Expedia-branded websites in the U.S., the U.K., Australia and New Zealand got a makeover of their hotel information pages and the rest of the company's global websites will get similar redesigns through the first quarter of 2011.
The redesigns are geared to enable users to view all of a hotel's information without leaving the page, providing travelers with easier navigation and Expedia with enhanced conversions of lookers to bookers, says David Arron, Expedia.com's director of ecommerce for hotels.
OK, so on Expedia.com, take a look at the redesigned hotel information page for the Palace Station Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas:
Notice that the hotel price is displayed at the top right of the page and also up high is information that the hotel is located "a quarter-mile from the Strip." Previously the hotel price was much lower on the page and the precise location was harder to find.
"The number one [thing] for customers is price and location," says Arron in explaining the page's new layout.
Also prominently displayed are photos and virtual tours, a Google Map, and guest reviews and ratings.
So,compare the new hotel information pages with the "old" hotel page design, which still is available on Expedia.ca and many other country sites.
Arron explains on the prior hotel information pages on Expedia.com users had to access links to photos and virtual tours, hotel details, guest reviews, and rooms and rates in a column on the left, and then navigate to those pages -- a relatively cumbersome process.
"We wanted to bring information front and center to make it easier for customers to find," he says.
The redesign marks Expedia's most extensive use of overlays, enabling customers to access detailed hotel information without leaving the main page, Arron says.
For example, when users click on the Google Maps snippet, an overlay appears with a much larger map showing nearby points of interest. When users close the overlay, they return to the original hotel information page.
For example, here's a Google Map overlay and the main hotel information page still in the background for the Palace Station Hotel and Casino.
An overlay also appears when users access hotel photos and virtual tours and then customers can easily return to the original page.
Arron says Expedia refers to the overlay as a "div layer," with users technically still on the original page.
"One of the big marching orders we had with this was scanability," Arron says, referring to the fact that users now can easily view all of a hotel's information on one page.
One of the ways Expedia accomplishes this is with category views, such as for Property Amenities, which expand for more detailed information or collapse for a smaller summary.
Another new wrinkle in the redesign is that Expedia gives customers the option of viewing all of the guest reviews -- 710 critiques for the Palace Station Hotel and Casino, for instance -- for a property while it previously limited the coverage to 25 reviews per hotel.
Arron says Expedia made the change about a month ago.
The expanded number of viewable reviews gives customers more information if they choose to peruse all of the content and helps Expedia.com in its SEO efforts, Arron says.
Expedia.com already is seeing improved hotel conversions from the hotel information redesign, Arron says, while declining to provide specifics.
PhoCusWright's Online Traffic Conversion Report, September 2009, cited Compete statistics showing that Priceline's hotel conversion rate in June 2009 was 7% compared with 4% at Expedia and 3% at Travelocity.
Expedia presumably hopes the redesign would help close the gap.
The redesign is fully launched on Expedia-branded websites in the U.S., the U.K., Australia and New Zealand after undergoing testing over the last couple of months, and will be deployed globally on the other Expedia websites through the first quarter of 2011, Arron adds.
The new layout also will be integrated into Vacation Packages/Package Holidays pages on Expedia websites around the world, he says.