| Documents > Reports > Hotel industry (November 2000) |
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| Preliminary report |
| 16 websites scanned
- Date: November 7-15-17, 2000: |
Epsom Manotel -
Beau Rivage - Rhône - Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza - Intercontinental
- La Réserve - Noga Hilton -
Penta Forum Park - Président Wilson - Ramada - Bergues
- Bristol - Cigogne - Richemond - Armures - Tiffany |
| 1. General aspects: |
| 1.1. Search engine
visibility - Test: Yahoo, Altavista: |
| Compared to the other sectors
of activity already analyzed, the Geneva 'luxury' hotels are
fairly well referenced in search engines. It was one of the
first industry to understand the advantages Internet would represent;
thus explaining why, within the 10 most visited websites in
Switzerland, we find a large number of hotels - but not necessarily
those in Geneva... |
| Research with the following combinations |
Altavista |
Yahoo |
+hotel +genève
+hotel +Genève
+hôtel +genève
+hôtel +Genève
+hotel +geneva
+hotel +Geneva
|
4
3
4
4
4
3
|
4
4
2
2
4
4
|
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| 1.2. Websites compatibility
with browsers: |
| This analysis will be performed
upon request... |
2. Ease of download: |
| Once more, the average
amount of slow pages on the scanned sites stands between 30
and 40%... still nothing is made for Internet surfers in this
area! Please remember that they are seeking more for information
than for images (especially those of rooms!), even though this
aspect is valuable for potential clients. It is far more important
for them to quickly access the information they need, before
"having the possibility" to see various pictures - such as the
Alps or the look of a junior suite - by clicking on a specific
link, leading to photos of higher resolution. |
| 3. Ease of use: |
| 3.1. Broken links: |
As for the real estate
industry, we noted that the number of broken links is very low.
What does it mean? On the one hand - internally - that the sites
are well managed (regular checks and clean-ups), bringing to
a minimum the number of bugs which could occur while surfing
on a site (one good point!). On the other hand - externally
- it shows that these websites are not connected to others;
i.e. they are functioning like islands ignoring one another
- which is the exact opposite of the Web purpose - therefore
becoming invisible for the search engines which pick up sites
ONLY with regards to the number of links they have with other
sites having a similar content (e.g. Google).
Moreover, the most important argument is that broken links frustrate
your audiences/customers and make you look bad... |
| |
| 3.2. Attributes: |
An attribute consists
of tags (information) regarding the height, width and alt (alternative
text description for an object) of an image on a webpage. Adding
these tags decreases the time needed for a browser to render
a page when requested.
Furthermore, an alt tag (name) allows to reduces "further" surfing
difficulties; i.e. for even slightly disabled people or for
users with the 'image function' turned off.
Here, missing attributes represent 40% - situation that could
be rather easily improved... Yet, if adding an alt tag is technically
VERY easy, think about the amount of patience needed when it
comes to searching for every single image over hundreds or thousands
of objects!!!...
Needless to say the more detailed a project is planned, the
less amendments to be made later... |
| 4. High quality
content: |
| It is rather difficult
to make an overall comment. Nevertheless, all sites present
a similar structure (extremely customer-oriented), where it
seems almost always possible to make a reservation - but this
has not been tested yet. The only disappointment is that not
much information is offered to other "surfers" apart from clients;
e.g. potential employees or suppliers. |
| 5. Frequent updates: |
Generally speaking, approx. 20%
of the pages are more than 4 months old… Part of the content
seems to be updated on a regular basis - like special offers
- which demonstrates the industry has well understood that a
website must be "lively" for Internet surfers to return to it.
Besides, the software used to perform this analysis determines
the 'last modification date' by reading the header codes returned
by the server when a page is requested. So, websites setting
the 'date of the day' instead of the 'last modification date'
of a page render the test impossible; i.e. some pages might
be 'old' but they are not visible... we therefore cannot establish
which elements should be 'updated' on the related sites.
However, what should be kept in mind is that updated information
increases recurrent traffic, customer satisfaction and therefore
helps building trust! - in addition to the fact that old content
should be examined to ensure it is still relevant!?!... for
instance, it was rather 'interesting' to fall upon one of May's
'menu of the day', while we are already in November!!! |
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