Hotel Blogs - Let's talk about hotels

Ask the CEO (15) - Juha Huttunen, TripSay

Today 'Ask the CEO' features Juha Huttunen  (@juhah) from TripSay located in Helsinki, Finland.

1. What problem (s) your company is trying to solve?

We're solving the problem of too much anonymous information on the web problem. Tips, recommendation, reviews etc. are most valuable when you understand who has given it and in what context. Otherwise it'll take you a lot of work to find out if a certain city, place, hotel, etc. is really good for you or not. We're bringing profiling and Amazon-like recommendations to travel. It's an ever growing travel guide personalized for you.

2. How did you finance your venture?

We got a small seedround plus some governmental R&D funding along the way. Now were looking for a series A investor.

3. In a difficult climate of uncertainty, how do you attract talents to join you adventure?

We haven't grown too much and employ a team of six people. We took our time with recruiting and hired people having several recommendations from people we knew plus who demonstrated a suitable startup attitude. Perhaps not that coincidentally these people wanted to work on a new product that has a chance of being something big instead of the safe but somewhat boring consultation work. Thus it wasn't really that hard to attract them to join once we found the right people.

4. Could you explain your revenue model

We will make money through leads and commissions from travel vendors using our highly detailed profiling and collaborative filtering algorithms. We also sell services on the site, first of which is our new hotel search http://www.tripsay.com/hotels/ that has gotten a lot of great feedback from our customers.

a/ Favourite hotel experience

I'm not really a hotel person, often I go on vacation without a reservation and just book something on the way depending on where I end up. On business trips as a startup I book the cheapest hotel I can find so no great experiences there either. I'd have many good stories about bad hotels though. :)

b/ Mac or PC?

PC at work, Mac at home

c/ Explorer or Firefox?

Firefox

d/ MP3 or CD?

MP3

e/ Twitter or Facebook?

Facebook

Ask the CEO (14) - Sally Broom, Tripbod

Today 'Ask the CEO' features Sally Broom (@tripbod) from Tripbod  located in Lancaster, United Kingdom.

1. What problem (s) your company is trying to solve? (quick snapshot of the company)

Lack of access to independent, reliable local information when planning a trip. We solve this by connecting travellers to trusted local experts – ‘Tripbods’. Travellers can ask us anything, from what to do on a wet day in the Lake District to ways of travelling overland through Jordan.

2. How did you finance your venture?

Personal savings and then seed capital from Chelwood Capital late 2009.

3. In a difficult climate of uncertainty, how do you attract talents to join you adventure?

We offer our suppliers something very valuable which often helps them to grow their own businesses. we work closely with our Tripbods and give them a trusted platform on which to preset themselves as local travel experts. Plus they get paid for sharing their local knowledge with travelers.

4. Could you explain your revenue model

Travellers pay to connect with a local Tripbod in their destination. Prices go from £16 for a 4-day trip plan to £150 for a 6-month trip plan. At least half of that money goes directly to the Tripbod

5. Who gives you inspiration when you feel down whilst leading your company?

The Tripbods. Each one is uniquely inspiring and reminds me of why we’re doing this – to promote great local people and places, protect local cultures, support independent travellers and bring great people together.

a/ Favourite hotel experience

There is a wonderful little hotel on the island of Mjlet in Croatia, just off the coast at Dubrovnik. The hotel isn’t especially upmarket but the rooms all overlook a stunning sea view and the people/surroundings are lovely.

b/ Mac or PC?

PC

c/ Explorer or Firefox?

Firefox

d/ MP3 or CD?

MP3

e/ Twitter or Facebook?

Twitter

Ask the CEO (13) - Drew Patterson, Jetsetter

Today 'Ask the CEO' features Drew Patterson (@jetsetdrew) from Jetsetter located in New York, USA.

1. What problem (s) your company trying to solve? (quick snapshot of the company)

 

Travel sites don’t do a good job of helping travelers decide where to go on their next vacation and travel magazines don’t offer a means to book the trips they feature.  Jetsetter is the first vacation site to combine these two worlds.  Like a travel magazine, Jetsetter inspires members to discover new destinations, hotels and experiences.  Then, Jetsetter provide a simple booking process so consumers can easily book that dream vacation. 

Jetsetter is a private sale site that helps leisure travelers discover and purchase the world’s best vacations.  Our team of travel experts search the globe for new destinations, hotels and experiences and build unique packages for our membership.  Jetsetter provides exclusive access to insider travel deals that are typically 30-50% better than prices found elsewhere.  New sales start almost every day, and offers only run for a limited time.

2. How did you finance your venture?

 

Jetsetter was funded by the Gilt Groupe, the leading flash sale site that brings New York City-style sample sales to consumers around the globe.  Gilt offers invitation-only access to daily sale events of coveted designer fashion and lifestyle brands at up to 70% off retail.

3. In a difficult climate of uncertainty, how do you attract talents to join you adventure?

Hiring the right people is critical to building a world class business and finding talent is never easy. I’ve had the most success networking with folks I’ve known from the tech and travel industries which I’ve been involved with for years.  There’s no substitute for relationships and personal experience.

 

4. Could you explain your revenue model

 

Jetsetter negotiates special member-only rates with our travel partners and sells the inventory at a mark-up.  All partners recommended by Jetsetter meet our high standards and cannot pay to be listed in our sales. 

 

5. Who gives you inspiration when you feel down whilst leading your company?

 

Reading our customer feedback is great.  It keeps me in touch with our service.  Members really seem to love learning about our partners, and it’s satisfying when they write back about their fantastic vacation.  

 

a/ Fave hotel experience

 

That’s tough… there are so many.  I think my favorite would be Casa Brancas in Buzios, Brazil.  Buzios is a little town about 2 hours outside Rio.  The hotel is not over-the-top luxurious, but the staff is so welcoming.  I was with old friends, and we spent the week drink Mojitos by the ocean.  What’s not to like?

 

b/ Mac or PC?

MAC

c/ Explorer or Firefox?

It’s Chrome these days.

d/ MP3 or CD?

iTunes

e/ Twitter or Facebook?

 

Facebook

Ask the CEO (12) - Gautam Lulla, Travel Tripper

Today 'Ask the CEO' features Gautam Lulla (@travel_tripper) from Travel Tripper  located in New York, USA.

1.     What problem (s) your company is trying to solve?

The primary problem we are trying to solve is the over-dependency of hotels on the very expensive online travel agencies. The stranglehold that those third-party sites have on hotels is outrageous, given the margins they charge, so we are giving hotels a solution that will help shift that business to their own direct website. The new version of our private label booking engine, RezTrip 2.0, is the centerpiece of that solution, but the idea is to really get at the online consumer from the beginning, so our solution is comprehensive in terms of really making a hotel's direct website a serious competitor to those OTA's. This includes getting consumers to visit the site at all, coming up with the right pricing for them, and also presenting them with a booking engine that has the merchandising capabilities as well as user interface that is superior to those of any third-party site.

Expedia, for example, did some very smart things in terms of pricing capabilities and shelf-spacing their suppliers products a number of years ago and several of the merchants sites followed suit. It is a tribute to them and an embarrassment to the suppliers (hotels in this case) that OTAs are still able to out-smart the hotels own systems as far as pricing and merchandising goes.

Our answer for the hotels is the smartest private label booking engine that's yet been invented. Probably the most truly disruptive feature of our product will be our Dynamic Pricing module – a hotel can very quickly and efficiently create targeted offers to gain share in new markets without diluting ADR from their core segments. This is done without the need for new rate plans, which any hotel revenue manager knows is a huge problem in our industry – just think how much time is spent managing a rate plan for every given type of customer and booking and stay criteria! Dynamic Pricing also streamlines the number and presentation of offers to the consumer during the shopping process and ensures that hotels can meet their best rate guarantee promises.

There are a number of other issues we tackle with RezTrip 2.0 -  the hotel is better able to price, merchandise, cross-sell and up-sell the entirety of the destination experience offered at the hotel and the destination, resulting in not just more bookings, but more profitable bookings. 

The application is also built using open technologies, which is becoming increasingly advantageous. Very importantly we use Google Web Toolkit (GWT) for the User Interface. While this seemed a little risky initially, it is proving to be the right choice for a number of reasons. Aside from being a very versatile platform to develop on, it is more compatible with mobile platforms  (with our booking engine hotels won't find that mobile apps won't support their sites, the way flash-developed sites will), and capable of producing fantastic analytics about the way consumers use our engine, which of course will help us improve it over time. Also, because GWT is developed on an open source model, and is Google-backed, users of our technology will be able to reap the benefits of continual, faster evolution anchored by Google's stability.

And as I mentioned before, we've built on top of our private label booking engine search marketing and revenue management consulting services that drive more traffic to the hotel's direct website and suggest the most effective, timely offers.

For the future we have a bigger ambition than the building the best booking engine and Central Reservation System (CRS), but it is pre-mature for me to talk about it right now.

2.     How did you finance your venture?

Our company is privately owned and profitable. We finance our growth through our revenues. Initially there were a few angel investors and now we are also owned by institutional investors.

3.     In a difficult climate of uncertainty, how do you attract talents to join you adventure?

Recruiting great talent is the most critical internal activity in our company. The best way to attract talent is to show passion about building and delivering products and services to our customers better than anyone else in the market. This is surprisingly the biggest motivating factor for potential members of our team. Convincing and showing potential employees that we want to change the way hotels are priced, marketed, distributed and sold goes a long way in acquiring superior talent – even from outside the hotel industry. They're interested in being part of a venture that they see as being on the forefront of change instead of a follower--they're excited about that. 

Also, people want to make a difference, and if we can show them that at Travel Tripper they will be able to do so. That goes a long way in acquiring talent. A quality, in-depth interview process during which we actually get to know the candidates skills, interests outside work as well as personality makes them feel important and underscores the seriousness of our endeavor. We also make it a point to highlight the open and meritocratic structure of our organization, which is hugely appealing. 

And very importantly, great talent attracts more great talent.

4.     Could you explain your revenue model

We are a pay-for-performance-company. The technology component and optional revenue management services are paid for in direct proportion to the revenues generated.

Also, as I said, we provide online marketing services to drive qualified traffic to the hotel website. This effort is funded through a percentage of revenues generated for the hotel through their website. We charge no administration fee to run the search marketing campaigns.

This model is mutually beneficial for our customers as well as Travel Tripper as it creates a virtuous cycle – better online marketing generates more reservations makes more money to market the hotel which generates more reservations… until we fill the hotel.

 5.     Who gives you inspiration when you feel down whilst leading your company?

My team. I have a truly inspiring team that I hope knows me equally as a person and a boss. I often turn to them for motivation and inspiration.

a/ Fave hotel experience

I am biased towards my original employer, the Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai. The problem is I’ve only stayed there a couple of times as a guest since my parents and childhood home are also in Mumbai.

b/ Mac or PC?

I prefer Macs but at work I’m forced by my technology team to use a PC.

c/ Explorer or Firefox?

Chrome, actually.

d/ MP3 or CD?

MP3. I don’t even have a CD player

e/ Twitter or Facebook?

Facebook.

Ask the CEO (11) - Jared Salter, Joobili

Today 'Ask the CEO' features Jared Salter (@joobili) from Joobili located in Budapest, Europe.

1. What problem (s) your company is trying to solve?

If you go to nearly any travel website the first thing you're asked to do is enter your destination. But what if you don't know where you want to go? You just know you have an upcoming holiday and you want to get out of town. At Joobili, we believe the question of where is best answered by when. We are flipping the travel entry point from destination to time. You simply enter your travel dates, and we give you the best things to do and places to go specific to your travel dates.

2. How did you finance your venture?

We received a seed investment from Esther Dyson (Flickr, Orbitz, Dopplr, Delicious, etc.) and another investor, in addition to bootstrapping with our own funds.

3. In a difficult climate of uncertainty, how do you attract talents to join you adventure?

It is difficult. I think you have to convey your vision and be willing to sacrifice some equity for the right person who will push your venture forward. By the way, we are currently hiring a Lead Developer to so if any of your readers are interested have them give us a shout http://joobili.com/page/jobs/

4. Could you explain your revenue model

We have a freemium model that allows event organizers and tourism boards to list events free on Joobili.com and purchase an upgrade for premium presence and additional distribution. A place like Oulu, Finland is not going to be on any Top 100 European cities lists, but for a few days in August the Air Guitar World Championship makes Oulu a really cool weekend getaway http://bit.ly/drUgBL. Joobili's time-sensitive approach helps travelers discover these destinations. We haven't flipped the switch yet on our other revenue streams, but keep an eye out as we roll these out in the near future. That's all I'll say for now.

5. Who gives you inspiration when you feel down whilst leading your company?

Running a startup is definitely filled with highs and lows. My co-founder Tamas and I do our best to pick each other up during the lows. But at the end of the day I love what I'm doing so the thought of going back to a "regular job" is also good inspiration for pushing ahead.

a/ Fave hotel experience

Count Kalnoky's Transylvania Estate: http://www.transylvaniancastle.com/

 
b/ Mac or PC?

Both

 
c/ Explorer or Firefox?

Chrome

 
d/ MP3 or CD?

MP3

 
e/ Twitter or Facebook?

Twitter

Ask the CEO is back

Last year, Hotel Blogs interviewed 10 entrepreneurs and CEOs who try to disrupt the travel industry by bringing something new to hotels or the travel consumer.

At the end, you were thousands to vote for your best startup CEO interview and Vipe was a clear winner after intensive votes for a week.

Who will win this year? You decide. Stay tune!

Congratulations to Vipe - Ask the CEO

It has been an intense end of the week last week in terms of traffic and interaction with your votes and comments on the latest Ask the CEO competition to elect your favourite travel startups I have interviewed on Hotel Blogs.

So big thank you for participating in the contest. A bit less than 1,000 people have voted.

And Vipe - an innovative company which helps hotels to add video in their sales communication - is a clear winner of the competition with 343 votes which represents 35% of all votes.

Vipe has won a free banner on Hotel Blogs for 3 months.

Again thank you to all CEOs who participated in the interview. Looking forward to the next 10.

10 Travel StartUps CEOs, who's your favourite? - updated

 

I have conducted interviews in the last 10 weeks with 10 different CEOs with very different business models and online value proposition. Which is your favourite startup among these 10 companies in terms of usability, uniqueness, value added?

In case you need to refresh your memory, here are the links to these CEOs interviews by alphabetical order:

AboutAnywhere

ChooseToTravel

DealBase

Hotelicopter

Oyster Hotel Reviews

TicketAD/StayPlanner

TourCMS

TripBase

Trivago

Vipe

Vote now!

The startup who will get the most votes by Sunday Midnight GMT time will get a free banner on Hotel Blogs for 3 months.

Ask the CEO (10) - Jonathan Shaw, ChooseToTravel.com

Today 'Ask the CEO' features Jonathan Shaw from ChooseToTravel.com located in Malta, Europe.

1. What problem (s) your company is trying to solve?

Today's travellers are looking at an average of 6-7 sites (including destination information, guides, and booking engines) before they book their holidays.  Our mission is to reduce this number by providing destination specific travel websites.

By providing local knowledge (detailed guides, images, what to do's, etc) coupled with product (hotels, car hire, flights, tours etc) our sites aim to provide a one-stop shop for that particular destination.

We currently operate 50 such travel sites all branded under a Choose''.com domain (eg: ChooseItaly.com, ChooseDubai.com, ChooseSouthAfrica.com). We own a large stock of these domains and are currently launching 5 a month.

2. How did you finance your venture?

My IT Director and business partner Chris Knights used to live and work in Sydney and I met him there before moving to New York. In 2004 we both decided to move back to Malta and we joined forces. Malta is a tiny unique island in the middle of the Mediterranean and is a member of the EU. We enjoy a great lifestyle yet one big downfall is the lack of a VC culture in the country. Hence, we financed the start-up from our own savings and also a couple of years without much income! Nonetheless, we are working on a global project and this keeps us glued to our project!

3. In a difficult climate of uncertainty, how do you attract talents to join you adventure?

I think that in difficult times such as these and for small companies the question is not that of attracting talent but more a question of retaining talent! Both myself and my partner have a hands on approach to running the business. I think that the key is to:

1.    Create a fun and yet challenging work environment

2.    To respect your team and have an open communication channel

3.    And finally, to manage by example

4. Could you explain your revenue model

We own 100+ travel destination specific website, of which 50 have been launched. Two third of our traffic lands in our 'Guides' sections; our challenge is to convert these into bookers! We do this by offering primarily a hotel booking engine; however also generate revenue earning commission on other travel services and advertising solutions for local business.

5. Who gives you inspiration when you feel down whilst leading your company?

My greatest inspiration is my internal drive to make this venture a success. Whilst I understand the value of money and what global success can generate;  I’m also equally driven by other factors. The experience of creating something from nothing and the lows and highs of such a business journey does enrich one’s life and creates challenges. When I’m feeling down I think of the various milestones we achieved and the ones we can achieve. Having said this, Chris Knights, my business partner and his focused approach provides the bulk of this inspiration and strength.

And 5 Trivial questions...

a/ Fave hotel experience

Probably the Soho Grand in New York. It’s getting a bit tired nowadays but I stayed there last year and it really completes the Soho/New York experience.

b/ Mac or PC?

I was a PC user, switched to Mac for 4 years when living in New York (had the Soho Apple store round the corner, could not resist) but then switched to PC again 5 years ago in order to be in line with company set-up, platform and network. At the end of the day it's about getting the job done, so I'm fine with both.

c/ Explorer or Firefox?

I’m typically an Explorer user but my IT partner has recently set Firefox as my default browser. Nonetheless, I do find myself browsing in both especially when we launch new functionality on the sites.

d/ MP3 or CD?

I mostly enjoy music as long as it’s background music. I do occasionally blast on my CD’s when driving but most of the time I’m on the phone anyway. Nonetheless, when jogging the MP3 comes in handy.

e/ Twitter or Facebook?

Neither. I value Facebook more than Twitter yet I personally haven’t joined either. Too be honest my biz partner and IT team look after the social networking aspect of the business

Ask the CEO (9) - Roy Manor, TicketAD

Today 'Ask the CEO' features Roy Manor from TicketAD located in London, UK.

1. What problem (s) your company is trying to solve?

TicketAD's goal is to help travel suppliers provide their customers with
value added services and generate additional revenues. In order to help
Airlines, hotel chains and travel websites improve their service and provide
their customers with a comprehensive solution and not just with booking and
pricing for flying from point A to B, or price of staying at point B we have
built and building tools that also improves their SEO performance.

2. How did you finance your venture?

Our company is financed from 3 main investors, some of them are from "3F
Venture" (Friends, Family & Fools) and more investors are coming on board as
we are just finalising a fund raising round.

3. In a difficult climate of uncertainty, how do you attract talents to join you adventure?

Key thing for attracting a talent into your company successfully in
difficult climate but especially when you don't have enough resources to
"buy" him is selling him your idea and making him believe in the team and
the chances "to make it happen". A combination of average salary with
greater benefit in options might help in making him join and feel part of
the founders team.

4. Could you explain your revenue model

TicketAD's business model is pretty much straight forward - we are
affiliating our affiliates - we share the commissions generated by our
partner's customers.

5. Who gives you inspiration when you feel down whilst leading your company?

As an entrepreneur your most important supporter, a lot more than any other
investor, is your family and especially your wife. There a lot of ups and
downs along the way and my wife will always inspire me to keep fighting.

And 5 Trivial questions...

a/ Fave hotel experience

JK Place in Florence, Italy.

b/ Mac or PC?

Both.

c/ Explorer or Firefox?

Firefox.

d/ MP3 or CD?

MP3.

e/ Twitter or Facebook?

Facebook.