Blog homeLast October (7 months ago) I reviewed the Expedia Inspiroscope tool. At the time I wrote
“I don’t expect this one to stay on the Expedia homepage for too long if it is designed in its current form. Perhaps it was never intended to replace their Inspirator – and is just there for a forthcoming marketing campaign”
Well…. it is no longer so dominant on the homepage ….. the tool has been relegated to their inspiration homepage found here (OK there is still a tiny mention on the UK homepage). Instead, Expedia have a new “Where to go” map…. which I expect is much more commercially successful.
However, the inspiroscope is still getting mentioned in the UK travel trade press…. two UK travel conferences have recently held the tool up as a great example of online travel innovation – hence it is probably worth taking a second look before Expedia remove it completely!
The statistics
One of the best ways of investigating the success of a solution is to look at statistics. I don’t have any usage stats….. however Expedia have kindly still left the “vote” results available for all to see.
http://inspiroscope.expedia.co.uk/GetWordVotes.ashx
Lets do a quick analysis:
(Remember this is for a 7-8 month period, during the UK winter….. so will be dominated by summer holiday concepts, probably)
- Interesting places – 11037
- Beach – 10011
- Beautiful scenery – 9335
- Good weather – 7301
- Hot weather – 7093
- New experiences – 6228
- Time to relax – 3906
- Relaxed atmosphere – 3690
- Culture – 3505
- Exotic – 3365
- Beautiful Sunsets – 3303
- Lazy days – 3013
- Nice Accommodation – 2814
- Good hotel – 2753
- Relaxing – 2723
- Adventure – 2439
- Getting a tan – 2137
- Far and away – 1989
- Eating out – 1787
- Good food – 1721
- Architecture – 1449
- Local markets – 1411
- Excursions – 1380
- Beer – 1365
- Cocktails – 1361
- Rest – 1272
- Archaeology – 1259
- Friendly locals – 1247
- Blue sky – 1171
- A good book – 1115
- Entertainment – 1109
- Fresh air – 1103
- Snorkelling – 1055
- Socialising – 1049
- Bars - 1040
- Meeting people – 1035
- Sand – 1024
- Swimming – 1015
- Sea – 1012
- Good wine – 976
- Ice Cream – 939
- Watersports – 898
- Nice pool – 833
- Kids clubs – 767
- Boat trips – 709
- Museums – 597
- Diving – 496
- Friends – 454
- Friendly staff – 275
- Theatre – 219
Firstly the tool is definitely hitting the correct users (so the marketing and site positioning has been appropriate). With interesting places being the top result you can imagine that users are, even with a tool in front of them, struggling to come up with anything that they really want…… and relying on the tool to inspire them.
The second top theme is weather (with good weather and hot weather coming in 4th and 5th). Weather is a tricky concept as it is relative to the user’s location and the proposed activity. If you are in the South of England your expectation of good weather may be different to someone in the North of Scotland. Likewise, if you are going for a hill walking holiday you may not want the weather to be as “hot” as if you are going for a beach holiday. And for ski holidays the definition of good weather / hot weather becomes even harder to determine.
The third theme to come through is “relaxing”. Time to relax, relaxed atmosphere, lazy days, relaxing and rest are all in the top half.
Kids clubs comes in low on the list…. can we infer anything from the Expedia demographic from this?
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