TUBE The Ultimate Booking Experience

1. User Experience.  

The overriding goal is a satisfying user experience.  Like the web site, the booking experience should be commensurate with the guest experience at the hotel itself.  The web site and the booking engine are part of the hotel - the online lobby.  It's where many users make their decision about the hotel, so whereas the web site might be their first impression, the booking engine is the second.  Thus the User Experience is the main driver.

 

2. Visual Browsing.  

Visual Browsing lets users find things with pictures instead of text.  In TUBE we show an array of room type or package photos instead of just a text name.  This is not a new concept.  For example, iTunes has several views that let users find albums and songs by viewing album art instead of an album or song list.  The Mac Finder has a 3D "CoverFlow" view that shows small thumbnail previews of the file contents.  Bing now has a "visual search" that displays user search results as images  (bing.com/visualsearch).  Viewing photos (and videos) of rooms can help users make decisions faster without having to read and digest too much text.

 

In TUBE we have created Room Type Cards that arrange themselves in a 3D space.  The card metaphor is like a post card or a baseball card, where there is a photo on one side, and detailed, text-heavy information on the reverse side.  Users can browse a stack of Room Type Cards using several different methods, then flip them over for more detailed information, like room description, rate details, etc.  We use a similar approach for Packages and Add ons.  The card metaphor is employed in other places in TUBE.  In fact, the reservation form is located on the backside of the TUBE application;  when the user is ready to book the room, clicking the Continue button flips the application over to reveal the check out form.  The user can flip it back over to make changes.

 

Users prefer selecting dates on a calendar over entering their dates as text or from pull down menus.  TUBE displays multiple, persistent month calendars that users can click to select check in and check out dates.  The interactive visual calendar also reflects availability and prevents users from selecting dates that are closed. To see a demo go www.riveroakshotel.com

 

Once a user selects dates of stay, a visual representation of their itinerary is displayed, showing check in and check out dates in a week view.  

 

6. Liquid Layout.  

Not all screen sizes are the same.  In the past, we have designed booking engines to fit within the smaller screens so that part of the booking engine is not hidden below the scroll.  This is fine for the smaller screens, but it doesn't take advantage of the screen real estate available on the larger monitors, which are becoming more common.  With TUBE, instead of designing for the lowest common denominator, we have designed a layout that is flexible or "liquid" in that it can expand to fill larger screens with bigger photos, videos, etc., and generally more information.  As the user enlarges the browser window, some elements of TUBE expand;  conversely when the browser size is reduced, certain TUBE elements contract.  Minimums are set so that the booking engine is still usable for the smaller screen sizes, but it becomes spectacular on the larger screen sizes.  

 

TUBE allows hotels to include multiple photos, videos, for Room Types and Packages.  While the rich media is not required, it does help better sell the hotel, and may encourage upselling.