Using Online Trip Planners
Do you or have you ever used an online "trip planner" or "travel itineraries" to plan your entire vacation? I'd love to hear about your experiences.
I have a horrible habit of assuming that everyone thinks like me. Like when I stopped watching Friends after the fourth season and just assumed that everyone stopped watching it too (and later I was very surprised to still see it on the air (and even moreso that it lasted ten seasons)).
Yesterday, I had the opportunity to sit down at a presentation to hear about Tourism Calgary's new site: Visit Calgary. Though I was still partially dazed by the $1.8 million price tag (over 3 years), I have to say they have some great functionality and some great information about Calgary.
One of the items that importance was stressed upon was for travel sites (us) to have some kind of a "trip planner" to aid travellers in planning their entire vacation.
More than likely you won't remember this, but when I first took on the Web Editor gig, this website had a (weak) trip planning functionality. I say you won't likely remember it's because when we looked at whether we should invest in this further I think 3 people had used it, so I killed it until we could prove it's usefulness and/or also make it substantially better.
Do you or have you used online trip planners to plan part of or an entire trip?
So this is where I am wondering if you (all of you) and I think alike or not.
I can see that the majority of people use online sites to book hotels/resorts, car rentals and maybe a few bigger events (like a show in Vegas or something). That much is obvious, otherwise sites like Expedia (or even Visit Calgary with it's new booking engine) couldn't possibly thrive.
But what about everything else? Restaurants? Attractions? Maybe I'm just not a planner.
Generally, I do some research on the destination (using upmagazine.com as a resource obviously (as well as others)), make a list of places I might like to visit, and then just see how I feel when I'm actually on the ground. I like exploring, but with a few tried-and-true backups.
Should up! magazine invest in an online trip planning application?
Currently, if you have an account on this site, you can save articles to your profile, so you can easily bookmark them and come back later or remember the cool things you find. But that's about it in terms of us aiding you in actual trip planning functionality.
Though I love the web, some times I just end up thinking that a pencil and paper is just easier, but I could be really wrong so I'd love your feedback.
So, please tell me. Do you use online trip planning/itineraries services? If so, which ones do you think work really well? Or what are your experiences? I'd love to hear.
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Rhett Soveran is the Web Editor of WestJet's up! magazine. He has been published in Unlimited magazine and a handful of small literary journals. After work, Rhett can be found blogging at Bailing Bucket, walking his giant schnoodle Duke or playing ultimate frisbee.
Dawn
I use the “flight and hotel” element of sites like Westjet vacations and Expedia, but I NEVER use trip planners.
Part of it is that I feel that the prices won’t be as good, and that the ‘planner’ is being paid to promote one venue over another. I’ve seen them suggest restaurants that are a 30$ cab ride away (I didn’t book) – and then get to my location and find out that a similar restaurant is a block to the left.
I’m probably enough like you – I look at vacation planning sites, tourism sites, talk to friends, look at tour books to pick out the “must sees” and check out things of interest. I like getting those special tips like “don’t forget to bring a flashlight to check out the cave at the end of this hike” – but I like to also be spontaneous, and upon meeting a friendly stranger in the hotel (or hostel, which is even more likely!) – throw out all plans for that Thursday afternoon to check out something completely unplanned.
Even at “planned” vacations (resorts, cruises) I still like to shake things up and do things based on how I feel at the moment. The only exception to this is once on cruise I booked an excursion trip – just because the timing was tight and I wanted the guarantee that I would be back to the ship on time!
I think a ‘trip planner’ that helped a traveller find local restaurants, drug stores, etc… near where they’ll be travelling would be great - but GoogleMaps does a great job of that anyways!
Rhett Soveran
Thanks Dawn. I really agree with you on all your points. It's good to know that I am not (totally) out-to-lunch. I think if I ever got a budget for new functionality on this site would be to really invest in geo-social world. One idea is to be able to pull up articles that we have based on your hotel or, even, where you are (mobile).
paddy Singal
I use the internet often to book everything from flights to hotels when I am traveling. I only look up restaurants and attractions if I am in a hurry and I need to find something quickly. Mostly for research, because you can get a review before you turn up. That helps a lot
Rhett Soveran
Totally agree, Paddy. Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts. Great to hear.
Brendan Harrison
I definitely do not use trip planners to plan my vacations. I'll use sites like Kayak or Expedia to book flights and hotels, but in terms of planning out an itinerary, I'm much more likely to use various websites and forums to find out what's interesting where I'm heading and plan accordingly. I think city guides are much more relevant to modern travelers than full-fledged trip planners.
Rhett Soveran
Definitely agree with the idea of "city guides" or something of that nature. We're just in the process of really starting to outline and explore our city destination pages. It's an area that I think deserves more time and content. Thanks BH.
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