TheHotelGuru was languishing in the widening pit of hotel content sites on the web until WorldReviewer came along with a plan to reinvigorate it as part of a wider reorganisation of its hotel strategy.
WorldReviewer has taken an undisclosed 50% stake in the company and plans to relaunch the brand in February with a focus on providing exclusive editorial content and consumer-focused lists.
James Dunford-Wood, co-founder of WorldReviewer, says relaunching TheHotelGuru on the WR platform will be the start of a series of projects to boost the site and provide a hotel system for WorldReviewer.
TheHotelGuru was run by well known UK travel writer Fiona Duncan until the acquisition. She will stay on board to coordinate editorial content, but WorldReviewer will now effectively operate the sales, functionality and content management system through its own technology.
Dunford-Wood admits WorldReviewer has "struggled with hotels" since its launch but hopes having an offshoot brand to provide content and listings will give the accommodation part of the site a new lease of life.
WorldReviewer hopes to eventually run a hotel booking system through TheHotelGuru which by extension will power the hotel section on the main site.
TheHotelGuru, Dunford-Wood says, will pen content about hotels regardless of whether the property eventually signs commercial deals with it - an area, he says, many hotel content sites have failed to do.
WorldReviewer will also work on a trip planning widget in 2010.
The acquisition of the 50% stake has also brought about a change in corporate identity with WorldReviewer, its ad serving system AdNet and TheHoteGuru now coming under the broader banner of James Media.
Dunford-Wood's co-founders are Al James and James Blackwell.