a local map and easy access to local search listings, as well as a set of suggested related searches that can help you refine your query. Yahoo's results are a bit broader, including links to more info from Yahoo's travel vertical, Trip Advisor and the Vacation Rentals By Owner website.

Bottom line: If you're just starting your vacation planning, general search engines can help you get a good initial "lay of the land." But if you have a good idea of where you want to go you're better off going directly to one of the travel planner sites I'll be reviewing later this week.

Using maps for travel planning

For a long journey, it's useful to have detailed driving directions, overhead and street-level images to help you get a sense of place, and particularly if you're traveling in urban areas, real-time traffic info. All three major search engines have very good and usually accurate (careful, though! not always) maps at Bing Maps, Google Maps and Yahoo Local Maps (this is a link to the beta version which I think is better than the current service).

Of the three, I prefer Google for driving directions, primarily because it has autosuggest enabled, making it easy to select different variations of keywords for your query (though Bing and Yahoo have autosuggest for web search, they don't offer it for maps). Google also offers alternative routes for some trips. By default, all three mapping services look for the fastest, most direct route to a destination, which in most cases is what you want. But if you're more interested in a scenic route, especially for longer trips, you'll want to experiment with adding cities or landmarks as waypoints between your starting and ending locations.

Arguably the biggest difference between the three is in the print versions of your itineraries. Each offers a map of your journey, but renders step-by-step directions differently. Bing's are visually rich, with road sign symbols, visual turn indicators and nice total miles/time markers for each step. In addition to the map of your complete journey, Bing also includes smaller maps of your beginning and endpoints. In the list of directions, Google offers road sign symbols and visual turn indicators, but the layout isn't as easy to read as Bing's—for some, an important difference when you're simultaneously driving and trying to read directions. Yahoo's driving directions are the most spartan, but it also offer options for beginning and end point maps. Here are sample driving directions from each of the three—click on the links to see the complete list:

Bing map & directions: Newport Beach to Brooklyn

 

Google map & directions: Newport Beach to Brooklyn

 

Yahoo map & directions: Newport Beach to Brooklyn

 

Bottom line: Each of the major search engines' mapping functions are useful, with just a few variations in features. Which one you ultimately use will likely be more determined by your comfort factor than due to differences in functionality or accuracy.

Search engine travel verticals

At the moment, just Yahoo has a fully-fledged travel vertical with its Yahoo Travel property, with comprehensive booking, research and planning tools. Although positioned as a vertical, Bing Travel isn't as comprehensive as Yahoo (Bing does aggregate travel articles from other sources and publish some original content, though it isn't easy to find). However, Bing does offer some excellent and unique fare and rate comparison tools that help you find good deals on travel—it just lacks the guides and other tools that Yahoo offers.

What Bing does that no other travel site does is attempt to predict when to buy, when to fly, and where to stay based on a huge volume of airfare and hotel rate data it processes every day.

At its most basic, you can enter two cities and the dates you want to travel, and like most travel sites Bing will present you with a list of airfares, hotel offers and links to book online. But Bing takes this a step farther, and also tells you if this is the best time to make a booking or not:

If Bing suggests that you wait, when exactly should you book? To find out, click the "Flexible search" link on the menu bar:

Re-run your flight search, and you're presented with three options: a map, showing your route, a graph, showing you when to travel, and a grid, showing options when you vary the length of your trip. To determine the best time to buy if you have fixed dates, select the graph:

This shows a chart of predicted prices over the coming month for your itinerary, based on historical data and other factors (such as holidays, major conventions or events happening in your destination city, and so on). Note: you'll need to be careful here, as the chart shows the dates when predicted fares for specific dates should be lowest, not the date you should purchase a ticket. Airline fares constantly change—what this graph shows you is a probable trend in fares, not exact pricing. You'll need to think about other factors like early purchase discounts when making your purchase decision.

If you have some flexibility with your travel dates, you'll get another interesting view of predicted prices based on the duration of your stay mapped with suggested departure dates for your trip:

Notice the more than $400 dollar difference if you simply change the dates and duration of your trip! Using these tools, it's possible to save some serious coin when making your reservations, usually without doing anything other than following Bing's recommendations.

If you're looking for a hotel, Bing will also look at historical prices and will offer an opinion about the rate a particular hotel is offering:

Although Google has sent a clear signal that it intends to become a big player in travel with its recent purchase of travel reservations software company ITA, as well getting the team behind travel guide site Ruba to "join" Google, for the time being its only pure travel related services apart from maps are flight tracking and currency conversion—just type any U.S. airline and flight number (united 929) or monetary conversion (100 USD in ZAR) directly into any Google search box.

Bottom line: Bing's travel vertical offers unique planning tools, and some useful information (if you can find it). But in general, if you're looking for travel guides, route planning tools and other resources to help you with your trip, you're better off with Yahoo travel or one of the other travel planning resources I've written about in The Thirteen Best Online Travel Guides.

Moving forward

General-purpose search engines try to offer reasonable results regardless of the type of query. But to get really useful travel information, you're almost always better off seeking out specialized resources. Read on for an in-depth look at the web's most useful travel planning resources:

>> The Thirteen Best Online Travel Guides

Collaborative Mapping Startup CloudMade Lands $12.3 Million From Greylock

CloudMade, which provides collaborative data and tools to developers and OEMs for mapping and navigation applications, has raised $12.3 million in series B funding led by Greylock Partners with existing investor Sunstone Capital participating in the round. This brings the startup's total funding to $15.7 million.

CloudMade's platform allows third parties to create applications with stylized and customized map tiles, fully featured turn-by-turn navigation, in-app advertising, local search and data sets relevant to thousands of consumer activities. CloudMade distributes its collaborative mapping, package maps, geo services and advertising to developers and businesses; its main customers are mobile developers, OEMs and network operators. Some of the 12,000-plus developers using CloudMade's API include Skobbler, OffMaps, Geocaching, Trails, Ride the City, GayCities, Dopplr and MotionX GPS.

The startup uses data from partnership with OpenStreetMap (OSM), a wiki map of the world that has over 250,000 users worldwide (and is adding 3,500 new users per week), making over 7,000 edits per hour. CloudMade's CEO Juha Christensen likens the relationship between his company and OSM to that of the Mozilla Corporation and the non-profit arm Mozilla Foundation. In fact, OpenStreetMap founder Steve Coast works at CloudMade.

The company will use the funding to attempt to build the world's most comprehensive map and geo database, and serve this data to developers, device manufacturers and mobile
operators. The investment will also be used to build out and add to CloudMade's suite of consumer-focused mapping products, Mapzen.

Christensen believes that collaborative mapping will do to the mapping industry what Wikipedia did to encyclopedias. Of course, the startup faces competition in space, including Google. But CloudMade has built a loyal base of developers and OpenStreetMap seems to have no lack of participation from the crowd, making its data incredibly valuable.

Apple buys Poly9

Apple could be upping the ante in its battle with Google as the company reportedly purchased Poly9, a mapping company based in Canada.

AppleInsider on Wednesday cited a report from French-Canadian news site cyberpresse.ca saying that Apple bought the company and has already moved the majority of workers to California. While many companies that get purchased post a note to their Web site, Poly9's site appears to be offline this morning.

Apple representatives were not immediately available to confirm the purchase when contacted by CNET.

Poly9 has worked with some big organizations in the past including Microsoft, Yahoo, the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), and MSNBC. While there is no clear indication what Apple will do with the technology, a demo of the Poly9 Globe is still available on Skype.

Poly9 would be the second mapping company Apple purchased in the past 10 months. In October, Apple purchased Placebase, a company that produced a maps application programming interface called Pushpin and offered a mapping service much like Google Maps.

Both products could easily compete with Google Maps and Google Earth, products that are available for the Mac,iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad. While Google and Apple compete in the mobile market now, Google has remained the default search engine and mapping application for Apple products.

What would “Troogle” mean for travelers?

April 27, 2010 | Online Travel

At the most basic level, the deal would give the search giant the information that it needs to offer instant fare information next to search results for flights, in much the same way as hotel prices have now been integrated into Google Maps. But the software that ITA produces could potentially be used for much more.

Owning the Cambridge, Massachussets-based ITA would instantly elevate Google to one of the leading players in the travel "meta-search" market, which is rapidly becoming travelers' preferred way to book tickets.

At the most basic level, the deal would give the search giant the information that it needs to offer instant fare information next to search results for flights, in much the same way as hotel prices have now been integrated into Google Maps.

But the software that ITA produces could potentially be used for much more. It offers the ability to plan trips based around event listings in select cities, for instance, potentially integrating with Google's other offerings such as Google Calendar to allow full travel "packages" to be sold.

It can also process booking changes, seat selections and online check-in for airlines (both online and through mobile devices), giving Google the chance to provide richer information on departures for travelers through its portal and location-based offerings.

Get the full story at The Independent

Apple iTravel: Major headwinds for OTAs, more options for hotel marketers

April 28, 2010 | Online Travel

Apple filed a patent this month for a future iPhone app called iTravel that like the Google/ITA rumors has the potential to become a game changer for the travel industry, or how Steve Jobs would put it "revolutionize travel."

By Markus Busch

The folks at Patently Apple fan website did a great job going through an Apple patent filed this month, uncovering drawings for an Apple iPhone app called iTravel, which would basically app-ify the entire travel process.

Unlike with most OTAs, travel for Apple is not just searching and booking. In the true fashion of an innovator with a track record of getting things right (mostly), Apple is looking at travel as a whole, planning to create value by turning a once frustrating shopping experience into an easy, intuitive, and enjoyable one.

Based on a combination of iPhone hardware and apps, Apple iTravel wants to manage your entire travel process, from planning, searching, reviewing and booking flights, hotels, car rentals, trains and bus journeys, including identifying yourself at airports for baggage handling and boarding passes - technically in a similar fashion as the iPhone-based payment system adopted by Starbucks.

While electronic ticketing and check-in via mobile devices are already available in many countries, putting the whole travel experience in one slick application is the innovation here and a huge business opportunity, especially coming from a travel outsider like Apple, who already successfully disrupted industries like music and phones.

Who will deliver the travel content?

That's the big question, that nobody can answer today, as iTravel is currently only at patent stage.

But unlike Google, who regularly states that it does not want to get into the transaction side of the travel business (read: not directly compete with its AdWords travel customers), it is likely that Apple will want to own the transaction, as the travel shop will become a central part of the whole iTravel experience, very much like Apple's iTunes and iBooks (on iPad) store.

And if iTunes and iBooks serve as a hint in which direction supply partnerships may go, Apple will work with a few selected certified aggregators to provide content for iTravel. Like the GDS, Pegasus, hotel chains and hotel bed banks, and travel fulfillment service providers like TRX . But most likely not individual hotels, the same way as musicians and writers have no direct access to iTunes or iBooks.

Still, for hotel marketers Apple iTravel could simply mean another, highly potential distribution channel, creating more competition and thereby options in a hotel distribution environment currently marked by concentration and steady increases in cost of sale.

And how about OTAs as content provider? Not very likely, as Apple's iTravel will be in direct competition with companies like Expedia and Co. In fact, OTAs have all reason to be worried, as the patent Apple is proposing is a very timely one, and would certainly be welcomed by many travelers around the globe.

But for now, the only thing we know is that Apple plans to get into travel - the question is just when and how.

Oh, and one more thing ... starting this Summer, Apple will be busy revolutionizing online advertising with iAds. What a great fit for travel, one of the biggest online advertisers.

Read also "iTravel: Apple's Future Travel Centric App for the iPhone" at Patently Apple

Local Services for Everyday People

Thumbtack Takes On RedBeacon As It Looks To Bring Local Service Providers Online

Posted at TechCrunch: 25 Nov 2009 02:25 PM PST

Last month we saw the launch of TechCrunch50 winner RedBeacon, the startup that lets you book local service providers directly from the web. Today it's getting some strong competition from a new startup called Thumbtack, a local service booking engine that's looking to offer both a comprehensive directory of providers and a greater degree of trust than you can find elsewhere.

Featurewise, Thumbtack is a mix between RedBeacon, Yelp, and OpenTable. Like RedBeacon, it lets you sign onto the site and issue a request for a service, which service providers can then bid on. CEO Marco Zappacosta says this portion of the service is nearly identical to RedBeacon, complete with a bidding engine for providers to set pricing. But Thumbtack also offers provider profiles, where these providers can list some of their specialties and price points. There's also a section where you can book a service directly from a profile page as you would on OpenTable, complete with an availability calendar.

One of the biggest issues with local services like Thumbtack is the chicken-and-the-egg problem. These sites generally launch with a relatively small number of services, which means that users can have a hard time finding what they need (and without users, providers have little incentive to join the site). Thumbtack has tried to address this by spending the last year recruiting providers – at launch, the startup says it already has 10,000 of them, ranging from tutors and handymen to rap teachers and henna artists. Thumbtack is also using some clever incentives to get companies to sign up, like offering discounted business cards and other marketing materials. Zappacosta explains that Thumbtack can order these goods in bulk because they work with so many companies, and then pass the savings on to businesses that sign up.

The other big issue with this kind of site is the creepiness factor – many of these services involve inviting these people into your home (say, to fix a sink) or to a private event (wedding caterers). Along with user reviews, which are standard for this space, Thumbtack is taking a few extra steps. If a service provider is licensed they can post that in their profile, which Thumbtack will verify for free. Thumbtack is also giving providers a handful of premium verification options, such as electing to undergo a background check by a national agency (prices vary from $8 to $49 depending on the level of verification). Providers who successfully pass these checks are rewarded with badges on their profile pages, giving users more confidence in their service. Every provider is also run through the DOJ sex offender registry.

Thumbtack plans to make money by building a payment system off of PayPayl's adaptive payments API. They'll take a cut out of each transaction that occurs on the site, and for services that require in-person estimates (like plumbing) they'll take a lead-gen payment. They'll also be taking a cut every time a provider elects to get verified through one of the third party background check services. Thumbtack is offering its service nationwide beginning today, but as with RedBeacon their primary focus is the Bay Area, with plans to expand down the road.

Thumbtack is doing a lot of things right with its site – I particularly like the idea of having providers verified through background checks, which helps differentiate it from sites like Angie's List, Craigslist, and RedBeacon (which lets providers display their licenses but doesn't do background checks). That said, Thumbtack faces the same challenges that RedBeacon will have. For one, it's going to have to train users to turn to their computers rather than their yellow pages for these local services. And while 10,000 businesses is a good start, it's going to take a long time for the service to build up a robust community of users and reviews. The background checks are a nice touch, but they don't do much for helping users discern which providers offer a high quality service.

For another service that's taking a different approach to matching users with trustworthy service providers, check out Workstir, which provides suggestions based on your social graph.

On The Mark

More Details On SimpleGeo, The AWS For Location

by Jason Kincaid on November 19, 2009

This morning at Under the Radar, former Digg Chief Architect Joe Stump and Social Thing founder Matt Galligan are taking the stage to unveil SimpleGeo, their new infrastructure for location based services. We've been following the company over the last few months and uncovered some basic details earlier, but this marks the first time the founders are talking about the company in public.

SimpleGeo is akin to an 'Amazon Web Services' for location: developers looking to integrate location based services (LBS) can plug into some simple APIs and SimpleGeo will do most of the legwork for them. The startup originated as a gaming company, but after spending four months building out their location platform, Stump and Galligan realized they had stumbled across an opportunity: location is soon going to become an expected feature in many applications, and there's no reason developers should have to reinvent the wheel every time they want to include the feature. SimpleGeo is looking to do it for them.

I spoke with Galligan last night, who says that one of the ways SimpleGeo could help spur radical change in location based services has to do with real-time (incidentally, he'll be speaking at our Real-Time CrunchUp tomorrow). Galligan says that the technologies currently used to process real-time data can't cope with the rapid read/write operations required as a LBS scales. In other words, these technologies simply weren't built with real time in mind (he says this is one reason why companies like Foursquare have partitioned their users by city). SimpleGeo, Galligan says, was built from the ground up to support real-time on a much broader scale.

SimpleGeo is currently in a private beta (you can apply to join from a form on their homepage), with plans to roll out broadly early next year. The service will be available for free to apps just getting started, and paid packages will kick in as they hit scale (the more API calls you use the more you'll pay).

For more details, check out the slides below.