SmarterTravel, an online travel resource of independent expert advice, inspiration and travel deals, has announced the launch of a newly designed site that offers a multi-device experience for desktop, tablet and mobile use. With updated user benefits designed to make navigation easier while delivering more relevant travel search results, SmarterTravel unveiled the new site with an added emphasis on beautiful, inspirational imagery.
The New Design
- SmarterTravel will continue to run high quality, expertly written travel stories focusing on expert advice, inspiration, and deals.
- SmarterTravel becomes mobile-friendly: The user interface will be responsive to window size and device, and will look great across all screen sizes.
- Navigation has been restructured to make finding content easier than ever.
- Site search has been rebuilt to provide better and more relevant search results.
- Updates to fonts (styles and sizes) will make stories easier to read.
- SmarterTravel will focus more on beautiful, inspirational imagery.
- Readers will have the opportunity to get to know the site’s expert travel editors better, as each story will have an integrated author bio.
- SmarterTravel has designed pages to allow for travel brands to target an audience rich with travel needs with impactful native and display options.
The History Behind SmarterTravel
- SmarterTravel launched as a team of one person (the company’s founder Dan Saul) in 1998 as SmarterLiving.com, primarily covering last-minute airfare deals (“web fares”) offered by airlines, with a secondary focus on deals for “better living” outside of travel (shopping, health products, etc).
- In early 2005, the site officially rebranded as SmarterTravel and went on to focus exclusively on all aspects of travel.
- The site underwent its last major redesign in January 2006 (Apple did not announce the first iPhone until 2007).
- SmarterTravel was acquired by TripAdvisor (then a part of Expedia) in February 2007. Today, SmarterTravel averages more than 120 million page views per year.
“We’re thrilled that the look of SmarterTravel is finally as great as our stellar expert advice and inspirational travel stories. The world we love to explore and share is beautiful, and now so is SmarterTravel,” says Sr. Editor, Christine Sarkis.
