Tour Companion
B2C native mobile application that enables users to conveniently track and manage their booked holidays, as well as socialise and connect with other travellers on their tour
Team: One product Designer, Three Developers, One sales manager.
Role: Product Designer
Timeline: 8 weeks
23%
Solo traveller bookings up
Application adoption
98%
Tour reviews up
12%
Introduction
Since 1947, more than five million happy past guests have traveled with Trafalgar. They offer tours that allow visitors see top destinations, iconic sites, and get treated to exclusive local experiences – all with their team taking care of all the details. Their goal is to provide holiday packages that suit all weather they are traveling with friends, family or solo and make memories that last a lifetime.
User surveys indicate that solo travellers are less inclined to choose Trafalgar, with feedback indicating that anxiety about traveling alone may deter potential bookings.
Goal
Develop an application designed for all travellers that enables them to effectively prepare for their booked tours while also providing a platform to interact with fellow travellers who are embarking on the same exciting journey. This tool will facilitate connections, exchange valuable insights, and share experiences with like-minded individuals, enhancing the overall travel experience.
Target Audience
Trafalgars target audience is traveler’s aged 50+ eager to see iconic sights, connect with locals, and dive into the heart of each destination. Encouraging a mixed group from spouses to mothers and daughters, and grandparents with their grandchildren, first-time adventurers to seasoned explorers, solo travellers and groups of friends. This app connects travelers seeking friendship and companionship.
Jillian
Holiday maker
50 years old
Divorced
Mother of two
Frequent traveler
Confident with technology
Amateur photographer
David
Holiday maker
68 years old
Widower
Retired police officer
New Traveler
Not confident with technology
Enjoys writing
Unanswered Questions
Why are solo travellers less inclined to book a tour?
How do travellers currently document their holidays?
Will a seasoned holiday maker use a mobile application?
User Research
Why are solo travellers less inclined to book a tour?
Not having direct access to the intended users of the application was a significant challenge, so I had to request that Trafalgar add a customer survey to be prominently featured on the home page of their website, specifically asking solo travellers for their valuable input and assistance. To enhance this effort, Trafalgar also married this digital approach with a physical paper survey, which was thoughtfully handed out to solo travellers during their tours, specifically requesting their feedback on various aspects of their experiences.
What I discovered
Solo travellers struggled with anxiety over traveling alone
Travellers are looking to find connections and make friends
Solo travellers rely on devices for communication with their family while on holiday
Travellers have lots of unanswered questions before their tour
Travellers struggle to manage all aspects of their trip on their own
From these findings I surmised that the application would need to do the following things:
Allow the user to manage their tour from end to end
Connect with fellow travellers that have booked onto the same tour
Allow the user to document and share their tour
Provide full information of the booked tour and a means of asking questions in the lead up to departure
How do travellers currently document their holidays?
In the same survey we also asked these questions:
Do you document your holiday? Yes/No
If yes, do you do this during or after your holiday? During/After
Do you share stories or pictures of your tour with friends or family? Yes/No
If you have been on a trafalgar tour before, what do you like to do on the tour bus between stops?
⏹️ Sight see
⏹️ Read
⏹️ Talk with other passengers
⏹️ Look at my pictures
⏹️ Write about my day
⏹️ Other
If other please specify…
Results
82% of travellers document their tour
15% document during their tour
96% share pictures and stories with friends and family
57% of travelers read on the tour bus
Most travellers had not considered documenting their tour during the holiday and thought it would be great to come away from their holiday with a keepsake that they can share with friends and family.
Application flow
Intro
Log in
Menu
Notifications
Account
Home
Tickets & times
Itinerary
Group chat
Tour diary
Tour info
Book Another
Tour
Wireframes for testing
I tested this low fidelity prototype with a test group of 50 users aged between 50 and 76 that have booked or are planning a holiday in the next 6 months.
The test was moderated and in person using a rented testing lab with Tobi tracking to allow for greater feedback from the users actions with the device.
Findings
Overall success rate 98%
Users were able to navigate the application with ease
Users found the Diary screen overwhelming
Useful comments
‘it would be nice to be able to speak directly with each person’
‘Information about travel would put my mind at ease before traveling’
‘can I place images in with my text to go with what I am typeing?’
Final Product
What I improved
Addition of a search bar on the home page to allow users to find their next trip
Reduction of Trafalgar logo presence to gain more space
Moved the navigation up the page to give it higher priority and used icons to clean up the interface
Simplified the chat interface to allow users to see other tour guests
Re arranged diary to allow for stacking enteries, inline images, entry sharing and editing
The new app boosted Trafalgar's solo traveler engagement by more than 23%, based on new bookings from recommendations and returning solo travelers. A survey showed that the app was the main reason they chose to travel with Trafalgar again.
Learnings
As this project was completed in 2015 and technology has moved on quite a bit, what would I do differently?
I would include an Ai chat bot to receive messages and reply to users wanting to speak with the tour guide and then send a summery of the conversation to the guide a day before the trip as feedback was that tour guides struggle to keep up with the messages when managing multiple tours in a single season.
I would include an Ai text assistant to help users with writing their diary entries.
Now that most people use their phone as their primary camera, I would add a separate gallery page that would allow users to view their images by trip.