Key Lime Interactive’s (KLI) Competitive Research division has investigated the overall functionality and experiences offered by today’s last minute hotel booking apps. In an upcoming competitive report titled Last-Minute Hotel Booking Mobile Competitive Index Report, KLI reviews sixteen (16) apps including those designed specifically for booking last-minute travel as well as the top OTAs in the U.S.
This is more than an industry standard travel technology survey. KLI asks users traditional questions about their current behavior to understand trends, but they also push to learn about the innovation that consumers are buzzing about, what they expect to see next, and what barriers to a perfect experience exist.
Key Lime Interactive recognizes the importance of aligning business-centric goals with consumer-centric needs to produce winning solutions and makes this a core component to all deliverables. This incorporation of user feedback is a primary component for this and all studies across various industries ranging from finance, retail, hospitality, etc. This time, consumers also rank existing features on these last-minute apps and new developments, which takes a pulse of the market.
“With many players in direct competition to secure a place to rest your head while traveling, the indecision about which booking agent or OTA to use can be paralyzing to the user.” says Phillip McGuinness, report contributor. “As with all of our reports, we survey the target audience to see what they need and want in terms of features and capabilities first. Then, we take those desires into consideration when comparing and ranking the apps, giving more weight to consumers top priorities.”
Apps in this assessment include: Airbnb, BookingNow, Expedia, Hipmunk, HotelPlanner.com, Hotels.com, HotelTonight, Hotwire, Jetsetter, Last Minute Travel Deals, Orbitz, Priceline, Room 77, Stayful, Travelocity and TripAdvisor.
The review examines their iPhone and Android apps (where applicable) and ultimately ranks the apps, awarding top rank to those who most effectively meet the consumer’s self-defined need.
Buyers receive a detailed report that identifies the survey results and the associated ranking of the 16 apps. They also benefit from detailed best-in-class features including screen prints and expert analysis. Opportunities for improvement are discussed as well as a new trends and innovation section where new concepts such as the use of an app to open hotel room doors or a mobile chat feature to communicate with hotel staff are highlighted.
“Differentiation such as the ability to set style preferences, access customer reviews, set filters, as well as view saved search history and favorites become apparent. Better, the impact that these features have on the user experience or the ability to meet user preferences is identified.” states Dana Bishop, primary report analyst and Director of Quantitative Research. “Organizations crave a way keep pace with what consumers want as they build their roadmap while also tracking and scoring themselves against the competition; to have a baseline that they want to beat as they continue to evolve. This offers them just that.”
To purchase the published report, reach out to Key Lime Interactive for more information at sales@keylimeinteractive.com.
