With the release of the Google Trips app for Android and iPhone earlier this week, I decided to plan and visit London using the latest offering from the search engine giant to see what opportunities exist for local businesses and their marketing teams.
Google Trips functions as a personalized tour guide in your pocket. Historically, people might have used a paid tour guide or a tour book. Now, you can save money with Google’s free Trips app. You can even download your destination before you go, reducing your reliance on WiFi while moving around the city. The app is available on Android and iOS.
In their press release, Google stated they wanted to alleviate the stress that many people experience when planning their holidays. A GoodThink study found that 74% of travelers are most stressed when dealing with trip details—transportation, activities, unfamiliar locations, etc.
Here’s How I Got on With the New App
The first eye-opener on the app is that Google aggregates data from Gmail emails and reminds me of previous holiday trips. It also automatically creates trips based on travel information in your Gmail account—flight confirmation, hotel bookings, restaurant reservations, etc. Google already knows I will be in Berlin, Germany next month!
Day Plan
Ahead of your trip, you can instantly plan each day of your holiday with just a few taps.
The app contains significant information, picked up from Google Knowledge Graph and manually edited by Google staff. Each city has different sections. For example, London has Literary London, Art Destinations, Historic London, Posh Shops, Local Favourites, Wartime London, Vintage Shopping, Gothic Churches, and Quirky Museums. While Paris has Revolutionary Paris, Small Museums, Impressionist Art, Cutting-Edge Art, Parks & Gardens, Haute Shopping, Vintage Shopping, Food Shopping, Local Favorites, and Selfie Spots.
Interestingly, there is no Selfie Spots section for London!
The app cleverly estimates motorway delays and discovers when restaurants are most busy by leveraging its Knowledge Graph to determine popular places and activities for tourists.
You can plan all of your sightseeing in advance with maps and directions, distances, and walking times between landmarks, and download your day plan so you don’t need to worry about WiFi bills once you arrive.
Select from either pre-defined Google day plan suggestions (based on other visitors’ historic data) or create your own day plan.
The + button in the screenshot above allows you to see other attractions nearby.
Opportunities for Businesses
For the top 200 cities in the world (according to Google), Google Trips offers a variety of Day Plans, Reservations, Things to Do, Food & Drink, and more, all at your fingertips. For those outside the top 200, Google Local Listings are still available.
With a Food & Drink section, there is ample opportunity for restaurants, bars, cafes, and such to appear when visitors are both planning their trip or while they’re close by.
This means that completing your Local Listing correctly and securing positive reviews is crucial for your business.
While in London, the search results for restaurants and cafes all returned establishments with ratings of 4.0 or higher and at least 40 reviews. This demonstrates that the number and quality of reviews significantly impact your ranking.
In villages outside of London, restaurants and cafes showed ratings as low as 3.5, highlighting less competition there.
Location is another crucial factor. Ensure your Local Listings page is completed accurately and thoroughly to appear in both Google Maps and Google Trips.
Google has previously published a guide to improving your ranking in local results—Relevance, Distance, and Prominence.
They also state in their Local ranking guidelines that information from links, articles, directories, reviews, and positive ratings influences your position in web results. It is reasonable to assume this will be similar for Google Trips as well.
Google Trips is essentially a free version of TripIt. User reviews and Google’s historic data make it an excellent tool for tourists. The app’s potential popularity could make ranking in Local Results more crucial than ever for small businesses and chains alike.
Image Credits
Featured Image: itchaz.gmail.com/DepositPhotos.com
In-post Photos: Screenshots by Barrie Smith taken Sept 2016
