Breaking Deals Starting January 8th
Looking for some cheap airfare to a beach? How about FREE? Voyage.tv has a Companion Fly Free Promotion to do just that. Book now for travel through June 23 and you’ll receive an Instant Air Credit of up to $400 off of your total package price for stays of 4 nights or longer when you bring someone along. Since airfare varies nationwide across the contiguous 48 states, the Instant Air Credit will vary accordingly:
West Coast: $400 Instant Credit from CA, OR or WA on 4 nights or longer.
East & Central: $300 Instant Credit on 4 nights or longer.
Florida Only: $200 Instant Credit on 3 nights or longer.
Blackout Dates: March 19-April 18.
This Instant Air Credit is already on top of great deals at some of our favorite hotels like Atlantis, Sandals Royal Bahamian and Sheraton Nassau. Just book your complete air+land package on Voyage.tv and the Instant Air Credit will be deducted from the applicable package price. Book now and see why it’s Way Better in the Bahamas!
Breaking Deals starting December 11th
Just in!
Our best last minute deal is to the all-inclusive RIU Paradise Island in the Bahamas. Travel before 12/23 and receive a free upgrade and a $25 spa credit! The RIU has a great beachfront location and is within walking distance of the casinos and shops on Paradise Island, Nassau’s premier resort area. Prices start at $559 with air from Miami, and there are plenty of airfare connections from other major cities such as New York, Philadephia, Atlanta and Charlotte for an additional fee.
Winter Week in the Sun
The St. Kitts Marriott has a great winter deal: Stay 7 nights and pay for only 4–the 5th, 6th and 7th nights are free! Packages start from $1310 per person from New York. St. Kitts is one of the lesser-known Caribbean islands and has maintained an island feel that has evaded the commercialization of so many islands. From the green hills and peaks of the island to the stunning beaches, this is a great new discovery for the Caribbean traveler!
Breaking Deals starting December 4th
Our best deal this week is a 40% Off Sale in Aruba at the Renaissance Aruba Resort & Casino for winter travel. The Renaissance is the only hotel in Aruba that features a private island beach, Renaissance Island. A private water taxi picks you up in the main lobby of the hotel and takes you out to the island that features a family section and an adults-only beach. There is also a restaurant with beach bar, outdoor spa services, fitness area and a wildlife preserve where pink flamingoes wander along the water’s edge. The main hotel is located right in the center of Oranjestad so there are many restaurants, bars, and shopping boutiques all within walking distance–saving a lot on taxi fare. The 40% off sale is valid for travel Jan – April 2010.
What are you doing for the Super Bowl this year? We’ve found a great warm place to enjoy the Big Game on the beach in Barbados: Almond Beach Village is offering special 50% off savings for the weekend of Feb. 4-8, 2010. Not only is it fun to be in sun for the game, but the resort is all-inclusive: Meals, drinks and activities are included in the room price! Almond Beach Village has also invited former NFL stars so the weekend should be amazing with special events and activities. Barbados has a new daily Jet Blue flight from JFK as well as lots of connections on American Airlines, Delta and US Airways. Space is limited so book soon to save 50%.
Finally, we love the cool, classic charm of Bermuda which is only a 2-hour flight from New York, Boston or Atlanta. Winter is actually value season here, with mild temperatures that are perfect for golf, tennis or zipping around on a rented scooter to inspect the numerous pink sand beaches (Keep to the left, please–it’s still a British island!) Where to stay: The Fairmont Southampton offers a 4th night free now through March 21. The resort’s signature Willow Stream Spa is one of the finest in the Caribbean and features a glass-enclosed swimming pool and sundeck with panoramic views of the island and ocean.
–Kevin Matier, Commercial Director
Design Directions
Voyage.tv has been “live” since August. As with any new idea, we have learned a lot and we are beginning to think about how we incorporate those learnings into the design of the site, so as to improve the experience.
Our learnings are that 1) people like the content; 2) see value in having a variety of different but related content (e.g. hotel videos or points of interest videos); and 3) that the getting around the site is generally OK.
We have also learned that when user first land on the site they aren’t really sure what it is exactly. They know that it relates to travel, but the combination of original video, a booking engine and travel deals is a combination that they have not previously encountered. This results in most visitors bookmarking the site and then returning later in the day to explore the site (on any given day 50% of visits are same day return visitors).
We have been thinking about this and working on a number of alternative designs that might better communicate what Voyage.tv is all about. We wanted to share this with you and ask you for your thoughts. You can email them to us at Customerservice@voyage.tv. –MJM
Engagement Is The Objective
Voyage.tv is about finding experiences that we believe our Members will find interesting and creating programming around them. Is it working?
I thought the attached slide that Tedd presented at the PhocusWright Technology Conference in Orlando this week is worth sharing. It shows that Voyage.tv is generating significant time on site for new visitors (most of our visitors are new given how young we are!). It’s pretty cool. –MJM
Notes From Production: Shooting Our New Retail Show!
Now that our New York City cycle has launched, our next exciting project is already in the pipeline! This week we shot the pilot for our new Weekly Travel Video Deals show. The production, commercial and editing departments have been working very hard for the past few weeks to create a show that will highlight the must-see travel deals around the world. Itching to get away? Watch for vacation ideas that range from a day at the beach with pink flamingos at the Renaissance Hotel in Aruba to a night at the famous Egyptian-themed Luxor hotel in Vegas. The choices are truly endless! We know staring at videos of white sandy beaches all week has made us want to hop on a plane to sip Caribbean cocktails in the sun and the travel deals make it so tempting. But alas, back to work so we can bring the deals to you. Be sure to watch!
Travel Video: The Next Big Thing
Earlier this week I had the opportunity of presenting at the Phocuswright ’09 Conference in Orlando as part of the Travel Innovation Summit. Nearly 1,000 people attend this conference every year geared towards the leaders of the travel industry – a great opportunity to showcase the amazing things the team is doing here at Voyage.tv, to get the word out.
Sometimes, though it’s better to have a third-party state your case for you, and in this case we were fortunate to have Google and YouTube present video as “The Next Big Thing” for the travel industry. While most of us know that video — and in particular online video – is mainstream, it still remains somewhat futuristic for an industry used to data entry (think keywords and destinations entered into text boxes) as the place for travel discovery to begin.
At Voyage.tv we think video is a disruptive technology that will revolutionize the way travel discovery happens. Think about it, wouldn’t you rather let your interests guide you to a fantastic place, viewing bite-sized segments about a destination rather than hunting and pecking around the web for ideas?
That was part of the gist of our message, and the Google/YouTube presentation underscored and truly validated our approach to the marketplace and what we’re about. Their studies show that a majority of all travelers – some 56% — view video before making travel purchase decisions. This is an amazing statistic considering how few sites have actually embraced the medium, and it shows that we are indeed creating something that our viewers appreciate.
That’s a quick update for now – we’ll post the video of my presentation so you can follow along and understand better how we are out to make the travel discovery process more exciting, engaging and enjoyable than ever before. Now enough reading, go check out some of The World’s Best Travel Programs on Voyage.tv! – Tedd Evers, Chief Revenue Officer
A Few Changes With this Week’s Technical Release
There is a lot going on the technical front. Let me update you.
We released a new version of Voyage.tv today which resolves some of the bugs that we discovered after the release in late October. We tested rigorously for 5 days prior to the release, but we still encountered a couple of minor issues.
Specifically, we have fixed the issues with top 4 thumbnails on the Deals page and have cleaned up some alignment issues on the Home Page. We have also brought the H1 headline into conformity with our graphics standards.
If you are a frequent visitor to the site, you will see that we are adding new pages for each of the Signature Videos, as well as for Hotels. The idea is to have a landing page for each of the Signature Programs or Hotel videos that a Member can land on, grab an embed code or simply bookmark a page.
We hope the changes enhance the usability of the site.
Our next release is scheduled for mid December and is focused on improving the presentation of the Hotel Page, the Special Offers Pages and some of the interior pages. The main change to the Hotel Page is the move to an embedded video player on the page. We have found that having a pop-up player on the Hotel Page is not working well for many users as it is taking hem away from much of the surrounding information.
We are also re-working the Special Offers page to improve the information presented and to highlight the main “selling points” around the offer. You will see some great new page layouts on both the Hotel Page and the Special Offers Page.
There will also be some new pages available – we have created a Points of Interest Page for the POI videos that we are launching with the New York Cycle. You will also that we have changed the interior pages to make them a bit easier to navigate.
Outside of the Voyage.tv site, we continue to work on extending the availability of our programming and hotel clips. We have a new YouTube Channel that we are launching in early December in partnership with YouTube and have a revamped FaceBook Page that will be available about the same time. We are also working on the launch of several iPhone applications in January.
Stay tuned! –MJM
Now On Voyage.tv: POIs!
Last week, our production group announced our new POI or Point of Interest videos will be debuting on voyage.tv with the New York program cycle. We’re excited to announce they are finally here! Here’s some video of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Brooklyn Bridge and Time Warner Center:
Check out more POIs, including video on the Statue of Liberty and Washington Square Park here
There’s Still Time To Save $250 On Any 5-Night Booking To The Caribbean!
Our Caribbean Luxury For Less 5 Night packages are still on sale at voyage.tv, which means there’s still time to save $250 with our FALL250 promo code! To highlight a couple of especially attractive packages:
5 nights at the ALL-INCLUSIVE Iberostar Punta Cana is $639 with air from NYC!
A 5-Night Escape to Renaissance Curacao for $939 with airfare from NYC!
but these packages are just as great from anywhere in the country! Just enter your home city and book away!
And the best part is, they all qualify for an additional $250 savings of our list price, and you can travel from now through May 2010!
Be sure to enter FALL250 in the promo code box at checkout.
View & Book now on voyage.tv before the deals sell out!
Recent Comments