Finding something that will make it easier to plan your holiday Essay Example for Free

Finding something that will make it easier to plan your holiday Essay Finding something that will make it easier to plan your holiday It is not as easy as it looks to find a concept that you believe in and you think is going to make it easier or more convenient for people to travel. First I was trying too hard, finding something that would do amazing things, something that would be so new. Nothing came to my head, then I thought, why not just try something simple that I would like to have to help me planning my travels or for my friends. I had to stop trying to think something big as the small things are just as important when you are for example planning your trip. So after going through the thoughts that I was not going to find anything, something came into my head. Why not make a website that will help people travel around Iceland and maybe have an application that goes with it. I did some research before my presentation and found out what technology I could use. Then I went to class with the idea. Getting feedback and to work more with the concept After the presentation, the concept was more clear what it could have and what was needed to be done to get it going, as well as what more research needed. There were some new ideas from the class that in a way changed the purpose for the website and for the application. The research that had to been done was to look how many people could use it, maybe it would be a good idea to narrow it down in the beginning, so it would only be accessible for people that live in Iceland, to get the domestic tourism stronger, help people to travel in the own country before taking it further. So the concept was coming together and the next step was to do the research that had to be done to be sure that this would be possible for the travellers. Planning your dream holiday It is everyone’s dream to plan a dream holiday, it is not as easy as someone would think, there are so many information about different transport, activities, attractions, tours, accommodation and dinning. Putting all the information form each category into a database, each area would have its own database so it could work on its own as well as together. It is going to be a website as well as a application for I phone. The technology that Trip Sketch application is using with Green Traveller is similar as what is in this concept for the I phone, The focus going to be Iceland and not the USA or UK. For example for the website the customer will first have the opportunity to choose for how long the holiday is going to last and then what area of Iceland is interested for the customer. With that out of the way the customer can have the choice between the categories that were mention before, click on accommodation and there will be all the places in that area and if the customers click on for example a hotel they will get information about the hotel, where it is, how to get there, website, opening times and other important information. The customer can also save that hotel in his folder and later on compare different accommodations before booking the right one. This goes for all the things in the database. The application for the I phone is more for the customer on the road, following the technology as mention before with the opportunity to plan a day out. This is going to focus on domestic traveller at the beginning, if that is successful then it will be look at taking futher. What this concept idea will consist of The need to be able to make our own holiday in the comfort of your home is an increasing demand, this concept will help travellers build the dream holiday by going on a website, which will have multi choice questions so the person will answer questions related to what that the person would like to do on that holiday. It will look like questioners for the consumer and in the end the person will have all the information to plan and book the dream holiday. This site will only be available in Iceland for the start, if that goes well, then by time it will be open for international tourist that have Iceland on the list and there will be the opportunity to open a site for other countries if there is interest for it. The welcome page will consist of basic information about Iceland as well as safety tips for travelling in the country. There will be a demonstration on how the site works, similar to what is done on the website Just-Eat (Just-Eat 2010). On the page will be a sign in part, where the consumer will sign in and fill out basic information, like contact, age, gender, address and interests, this will create a username that will allow the consumer to log in anytime and will also store the searches that are conducted. There will be a â€Å"start your trip button† on the page that will take the consumer to the start of the exclusions process, the consumer will then be taken to a page where there will be a start of point choices. Like Region: the different region of the country – West, South, East, North and the West fjords. Adventure: for example; horseback riding, river rafting, hiking, sailing and more. Time: how long the trip can last, couple of hours, half a day, a day, week, month. Attractions: Culture and history: where the Icelandic culture and history are, like art galleries, museum, heritage centres, festivals for the arts and more. Based on the choice made, the consumer is taken to another page where there will be sub options to choose from, with the addition of accommodation. This process continues until the consumer presses finish and is presented with the result from the search that was undertaken. That would be called the travel plan and would give the consumer the insight of what kind of a holiday would be on offer. The opportunity is then available to book any aspect of the holiday right from the website. Like Travel option: booking a car rental, bus tickets or airplane tickets. Accommodation: hotels, country hotels, farmhouses, cottages, camping sites. Restaurants: would be able to make reservations for all the meals the consumer is thinking of having on the trip. Trips: the consumer would be able to book all the trips that would be on the travel plan. Tickets: to museums, festivals, shows and more. The flow chart below demonstrates the concept process of elimination to find the ideal holiday for the consumer. Figure 1.1 Flowchart for design concept The companies that want to take part in the website will need to create a retailer login, where the company will have to fill in an application form with all required information, such as Company name Type of activates: selected from a drop down menu. Location: where the company is based. Activities locations: where the activities are taking place. Dates: fill in a calendar with the upcoming activities. Prices: Range of package prices as well as prices for individual activities. Contact details: phone numbers, homepage, e-mails and contact person. Each company or business will have to fill out predetermined templates for each activity and these will then be available on the website instantly, the responsibility lies with each company to give accurate details. The templates are used so the website information is uniform for display to the consumer. A fixed charge will be taken for each booking that is made on the website, so the company will only pay if it gets business from the website. The website has two main objectives Assist the consumer in finding the ideal holiday. Assist local retailers in finding customers for the holiday activities. This is done by designing the website so that it only requires the input from consumers and retailers to function. Consumer input: search entries, holiday review, holiday request. Retailer input: holiday details, prices, dates. References: Just-Eat. (2010, November 17). Retrieved November 17, 2010, from Just-Eat: http://www.just-eat.co.uk/ What technology will support the concept and how Developing the concept will involve building up a web site that will take all the information that is needed and put it in the right places. Building up the website will go through several stages, taking the storyboard that is the foundation of the site (Sweeney 2008) and getting all the ideas on it is the first step, this gives the layout for the site at the beginning with the opportunity to improve further on. The second stage will be to get the information into the database that will be behind the web site as the storyboard is only the structure of the site but has no full information on it. The layout will have similarity to what TripSketch uses for the application Green traveller for the iphone . Using multi questions templates to plan a domestic holiday. It would be possible to take the website and turn it into an application for iphones or smart phones, which would then have to be in an area where there would be internet connection to be able to interact on the application and get the result straight into your phone. The concept is based around the use of a website as the interface for both the consumer and the retailer. This requires the development of a website interface that is linked to a database in which data is input or output to the interface. The consumers interface in one where the database is searched based on the input from the consumer is taken through a process of elimination. The consumer interface can be set up in many ways such as Search engine interface Single page multiple choice Multi page multiple choice The search engine interface allows the user to input any number of search terms and the n the database is searched and the results displayed. The pros of using this type is that it will make it easier for the consumer to find the activity that is on offer, however the user might not use the right words for the activity that will then resolve in not finding what is on offer. Single page multiple choice allows the user to input all choices on the same page and go straight to result page. This can be convenient if there are few choices in the form and holidays are mostly similar, the more the variety the more inconclusive the result will be. Multi page multiple choices allows the user to eliminate at each page before going to the next set of choices, this then only presents choices to the consumer based on its previous selections. Doing this the consumer will come to concentrated results and from there the user can select the ideal holiday. The retailer interface could have any numbers of styles to bring the data into the database as out of it, such as The website has employee that would take all the data that comes from the retailer and process them into the database that will then be available to the consumer through the website. The retailer would take all the data and put it into the database through the retailer interface on the website. That would then not require a special employee from the website and would then be more cost effective to the website. The site would be able to charge the consumers directly as bookings are made online, using online credit card facilities and possibly Paypal. In doing so the website can update the retailers account with the payment made and show the deducted amount to the website. The retailer is then paid on regular bases. The website could have a review interface for the consumer for a specific holiday that the consumer has undertaken. This would be an option for the user to do, as signed into the website and already gone on the trip, which would go into the database and be linked to the trip that the retailer has on offer as well as linked to the retailer. It would also be a possibility to have an comment box for the website that would give the consumer an opportunity to give comments on what could be improved data wise on the site as well as what has been done well and not so well. This data would then be send to the administrator for further improvement on the site The technology used for the website is widely used and thus easily implemented for this type of website. References: Bibliography Buhalis, D. (2003). eTourism Information technology for strategic tourism management. Harlow: Prentice Hall. Chris Cooper, J. F. (2008). Tourism; principles and practice. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited. Just-Eat. (2010, November 17). Retrieved November 17, 2010, from Just-Eat: http://www.just-eat.co.uk/ Nokia. (2010, November 15). Ovi daily app . Retrieved November 15, 2010, from Ovi store: http://blog.ovi.com/dailyapp/global/2010/08/travel-plans-in-your-future-try-tripsketch-green-traveler-for-nokia/ Page, S. J. (2009). Tourism management man; managing for change. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann. Sweeney, S. (2008). 101 Ways ti Promote Your Tourism Business Web Site. Jim Hoskins. Sweeney, S. (2009). 101 Ways to Promote Your Web Site. Jim Hoskins.