Reactive

Originally launched in December 2005, the site had been growing organically over time, and a loyal community of travellers was building. It was realised that, with more promotion from the STA Travel network of sites, the (then named) STA Travel Journals had fantastic potential.

Strategy

Before marketing the site more actively, the decision was made to redesign the site and change the information architecture, in order to encourage participation, increase visitation, and ultimately increase click-through to bookings. Reactive were chosen to redesign the Travel Journals, working closely with the development company, Off Exploring, who had built the technology behind the site, and alongside STA Travel’s Global Web team.

The first decision that was made was to rebrand. After discussion with STA Travel Webmasters from key markets, it was agreed that Travel Blogs was a more descriptive and interesting name for the site than Travel Journals. Next, a review of how people were using the site showed that many users were adding reviews of their favourite bars, restaurants and hotels in each location. This content was hidden within the site, and we wanted to make it a major feature, as effectively the community were creating an STA Travel-minded travel guide of the world…. for free!

An inspiration in the redesign was an article published by Jakob Nielsen (Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox, October 9, 2006) on Participation Inequality. The study showed that “in most online communities 90% of users are lurkers who never contribute, 9% of users contribute a little, and 1% of users account for almost all the action” *. We wanted to battle participation inequality in the Travel Blogs Web site by putting some of the articles suggestions into practice.

In addition to making the site more visually attractive, the redesign encouraged participation by appealing to the blogger’s desire to be famous. New features included the addition on a Travel Blog of the Day, complimented by the most recent blog posts. These additions meant that any member of the community could be featured on the Home page, simply by contributing regularly. Further, we incorporated Most Highly Rated and Most Popular blogs on the Home page, in order to encourage good quality contributions. We made it easier to contribute, by providing a one-click method to vote for a blog post, future plans are to simplify the registration process.

The Solution

Since the redesign, visitation to the site has more than doubled (monthly statistics Oct ’06 to March ’07), and the site was awarded Best Social Media Web site in the 2007 Travolution Awards. We believe this success has been thanks to the continuous evolution of the site, in response to the way the community are using the tools available to them. STA Travel plan to continue watching and engaging with the online community, and continue evolving the site to be even more useful tool for travellers.

Facts and Figures